The end of the Season
of Christmas arrives this Sunday, as we celebrate the event that marked the end
of Jesus’ early life and the beginning of his public ministry: the Baptism.
The Christmas
decorations coming down in our churches and homes inevitably leaves a feeling
of sadness and nostalgia. We don’t want
to move on from meditation on all the joyful aspects of Our Lord’s early life,
the incidents of wonder and mystery, like the angels singing to the shepherds,
or the visit of the Magi. Nonetheless,
as we leave the Christmas Season behind, today’s readings remind us of the
power of the Holy Spirit that we share with Jesus! The very Spirit of God has been given us in our
own baptisms—this Spirit has ushered us into a new world, a New Creation in
which we can daily walk with God, just like Adam and Eve once walked with God
in the garden in the cool of the day.
So we will look for
“New Creation” themes as we work through this Sunday’s Readings.
The celebrant has a
choice of Readings for this Feast Day: either the standard ones for any Year
(ABC: Isa 42:1–7; Ps 29:1–10; Acts 10:34-38) or optional readings (introduced
in 1998) for Year C: Isa 40:1–11; Ps 104:1–30; Titus 2:11-14, 3:4-7. In either case, the Gospel for Year C is
Luke’s account of the Baptism of the Lord: Luke 3:15-16, 21-22.
[The celebrant should
pick one sequence or the other, not
choose the First, Psalm, and Second Readings randomly. Each sequence
(ABC or C) has a kind of
integrity and commonality of theme.]
I will comment on the
Year C sequence in this post.
Comfort, give comfort to my people,
says your God.
Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her
that her service is at an end,
her guilt is expiated;
indeed, she has received from the hand of the LORD
double for all her sins.
A voice cries out:
In the desert prepare the way of the LORD!
Make straight in the wasteland a highway for our God!
Every valley shall be filled in,
every mountain and hill shall be made low;
the rugged land shall be made a plain,
the rough country, a broad valley.
Then the glory of the LORD shall be revealed,
and all people shall see it together;
for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.
Go up on to a high mountain,
Zion, herald of glad tidings;
cry out at the top of your voice,
Jerusalem, herald of good news!
Fear not to cry out
and say to the cities of Judah:
Here is your God!
Here comes with power
the Lord GOD,
who rules by a strong arm;
here is his reward with him,
his recompense before him.
Like a shepherd he feeds his flock;
in his arms he gathers the lambs,
carrying them in his bosom,
and leading the ewes with care.
says your God.
Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her
that her service is at an end,
her guilt is expiated;
indeed, she has received from the hand of the LORD
double for all her sins.
A voice cries out:
In the desert prepare the way of the LORD!
Make straight in the wasteland a highway for our God!
Every valley shall be filled in,
every mountain and hill shall be made low;
the rugged land shall be made a plain,
the rough country, a broad valley.
Then the glory of the LORD shall be revealed,
and all people shall see it together;
for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.
Go up on to a high mountain,
Zion, herald of glad tidings;
cry out at the top of your voice,
Jerusalem, herald of good news!
Fear not to cry out
and say to the cities of Judah:
Here is your God!
Here comes with power
the Lord GOD,
who rules by a strong arm;
here is his reward with him,
his recompense before him.
Like a shepherd he feeds his flock;
in his arms he gathers the lambs,
carrying them in his bosom,
and leading the ewes with care.
This very famous
passage is the introduction to the second part of the Book of Isaiah (40-66), a
section of Isaiah which, since ancient times, was regarded as one continuous
description of the “latter days,” that is, the coming era of peace and
restoration marked by the arrival of God’s “Servant,” who would later be
referred to as “the Messiah,” literally, “the one smeared with oil” (i.e.
anointed).
When asked about his
identity in the Gospels, John the Baptist identifies himself as the fulfillment
of Isaiah 40. Since Isaiah 40 is the
“introduction” to the “latter days” in the Book of Isaiah, we may say that John
the Baptist identifies himself as a kind of “Introduction Incarnate,” a
“Prologue in a Person” or “Foreword in the Flesh.”
We comment on each
section of this beautiful prophecy:
Comfort, give comfort to my people,
says your God.
Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her
that her service is at an end,
her guilt is expiated;
indeed, she has received from the hand of the LORD
double for all her sins.
says your God.
Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her
that her service is at an end,
her guilt is expiated;
indeed, she has received from the hand of the LORD
double for all her sins.
