31A.   Malachi 1:14-2:2b, 8-10.  God comes in this reading in divine authority and omnipotence to challenge the Hebrew priests who have been unfaithful to his covenant, the covenant made with their fathers (ancestors).  Their unfaithful leadership has caused many followers to no longer follow God’s ways.  They have become contemptible and base in God’s eyes for using their responsibility of leadership to lead the people away from God and God’s covenant.

Matthew 23:1-12, Jesus recognizes that the scribes and Pharisees, receiving their authority as successors to Moses, have the right to command observance of their teachings but not the right to have the people imitate their actions.  As Jesus says in this gospel, “For they preach but they do not practice.”  “All their works are performed to be seen.”  “They love places of honor.”  In their actions they seek to give glory to themselves, not to God.  Jesus preaches not to seek to be addressed by terms of respect as a way of seeking honor for oneself but not for God.  Jesus says, “The greatest among you must be your servant,” as a way of serving God by humbly serving one another and not be the one who wants to be exalted above others and in others’ eyes.  The position of authority they have received is to serve others and not themselves.

1 Thessalonians 2:7b-9, 13.  Paul in the first reading starts off, “We were gentle among you, as a nursing mother cares for her children.  With such affection for you, we were determined to share with you not only the gospel of God, but our very selves as well, so dearly beloved had you become to us.”  Paul, along with his fellow missionaries, Timothy and Silvanus, emphasizes the depths of their love for the Thessalonians in sharing the nurturing milk of life-giving Gospel of the Lord.  In sharing the gospel they were giving some of the life force that was their life too.  So much did they give of themselves that they depended not on the Thessalonians for material support but, “working day and night in order not to burden any of” them, they supported themselves.  “In receiving the word of God from hearing” them, they “received not a human word but, as it truly is, the word of God, which” continued to work in them to build them up to be the people of God.  The gospel of God, which is the good news of Jesus, who is the way, the truth and the life within us, was so much a part of the people  Paul, Silvanus and Timothy had become, that in sharing it they were sharing something of themselves as a mother shares the milk from her breast.