Thursday of Week 3 of Advent – Gospel

Commentary on Luke 7:24-30

Today’s Gospel is a continuation of yesterday’s. Jesus had been asked by disciples of John the Baptist whether he was the One who was expected. And Jesus had given an indirect, but very clear answer in the affirmative. He was indeed the One. After the messengers of John had left, Jesus then began to comment about John to the people around him.

What, Jesus asked them, had they gone out to the desert to see? “A reed shaken by the wind?” Someone who shifted his position with every passing fashion, someone who just said what people wanted to hear? No. People went out to hear someone who spoke the truth without fear or favour, who was not afraid to say what needed to be said, even if people were not too happy with what they heard, even when it pointed directly at them.

Did they go out to see “a man clothed in fine garments”? Someone who was rich and famous, who lived in the lap of luxury? No, “those who are gorgeously apparelled and live in luxury are in kings’ courts”. They went out to see a prophet and, indeed, more than a prophet. A prophet is someone called to convey to the people a message from God. A prophet is someone who has a deeper insight into the way people should live their lives. His or her role is both to announce and denounce and call people back to their senses and to right living.

But, John is even more than that. His special role is to prepare the way for the coming of the Messiah. “Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who shall prepare your way before your.” Among the long line of prophets his is a unique privilege. “I tell you, among those born of women none is greater than John.”

And yet – “he who is the least in the kingdom of God is greater than he”. Jesus is the one who inaugurates the Reign of God among us in his own person and in all those who accept his Word as their way of life. This was a privilege that John was never to know.

But with privilege comes responsibility. Our fellowship with Christ is something for which to praise and thank God. It is humbling to think that we are, in a way, more privileged than John, who knew Jesus personally. This privilege also carries with it expectations and challenges touching on all our lives.

We can ask ourselves that when people look as us, do they see a reed shaking and bending with every breeze of fashion? Do they see people who set great store by status, luxury and an obsession with the material things of this world? Or, do they see people who fearlessly and consistently proclaim the Way of Christ in all they say and do?

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Thursday of Week 3 of Advent – First Reading

Commentary on Isaiah 54:1-10

This is our last reading from the ‘Book of Consolation’.

“Shout for joy, you barren women, who bore no children!” Words addressed to Jerusalem (representing Israel), especially during the exile. The Israelites, in exile, are apparently abandoned by their ‘husband’ God. Humanly speaking, they seem to have no future as a people. In the Near East, barrenness was considered a terrible disgrace. Now, however, they can shout for joy. They are going to be fertile again.

The passage brings a message of comfort to the Israelites in exile with the promise of Jerusalem’s restoration. The people are called on to prepare for great changes, changes for the better. Israel, personified in the feminine figure of its capital, Jerusalem, which had remained desolate and uninhabited during the exile, will soon overflow with a burgeoning population.

The people are called on to enlarge their tents to accommodate greater numbers of God’s people.

You will burst out to right and left. Your race will take possession of the nations and people the abandoned cities.

A promise that they are going to go back to their homeland and fill their cities and towns again with their people. The past can be left behind.

You will forget the shame of your youth and no longer remember the curse of your widowhood.

In describing the sufferings the Israelites have been through, the prophet uses traditional images – the barren wife who becomes fertile, the repudiated wife who is taken back. It is a more positive message than that found in some of the other prophets who often see only more punishments in store.

There is now no need to be afraid. God is a faithful spouse who will not abandon his people for ever. They can now forget the “shame of your youth”, a shame brought on by their exile, they can forget “the curse of their widowhood”, when God seemed to have abandoned them.

Your creator will be your husband, his name, the Lord of hosts.

God will be their new husband and the source of a new fruitfulness. “Like a forsaken wife” they are now being called back. This was no separation, only a brief estrangement.

I did forsake you for a brief moment, but with great love will I take you back. In excess of anger, for a moment I hid my face from you.

Was it God who had abandoned his people, or was it they who had, by their faithlessness, distanced themselves from him? For he has never been far from them.

With everlasting love I have taken compassion on you, says the Lord, your redeemer.

This is God’s unchanging and unchangeable love, the love of a good father for his children or of a loving husband for his wife. A love freely and unconditionally poured out as a free gift.

The promises made after the Flood in the time of Noah are recalled:

When I swore that Noah’s waters should never flood the world again.

Now, God repeats his promises and reminds his people of his unchanging love for them:

…for the mountains may depart, the hills be shaken, but my love you will never leave you and my covenant of peace with you will never be shaken.

The Israelites have attributed their sufferings to the anger of the Lord, but God is never angry. Their sufferings have been brought on themselves by their failure to remain faithful to the covenant God had made with them. In the Exile, they have paid the price, but now is coming a time of reconciliation with their return to the homeland they have so bitterly missed for so many years.

As we approach Christmas, we see the same covenant with our God renewed in the coming of the Incarnate Son of God in our midst. On the one hand, it is an occasion for us to leave behind our self-centred ways. In Jesus, we are given in the clearest possible terms, the Way our lives are to follow if we are to be truly one with our loving Lord and Creator.

Here we have the story of God’s love for us: the total love of God, our infidelity, our sin. The Bible describes the mistakes of men, and then the infidelity of the people loved by God. But the prophets announce the New Jerusalem, Yahweh’s bride which will never again be abandoned. We know that the Church is this new People united to God in an eternal covenant.

It is quite true there are wrinkles on the face of the Church: dull parishes, existing but not really alive; institutions where one would look in vain for the Spirit of Jesus; and leaders of the Church subservient to the powerful [including the powerful in the Church!]. Somehow the New Jerusalem is in the church of Christ, but it is also true that we continue to look for it. Therefore, we are open to hearing and meditating upon this proclamation of the merciful love of God. (Christian Community Bible, loc. cit.)

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