This passage is set to music in utterly sublime
fashion by G.F. Handel in the oratorio The
Messiah. http://bit.ly/22L0Wsk
These verses mark the transition in the Book of
Isaiah from a primary emphasis on condemnation of Israel for past sins (Isaiah
1-39) to a primary emphasis on hope for restoration in the future (Isaiah
40-66). The hope for restoration is
largely dependent on a mysterious figure the prophet refers to as “the Servant,”
and describes extensively in passages found in chs. 42, 44, 49, 50, 52-53, and
61. The identity of the servant is
enigmatic. As we can see in Acts 8:34
(the account of the Ethiopian eunuch who asks Philip who Isaiah’s “servant”
is), ancient readers were as confused as moderns concerning the identity of the
servant. In biblical scholarship,
debates continue to rage on this subject.
Followers of Jesus, however, are convinced that Isaiah’s “Servant” is
Jesus of Nazareth. That is the claim of
the gospels and of the Church.
The message of these verses is that the
punishment on Israel (represented here by her capital, Jerusalem) has been
sufficient. Now is the time for
restoration and forgiveness. So the public
arrival of Jesus marks the end of condemnation of sin (in the ministry of John
the Baptist) and the beginning of the forgiveness of sin and healing (in the
ministry of Jesus).
A voice cries out:
In the desert prepare the way of the LORD!
Make straight in the wasteland a highway for our God!
Every valley shall be filled in,
every mountain and hill shall be made low;
the rugged land shall be made a plain,
the rough country, a broad valley.
Then the glory of the LORD shall be revealed,
and all people shall see it together;
for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.
Who is this voice crying out? The prophecy does not tell us, but John the
Baptist identifies it as himself. The
message of the “voice” employs the imagery of ancient highway-building for the
visit of a king or emperor to the distant parts of his empire. Workers (essentially slaves) would be
employed to level the road (valleys filled in, hills dug down) for the king’s
highway. In this text, however, the
coming King is the LORD himself.
In the Gospels, it becomes clear that we are not
talking about a physical highway. The “highway
of God” is Jesus: “I am the Way, the truth, the life,” Jesus says in John
14:6. The “valleys” that need to be
raised are the “poor in spirit,” who may despair of their salvation because
they are overly aware of their sins (see Luke 18:13). These people need to be raised up to hope for
salvation. The “mountains” are the
proud, who need to be humbled before they can be saved (see Luke 18:11-14).
These themes are prominent also in the Blessed Mother’s Magnificat (Luke
1:52-53).
Go up on to a high mountain,
Zion, herald of glad tidings;
cry out at the top of your voice,
Jerusalem, herald of good news!
Fear not to cry out
and say to the cities of Judah:
Here is your God!
Here comes with power
the Lord GOD,
who rules by a strong arm;
here is his reward with him,
his recompense before him.
Like a shepherd he feeds his flock;
in his arms he gathers the lambs,
carrying them in his bosom,
and leading the ewes with care.
Here, a herald identified only as “Zion” and
“Jerusalem” is commanded to announce to the people of God that their LORD has
arrived to be their shepherd.
The promise of the LORD being a good shepherd is
closely related to some other important Old Testament texts: Psalm 23 and
Ezekiel 34. The accounts of the Feeding
of the 5,000 in Mark 6 and John 6 draw heavily on imagery from these two
passages. Jesus shows himself to be the
Good Shepherd by feeding the tribes of Israel on the mountain heights with good
pasture until they are fully satisfied.
But the Feeding of the 5000 is really an anticipation of the
Eucharist. We experience Jesus “feeding
his flock” every time we receive his Body and Blood.
This theme of announcing the arrival of the LORD
is, of course, strongly related to the Gospel Reading, because the Baptism was
the public debut of Our Lord’s ministry and message. With the descent of the Holy Spirit, we see
that Jesus is God in our very presence.
2. The Responsorial consists of selections from
Psalm 104:
R. (1) O bless the Lord, my soul.
O LORD, my God, you are great indeed!
you are clothed with majesty and glory,
robed in light as with a cloak.
You have spread out the heavens like a tent-cloth;
R. O bless the Lord, my soul.
You have constructed your palace upon the waters.
You make the clouds your chariot;
you travel on the wings of the wind.
You make the winds your messengers,
and flaming fire your ministers.
R. O bless the Lord, my soul.
How manifold are your works, O LORD!
In wisdom you have wrought them all—
the earth is full of your creatures;
the sea also, great and wide,
in which are schools without number
of living things both small and great.
R. O bless the Lord, my soul.
They look to you to give them food in due time.
