2nd. Sunday of Year (A).
(Isaiah
49:3, 5-6; 1st. Corinthians 1:1-3; John 1:29-34)
In the first reading, taken from the book of the prophet
Isaiah, we heard that God, speaking immediately to His Chosen People but
ultimately embracing His promised Messiah, had said:
It is too little for
you to be my servant, to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and restore the
survivors of Israel; I will make you a light to the nations, that my salvation
may reach to the ends of the earth.
Out of all the nations on earth, God had specially chosen,
cherished and taught, one people, which became known as Israel. By the time of Isaiah that teaching and
cherishing had been ongoing for over a thousand years, and Isaiah himself was
one of a line of prophets sent by God to His Chosen People to form it into a servant
worthy and able to take God’s Name and His saving Word to the whole world. Israel could not be the definitive Servant of
God’s salvation because she herself, in her degree, shared in and was wounded
by the sin of the world. Nevertheless, she would be the stock from which that ultimate
Servant of God would rise Who would be uniquely able to fittingly reveal the
Name, manifest and proclaim the Word, and show Himself to be the Salvation, of Israel’s
God for the good of all mankind.
By means of the Old Testament covenant with Israel God did
ultimately prepare a people able to bring forth the wondrously holy and
sublimely beautiful Mary of Nazareth, of whom we read in the Song of Songs
(2:1):
I am the rose of
Sharon, and the lily of the valleys, a lily among thorns.
Uniquely adorned with true and God-rejoicing humility, she
it was who would welcome, endow with human flesh and blood, nurture and
bring up, the Son and Servant of God that He might become the Son-of-man foreshadowed
in the prophecy of Isaiah:
Let justice descend, O heavens,
like dew from above, like gentle rain let the skies drop it down. Let the earth open and salvation bud forth. (45:8)
In Jesus – Son of God, become Son of Mary and Son of Man --
not only the Chosen People are called to become children of God in the well-beloved
Son, but also the Gentiles -- who for millennia had walked in darkness and
lived under the shadow of death -- are to be evangelized, invited, and empowered,
to turn from their former ways and embrace the Good News of Jesus brought to
them by His universal Church founded upon the Apostles. The proclamation of the New Testament is,
indeed, God’s offer of salvation to all nations through faith in Jesus, the
Spirit-anointed-Saviour Who brings glory
to God in the Highest and on earth peace to men of goodwill. For mankind is to become one again in Jesus; sharing,
as adopted children, a common heritage in the Kingdom of the Father, a heritage
which the only-begotten-Son has won for them by shedding His blood on the Cross
of Calvary before rising again on the third day; a heritage for which the
Spirit bequeathed by Jesus will prepare them.
We should be filled with gratitude, People of God, as we
think on this: God trained the Jewish people for 2000 years, and then, in His
immense mercy and goodness, put us -- in Jesus -- alongside and together with
those He had chosen and cherished for so long!!
As St. Paul told the Christians of Rome (11:16-17):
If the root is holy, then the
branches also are holy. And you, a wild olive shoot, were grafted in to share
the rich root of the olive tree.
Let us now turn to today’s Gospel passage where you heard
John the Baptist, the fore-runner of the promised Messiah, revealing Jesus to
the Jewish people:
“I did not know Him, but the
reason why I came baptizing with water was that He might be made known to
Israel.” John testified further, saying,
“I saw the Spirit come down like a dove from the sky and remain upon Him. I did
not know Him, but the One who sent me to baptize with water told me, ‘On
whomever you see the Spirit come down and remain, He is the one who will
baptize with the Holy Spirit.’ Now I
have seen and testified that He is the Son of God.”
You remember the scene when Jesus was coming up from the
waters of the Jordan used by John for his baptism? It was then -- when Jesus was dripping with
water -- that John saw the Spirit coming down upon Jesus in the form of a dove,
the symbol of peace, signifying here peace between God and man, and peace among
men of good will; that peace which Jesus -- the promised Prince of Peace – alone
could bring about.
