SCRIPTURE READINGS
Fifteenth Sunday, July 19, 2026 

Biblical Readings Online Here 
(Year A in the three-year cycle of readings)  

Wisdom of Solomon was written in Greek sometime in the late first century BCE or early first century CE to encourage the Jewish community, probably in Alexandria, to be confident of God’s governance in a particularly difficult time. Today’s passage comes in the third part of this book. Part I described how wisdom, the hidden energy of the world, protects the child of God. Part II shows what wisdom is and how to attain it. Part III shifts the perspective by speaking of God rather than wisdom and naming God as the one whose wisdom guides and protects Israel, the righteous child preeminently. 

Part III also contains two excursuses relevant to the theme of God’s governance, explaining how power and mercy are inextricably combined in God’s rule, even with regard to nations and whose practices are abhorrent to Israel.

Today’s passage gives the reason for God’s power-with-patience approach. It comes from God’s loving commitment to creation and willingness to give humans the opportunity to repent and be renewed (11:23-12:2). Not all religious thinkers of the time were so positive regarding God’s abiding commitment and the possibility of human renewal. Some members of a Jewish sect, authors of the Dead Sea Scrolls and with some similarities to Jesus’s followers, for example, viewed outsiders with harshness and suspicion and emphasized divine punishment.

Romans 8:26-27 looks at divine governance in a more intimate and individual way. The powerful Spirit strengthens Christians and makes it possible for their prayer to be heard. The Gospel passage from Matthew 13 combines something of both perspectives in comparing soil receiving a seed to an individual hearing the word. Divine rule is implied in that God waits patiently for the word to germinate in each person’s heart.

Some Christians today are uncomfortable with God’s patience. Today’s reading may help everyone see that God’s power is exercised with compassion and restraint to allow time for human beings to reflect and to change. 

Richard Clifford, S.J., has taught biblical studies for 55 years, most recently at the Clough School of Theology and Ministry, Boston College, and has written many scholarly and popular books and articles.