When you give it to them, they gather it;
when you open your hand, they are filled with good things.
R. O bless the Lord, my soul.
If you take away their breath, they perish and return to the dust.
When you send forth your spirit, they are created,
and you renew the face of the earth.
R. O bless the Lord, my soul.
O LORD, my God, you are great indeed!
you are clothed with majesty and glory,
robed in light as with a cloak.
You have spread out the heavens like a tent-cloth;
R. O bless the Lord, my soul.
You have constructed your palace upon the waters.
You make the clouds your chariot;
you travel on the wings of the wind.
You make the winds your messengers,
and flaming fire your ministers.
R. O bless the Lord, my soul.
How manifold are your works, O LORD!
In wisdom you have wrought them all—
the earth is full of your creatures;
the sea also, great and wide,
in which are schools without number
of living things both small and great.
R. O bless the Lord, my soul.
They look to you to give them food in due time.
When you give it to them, they gather it;
when you open your hand, they are filled with good things.
R. O bless the Lord, my soul.
If you take away their breath, they perish and return to the dust.
When you send forth your spirit, they are created,
and you renew the face of the earth.
R. O bless the Lord, my soul.
We want to note here the strong creation imagery
of the Psalm. The Cosmos is described as
God’s “palace” which he has constructed “upon the waters” with the help of the
“wind” (“wind” and “Spirit” are the same word in Hebrew, usually ruach, sometimes also nishmah, “breath, spirit”) under the
outspread “tent-cloth” of the heavens.
The “waters,” the “Spirit,” and the “heavens” will recur in the Baptism
account.
This Psalm praises God as the creator of the
heavens and the earth. The principle of
creation is summarized at the end: “When you send forth your spirit, they are
created, and you renew the face of the earth.”
This Psalm helps us to understand the Baptism as
a great manifestation of a New Creation.
Just as the Spirit hovered over the waters of the first creation in
Genesis 1:2, and then brought forth the dry land, so in the Gospel reading the
Spirit will descend on the waters and Jesus will emerge. Jesus is the New Creation. He brings us into a whole new existence. We don’t really start to live until we know
Him. So St. Paul says, “If anyone is in
Christ, he is a new creation!” (2 Cor 5:17).
(As an aside, the doctrine of creation has
fallen on hard times because many think or fear that modern science has, in
some way, eliminated divine agency from the natural world and its origins. This is extremely far from the truth. The origins of the natural world and of life
continue to defy purely naturalistic, materialistic explanation. See here for
example: http://bit.ly/1RykyCn )
At each of our baptisms, we are created
anew. We come to baptism in the darkness
and non-existence of sin, in a state of privation where we lack the Spirit of
God which alone truly gives life. We are
submerged in the waters over which the Spirit hovers, and emerge like the dry
land, like Jesus, a truly new creation.
3. The Second Reading is Titus 2:11-14; 3:4-7
Beloved:
The grace of God has appeared, saving all
and training us to reject godless ways and worldly desires
and to live temperately, justly, and devoutly in this age,
as we await the blessed hope,
the appearance of the glory of our great God
and savior Jesus Christ,
who gave himself for us to deliver us from all lawlessness
and to cleanse for himself a people as his own,
eager to do what is good.
When the kindness and generous love
of God our savior appeared,
not because of any righteous deeds we had done
but because of his mercy,
He saved us through the bath of rebirth
and renewal by the Holy Spirit,
whom he richly poured out on us
through Jesus Christ our savior,
so that we might be justified by his grace
and become heirs in hope of eternal life.
The grace of God has appeared, saving all
and training us to reject godless ways and worldly desires
and to live temperately, justly, and devoutly in this age,
as we await the blessed hope,
the appearance of the glory of our great God
and savior Jesus Christ,
who gave himself for us to deliver us from all lawlessness
and to cleanse for himself a people as his own,
eager to do what is good.
When the kindness and generous love
of God our savior appeared,
not because of any righteous deeds we had done
but because of his mercy,
He saved us through the bath of rebirth
and renewal by the Holy Spirit,
whom he richly poured out on us
through Jesus Christ our savior,
so that we might be justified by his grace
and become heirs in hope of eternal life.
This passage is a short homily, if you will,
from St. Paul on baptism. The “non-existence”
we experienced before baptism is characterized by “godless ways and worldly desires”
and “lawlessness.” It is essentially the
relentless and self-destructive pursuit of money, sex, and power that we see
all around us. The New Creation is “to
live temperately, justly, and devoutly in this age” because we have become
“heirs in hope of eternal life.” It is a
totally different kind of life from the ground up, because instead of
desperately trying to have as much pleasure as possible before we die, we spend
our lives in peace preparing for eternity.
