That Which Was Wanting on Your Part, They Have Supplied
A Reflection on the Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Beloved in Christ,
There are names in the Scriptures which almost everyone remembers. There are others which we have heard many times without ever quite noticing: Stephanas. Fortunatus. Achaicus.
They appear near the end of Saint Paul’s First Epistle to the Corinthians, in the Apostolic reading appointed for this Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost. They are not introduced with great titles. We are told of no miracles which they performed, no books which they wrote, no extraordinary revelations which they received. Saint Paul simply tells the Corinthians that their coming had made him glad.
And then he explains why: “Because that which was wanting on your part, they have supplied. For they have refreshed both my spirit and yours. Know them, therefore, that are such.”
It is an easily overlooked sentence in an easily overlooked part of the Epistle. Yet there is something worth inspecting within those few words: Something was wanting. And then somebody supplied it.
In these few words, we can discern a great deal of the practical Christian life.
Now , we naturally notice the great things. We remember the martyr who gives his life, the missionary who carries the Gospel into a strange country, the teacher who defends the Faith, the ascetic whose holiness astonishes those around him. The Church rightly preserves their memories and sets their examples before us.
But most of the work by which Christian life continues from one day to another does not look like that. More often, something is wanting, someone stands in need. Someone notices. And someone supplies it.
A person is lonely, and someone visits. A task has been left unfinished, and someone quietly completes it. A family has fallen upon difficult circumstances, and someone provides what is needed. A church must be cleaned, a meal prepared, a journey made, a letter written, a sick person remembered, a grieving person accompanied, a candle lit, a prayer offered. Someone is exhausted, and another takes up a little of the burden.
None of these things seems particularly heroic while it is being done. Very often no one even notices.
But Saint Paul noticed.
He speaks first of the house of Stephanas, who “have dedicated themselves to the ministry of the saints.” This expression is worth pondering. For the house of Stephanas had not merely performed an occasional charitable act when circumstances happened to make it convenient. Rather, they had given themselves to service. They had acquired the habit of looking beyond themselves and asking what was needed.
Then came Stephanas, Fortunatus, and Achaicus themselves. Whatever precisely they had done for the Apostle, Saint Paul describes its effect in wonderfully simple terms: “They have refreshed my spirit,” for even an Apostle needed refreshing.
Saint Paul, who endured prisons, beatings, shipwreck, hunger, persecution, controversy, betrayal, and the constant care of the churches, could still be strengthened by the arrival of a few faithful Christians who brought with them what had been lacking.
We all can find some true comfort in this. Christianity does not require us to imagine that strength means never needing anything from anyone. The Apostle himself received consolation. Others supplied what he lacked. Their service did not diminish him; it strengthened him for the service which was his own.
This is one of the ways in which the Church actually lives.
We speak rightly of the Church as the Body of Christ. Yet that doctrine becomes wonderfully concrete in passages such as this one. A body does not require every member to perform every function. It requires each member to do what belongs to it, and thus to supply what another cannot. The Christian life is therefore not a competition in self-sufficiency. We truly do need one another, for there will always be something wanting on our part.
This is true even of the most faithful among us. No one possesses every gift. No one sees every need. No one has unlimited strength, unlimited time, unlimited resources. There are prayers we forget to say, burdens we cannot carry, tasks we cannot finish, people whom we cannot reach. Even when the spirit is willing, human weakness imposes its limits.
And so often, God supplies what is wanting through another person.
This ought to teach us humility when we receive and attentiveness when we give.
It is sometimes easier to perform an act of charity than to admit that we need one. We may gladly carry another person’s burden while quietly resenting the discovery that someone else must occasionally carry ours. Yet the communion of the Church requires both. Stephanas, Fortunatus, and Achaicus could supply what was wanting precisely because Saint Paul was willing to receive what they brought.
At another time the roles would be reversed.
Today I may be the one who strengthens another. Tomorrow I may be the one who must be strengthened. Today I may have enough to give. Tomorrow I may discover my own poverty. And truly, this is one of the reasons Christian community exists.
And perhaps this is why also Saint Paul adds an instruction which might otherwise seem unnecessary: “Know them, therefore, that are such.”
Notice such people. Learn to recognize them. Not merely the conspicuous people. Not merely those whose names are widely known. Notice the ones who have quietly dedicated themselves to the ministry of the saints. Notice the person who habitually arrives when something needs doing. Notice the one who remembers the forgotten. Notice the one who gives without making his generosity a spectacle. Notice the one whose presence somehow leaves others refreshed rather than exhausted.
The world has its own measures of importance. It notices prominence, influence, achievement, wealth, novelty, and power. We, as members of the Church, must learn another way of seeing.
Saint Paul looks at three men whose names would otherwise have disappeared into the immense obscurity of the first century and says, in effect: Remember these men. They supplied what was lacking. They refreshed us.
Because the Apostle remembered them, the Church has been speaking their names for nearly two thousand years.
There is also an important lesson here for anyone who wonders what he or she can possibly contribute.
The needs of the world are enormous. The needs of the Church can seem enormous. Faced with them, an ordinary Christian may easily conclude that he or she possesses neither the talents nor the opportunities to accomplish anything significant.
But perhaps that is the wrong question. We need not always ask, “What great thing can I do?” Sometimes it is enough to ask: What is wanting here? What is lacking in the place where Providence has actually put me? Who needs encouragement? What task has everyone assumed someone else will perform? Who has quietly disappeared from view? What burden has become too heavy for another person? What good thing has been neglected simply because nobody has yet taken responsibility for it?
The answer may be something very small. So was the cup of cold water of which the Lord spoke.
The greatness of Christian service does not depend upon the greatness of the task. It depends upon charity.
And Saint Paul has already given us the rule in the same Apostolic lesson: “Let all your things be done in charity.” Not some things. Not merely explicitly religious things. Not merely the things which will be noticed. All your things.
The Christian who learns to live in this way begins to see the world differently. Instead of continually asking what others ought to be doing, he becomes attentive to what has been left undone. Instead of measuring whether a task is worthy of his abilities, he asks whether it needs doing. Instead of waiting for an opportunity to accomplish something impressive, he becomes available for the ordinary opportunities which Providence continually places before him.
Such a life may never look remarkable. It may consist almost entirely of small acts which seemingly disappear as soon as they are performed. But the Kingdom of God has always contained such hidden labor.
Someone prepared the room. Someone carried the message. Someone fed the traveler. Someone opened his house to the Church. Someone cared for the sick. Someone buried the dead. Someone copied the manuscript. Someone taught the child. Someone kept the lamp burning. Quite simply: Someone supplied what was wanting.
And through such things the life of the Church continues.
Perhaps this is why the closing lines of First Corinthians feel so different when we linger over them. What can initially seem like a collection of greetings becomes a glimpse of the Church as Saint Paul actually knew her: households, friendships, journeys, labor, hospitality, mutual dependence, people strengthening one another across distances.
“The churches of Asia salute you.” “Aquila and Priscilla salute you much in the Lord, with the church that is in their house.” “All the brethren salute you.”
And among them stand Stephanas, Fortunatus, and Achaicus.
They did not do everything; they did what was needed. They supplied what was wanting. They refreshed the spirit of an Apostle.
And Saint Paul tells us still, to this very day: Know them, therefore, that are such.
30 August 2026