Think of that scene, People of God, and then remember the
words Jesus was later to say to Nicodemus, a leader among the Jews:
Amen, amen, I say to you, no one
can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. (John 3:5)
Water and the Spirit: what did they mean for the Jews and
the Gentiles, both called in Christ, the Saviour of the whole world, to become
God’s children? Listen, and wonder at
the wisdom, the beauty, and the goodness, of God; for, in order to save mankind
from the bonds of sin and death, God had to convict mankind of their
sinfulness, in order that they might turn from sin, reject it, and embrace -- gratefully
and wholeheartedly -- God’s offer of eternal life in Jesus, His beloved and
only-begotten Son.
The Chosen People had, over thousands of years, become a supremely
spiritual and moral people; and yet, although they had been given a Law which
was holy, they had, in their observance of that Law, become ever more reliant
on their own efforts: they had come to think that they were able to observe
that Law by themselves and imagined they could, in that way, prove themselves
worthy to be the Chosen People of God.
They came to regard themselves as having been chosen, not out of God’s
boundless mercy, but because of their own particular spiritual superiority and ability;
to believe that God had been right in choosing them, because they -- above all
other nations -- had the strength of will and moral character to keep His Law. There, People of God, we recognize the sin of
the Jews: spiritual pride.
In this scene by the Jordan where John was offering a
baptism of repentance, the Jewish people were being told that it was only by
God's free gift of the Holy Spirit -- to be given through Jesus the Lamb of God
-- that they could practice a holiness acceptable to Him Who is the all-holy
One; only by God’s Gift, which is the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Holiness,
could they become holy; and the Spirit was wholly Jesus’ to give, which is why
the Spirit was to be seen descending and resting upon Jesus as He came up out
of the waters.
The Gentiles on the other hand, although they had risen to great
social and cultural heights in the ancient empires, and most recently in the
glories of Greece and the achievements of Rome, nevertheless, they had become
morally degenerate despite all the truths they had glimpsed, the beauties they
had created, and the grandeur of the social fabric they had established. They had sunken into all sorts of moral
abominations for which the Jews had come to despise them, despite themselves being
subject to Rome’s omnipresent and all- subduing military power.
St. Paul, himself born and reared as a strict Pharisee,
expressed this awareness of the Jews with regard to their conquerors when he
wrote to the Romans:
Although they (the Gentiles) knew
God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in
their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. …. God gave them over
to a debased mind, to do those things which are not fitting; being filled with
all unrighteousness, undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, unforgiving,
unmerciful; who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice
such things are worthy of death, not only do the same but also approve of those
who practice them. (1:21-32)
There you have the Gentiles’ sin: wallowing in abominations
for which they needed to become repentant if they were to be washed clean; a
cleansing symbolised by the water dripping off Jesus as He came up, out of the
waters of the Jordan.
Water and the Spirit for the cleansing of Jews and
Gentiles: water and the Spirit, whereby Jesus would take upon HImself and
redeem the sins of the world! The whole
of human life had been infected with the sin of Adam from its lowest depths to its
highest achievements: social life, intellectual vigour, and spiritual
aspirations, all had been stained by the Gentiles’ lust for pleasure and power,
and the spiritual pride of Judaism; all had to be convicted of their sin in
order that forgiveness and fulfilment could be offered to all.
People of God, as we recall these truths, let us rejoice
with the deepest gratitude to the Father Who sent His beloved, only-begotten
Son as:
The Lamb of God, Who takes away
the sin of the world;
let us have generous appreciation for that people specially
chosen of old to prepare the coming of Him Who -- as the Glory of Israel and
Light of the Gentiles – now offers peace and salvation to all who believe in His
Name; let us, finally, open our hearts to embrace His gift of the Spirit Who --
as the eternal bond of love between Father and Son -- wills to make us members
of the heavenly Family and eternal Kingdom of God the Father.