This is the new life inaugurated by the “bath of rebirth … renewal by
the Holy Spirit … richly poured out on us.”
The people were filled with expectation,
and all were asking in their hearts
whether John might be the Christ.
John answered them all, saying,
“I am baptizing you with water,
but one mightier than I is coming.
I am not worthy to loosen the thongs of his sandals.
He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.”
After all the people had been baptized
and Jesus also had been baptized and was praying,
heaven was opened and the Holy Spirit descended upon him
in bodily form like a dove.
And a voice came from heaven,
“You are my beloved Son;
with you I am well pleased.”
and all were asking in their hearts
whether John might be the Christ.
John answered them all, saying,
“I am baptizing you with water,
but one mightier than I is coming.
I am not worthy to loosen the thongs of his sandals.
He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.”
After all the people had been baptized
and Jesus also had been baptized and was praying,
heaven was opened and the Holy Spirit descended upon him
in bodily form like a dove.
And a voice came from heaven,
“You are my beloved Son;
with you I am well pleased.”
The “heaven was opened” may be understood in
both a natural and supernatural way: a break in the clouds, but also a new
opening of access to the realm of God.
The descent of the Spirit “in bodily form like a dove” evokes the image
of the Spirit “hovering”—that is, moving back and forth (Heb. hithhalēk)—over the waters of creation
in Genesis 1:2. Then the voice of the
Father is heard from heaven: “You are my beloved Son, with you I am well
pleased.” This statement of the Father
echoes several important passages of Scripture:
(1) “Abraham, take your son, your beloved son, whom you love …” (Gen
22:2), the introduction to the account of the sacrifice of Isaac, in which
Isaac is thrice called the “beloved son” (agapētos)
in the Septuagint (LXX) Greek translation of the Old Testament. This allusion shows Jesus as a New Isaac, the
beloved Son who will sacrifice himself on the holy mountain out of love for God
and for his Father.
(2) “I will declare the decree of the LORD,
He
said to me, ‘You are my son
This
day I have begotten you” (Psalm 2:7)
The royal coronation hymn of the Davidic kings
had this line for the new king to recite as he ascended the throne. It is an affirmation of the Davidic covenant,
by which each heir to the throne had the privilege of a filial (sonship)
relationship with God: “I will be his father, and he will be my son” (2 Sam
7:14). This echo implies that Jesus is
the Son of David, the heir to throne of Israel.
In fact, the baptism comprises the washing and anointing ceremony by
which each Son of David marked the beginning of his reign (see 1 Kings 1:38-40;
understand that the Gihon was the stream where the new king was washed before
being anointed by the priest and prophet).
Note that in most of the Gospels, shortly after the Baptism Jesus begins
to preach “The Kingdom of God has arrived.”
Indeed, it has: because he has begun his royal reign.
(3) “Behold my servant, whom I uphold, my
chosen, in whom my soul delights; I have put my Spirit upon him,” (Isa
42:1). The verbal parallels are inexact,
but the thematic parallels with the Baptism and the words of the divine voice
from heaven are very clear. This is why
Isa 42 is the standard ABC reading in the Lectionary for the Baptism. The parallels between the passages show that
Jesus is the mysterious “servant” of Isaiah, who is marked with God’s spirit,
comes to preach good news to the poor (Isa 61:1-2), and will suffer and die to
redeem many (Isa 52:13–53:12).
Jesus is the fulfillment of the whole Old
Testament expectation: the new Isaac, the new David, the manifestation of the
Isaianic Servant. But especially in
today’s reading, he is the manifestation of the New Creation.
Through baptism we have truly been incorporated
into a New Creation, a new life and way of existence. However, it takes faith to experience
this. If we do not believe the truth of
what has happened in our baptism, the reality remains true, but we do not
experience the fruits of that reality.
In our prayer this Sunday, let’s meditate on the reality of the gift of
the Spirit which renewed each one of us in the sacrament. If necessary, let’s renew the sacrament of
Baptism by going to Confession before this upcoming feast day. And finally, let’s remember that the New
Creation is the world to come, the fullness of life we will experience after
the death of this earthly body. If we
still are living day by day for lusts of this life—for money, pleasure, sex,
comfort, fame, and/or power—we are actively undoing what Christ has done for us
in baptism.
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