March 14: Deeper Virtue

In Matthew 5, 20-26, we read, “Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees. you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” Another translation says, “Unless your virtue goes deeper than that of the scribes and Pharisees….” Jesus is not adding more rules to the multitude of rules that the scribes and Pharisees deduced from the Law; rather He approaches everything from a deeper level.

One may own thousands of acres of land, for example, but if they are just barren rock the person will starve, because nothing will grow there. Where there is no depth of soil, the seed comes to nothing (Mark 4, 5). And likewise when our actions do not spring from a deep life of virtue, they wither before they can bear any fruit.

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The renewal that this Lenten season calls for is not something we can bring about on our own. We need the Holy Spirit to work that kind of deep transformation within ourselves. A traditional prayer puts it very clearly: “Come Holy Spirit, fill our hearts, and kindle in us the fire of your love.” It is a prayer that calls on the Holy Spirit to recreate deep within us the love that shaped the person of Jesus; it prays for the roots of that “deeper virtue” – which is what God really wants for us.