Commentary on the readings for Sunday, July 26, 2026:
1 Kings 3:5.7-12; Romans 8:28-30; Matthew 13:44-52
Can we truly say that we are all saved? Or will there be, as the text of Romans 8:28-29 says, some who will be saved and others who will be condemned? A complex question that confronts us and which has been subject to many debates throughout Church history. When Paul speaks of this issue, he has in mind his own conviction that God only desires full life for us. And in this Pauline sense of God’s project, he understands the horizon to which we are predestined: “to be like the image of his Son,” which is nothing other than the “glorification” of our complete life. That is, through the incarnation, death, and resurrection of the Son, we access new life, a new time, a situation, a Kingdom that has new relationships and norms.
This is not about a judgment in which the good will be saved and the bad separated; it is about God’s desire for us to live in fullness, in a new situation, for ourselves and for all creation, where life is lived with justice and peace. God desires this plan for us, but it is not a given project. On the contrary, that project awaits our intervention, human creativity, the transformation of the material, of the mundane, of the historical that has become culture, so that it may resemble that initial goal of the Kingdom’s project: harmony and love for brothers and sisters.
God does have a design for us, certainly! That we love each other, and that this transforms our bodies and our lives—that is, that we “glorify ourselves.” No one can separate us from this project; no one can tear away that horizon of harmony. At the end of the letter to the Romans, Paul affirms: “no one will be able to separate us from the love of God” (Rom 8:39).
In this sense, we can speak of the parables in Matthew 13:44-52 as a gift that cannot be renounced. Jesus masterfully compares the kingdom with everyday things, so small, yet so valuable to us… a man who sells what he has to acquire a field containing a treasure or a merchant who sells other jewels to keep a pearl of special value. The two parables underscore one idea: the project of the Kingdom is more valuable than any other worldly project. The question is whether we discover the treasure in our daily lives and are able to make the decision to claim it as ours. Discovery and discernment are the steps preceding glorification.
However, we will not say that it is an easy situation. It is a risky decision. Will the pearl of great value truly be worth it? Will the sacrifice of leaving everything for the treasure lead to a good outcome? Is it wise to take this gamble on a Kingdom yet to come? Here Jesus gives us the key in the parables themselves: the gamble is wisdom and courage at the same time, we would say in simple words, a leap into the void toward God, a confident action that God fulfills that destiny, the total fullness of human being.
Wisdom and courage, learning to discover and learning to take risks, two ways of facing the world, two actions that go together. Putting them into practice in daily life, putting our five senses, life itself, into God’s project for us and the world. The Kingdom is within reach of everyone, but not everyone dares to take the step with wisdom. It requires taking a risk… and trusting.