Wednesday of Week 1 of Advent – First Reading

Commentary on Isaiah 25:6-10

Both readings today are about the abundance that comes from God. The theme of an eschatological banquet is common in early Jewish and early Christian literature. In Matthew’s Gospel, after healing the centurion’s servant, Jesus says:

I tell you, many will come from east and west and will take their places at the banquet with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven… (Matt 8:11-12)

And again, in Matthew (22:1-14) and in Luke (14:16-24), Jesus tells the parable of the banquet to which those invited made excuses not to come.

As in the Gospel parables, in our First Reading from Isaiah, there is a universal tone to the words:

The Lord of hosts will make for all peoples
a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines,
of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear.

It is not just for God’s people. People from all nations will pour in to join this immense banquet with the Lord. God calls every single person to experience his love and share his eternal presence.

It is not surprising that this image should be used as a vision of the future life. It was used by peoples who all too often experienced hunger and thirst brought on by drought, floods and poverty. A future life beyond death was easily conceived as an unending banquet at a table groaning with rich food and the finest drinks, things which in this life only the tiny minority of the rich could enjoy. Today’s Gospel about the feeding of the 4,000 in the desert confirms what the prophet is foretelling.

At the same time, the Lord will put an end to death, symbolised by the shroud that envelops the peoples and the sheet covering the nations. In fact, “Death has been swallowed up in victory”, a phrase quoted by Paul (1 Cor 15:54).

Later, in the Book of Revelation we read in the hymn to those who have sacrificed their lives for the gospel that:

God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. (Rev 7:17)

And again in Revelation:

He will wipe every tear from their eyes.
Death will be no more;
mourning and crying and pain will be no more. (Rev 21:4)

In the Third Eucharistic Prayer, when we pray for the dead, we also say:

There we hope to share in your glory when every tear will be wiped away.

Then, about Mount Zion on which the Temple of Jerusalem was built, the prophet says:

For the hand of the Lord will rest on this mountain.

With the coming of God (remember we are in Advent and Jesus is on the way), there comes comfort in all our sorrows—”Every tear will be wiped away”. This is what salvation means—the fulfilling of all our needs: spiritual, emotional, social and physical. What is promised in Isaiah will become a reality in Jesus.

In our world today we live with abundant food production that serves us even with our population growth. Yet, there is hunger, malnutrition and other unmet needs. We, God’s stewards, are failing in our task of distribution. It is certainly not the fault of God that our brothers and sisters go hungry—it is ours.

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Wednesday of Week 1 of Advent – Gospel

Commentary on Matthew 15:29-37

In today’s Gospel, full of trust and confidence, people bring the disabled, the blind, those unable to speak and those unable to hear. Jesus healed them all and the crowds were amazed. There then comes a scene which is a kind of parable of what Jesus stands for: the compassion of God and his desire that the needs of all be supplied. The people have been with him for three days and are hungry. They must be fed. There’s not much to feed them with—seven loaves of bread and a few fish. It is enough for Jesus. And again and again people who have dedicated themselves to caring for the hungry and homeless have found what they needed turning up on their doorstep.

At the end, seven (a perfect number) baskets are still left uneaten. All this symbolises the care God takes of his people. And yet, is it happening in many parts of the world today? There is a crucial element in today’s Gospel we cannot overlook. It was not Jesus, but his disciples who distributed the food. In our world there is an abundance. Food production outpaces population growth. If there is hunger, malnutrition and other unmet needs, it is because we, God’s stewards, are failing in our task of distribution. If there is hunger and suffering and death, it is not the work of God—it is our failure to work.

Christmas is a time of giving. We could ask ourselves: To whom are we giving? With whom are we sharing what we have or can afford to buy? Perhaps we could widen the circle this Christmas with gifts that mean life or death for the receivers. Beneficiaries who will never know who their benefactors are, and who will not be able to give anything back. Did Jesus not say something about giving so quietly that the left hand will not know what the right hand is doing?

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