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Readings for the fourth Sunday of Advent (Isaiah 7, Romans 1, and Matthew 1) give us many rich texts to contemplate in this, the final week of our approach to the Nativity of Our Lord.
We begin with the prophecy of Isaiah, "The Lord himself will give you a sign: Look, a virgin is with child, and shall bear a son, and shall name him Emmanuel." Emmanuel, as we all know, means "God with us." This is the core theme of the Christian religion: God with us, God taking on our humanity, entering our world, and in his life, death, and resurrection, showing us the true nature and destiny of the human race. And we respond to God's taking our humanity into himself, by opening ourselves to him in repentance, prayer, and worship. Especially we participate in eucharistic worship, in which God effects our transformation, our transfiguration, into the humanity which he wishes us to be, so that, as the Second Letter of Peter says, we "may become partakers of the divine nature." This is our high destiny, which we prepare for during Advent, and which we celebrate at Nativity, when our Savior, who is both divine and human, comes into our world.
Today's reading from the opening verses of Paul's Letter to the Romans, reads like a credal statement, a summary of what may be called the Gospel, the Good News, according to Paul.
Paul presents his own experience as part of his Gospel: first he says that he is set apart for the Good News of God, and then goes on to say what that Gospel is: the good news concerning God's Son. This reading from Romans is actually one long sentence. Paul packs a lot into this sentence, a summary of the good news as he has received it: Jesus is descended from David in the flesh and is Son of God by the Spirit. Jesus rose from the dead. Paul received grace from the Son of God to offer faith in Jesus to the Gentiles.
Matthew presents what he knows about the birth of the Messiah. This story could actually be called "The Annunciation to Joseph." We all know the Annunciation in Luke's Gospel, in which the angel Gabriel announces to Mary the approaching birth of Jesus. Angels are very important in Luke's Gospel, and they are also important in Matthew's Gospel, but there they appear to Joseph. And Mary doesn't do any talking in Matthew's narrative; all the initiative is with Joseph and the angels. Luke, of course, balances the male-centered story of Matthew, with a story in which women are the main actors. The sequence in Matthew's narrative is interesting. Mary is found to be pregnant "by the Holy Spirit" before she and Joseph live together. We can imagine what Joseph thinks of this when he first hears it. Joseph plans to "dismiss her quietly," as the text says.
The prophecy of Isaiah reappears here: "Emmanuel, God with us." Even in the extremity of a potentially humiliating situation for both Mary and Joseph, God is with them. That is why Matthew is careful to say at the beginning of his reading, that Jesus is the Messiah, the Anointed One, the Christ, the expected King and Deliverer of the Hebrews from foreigners, the Romans. The people expect a strong and glorious earthly king, who will deliver them from the oppressors and rule a great kingdom. He is to be a descendant of David, who will bring the whole world under his sway. The people of Israel have been looking for this deliverer from the time of their captivity in Babylon, and are even more eager for a deliverer from their oppression under the Romans.
But the Messiah, in Matthew's Gospel, although he is of the House of David, is not strong and glorious in earthly terms. No, he is a baby born to an obscure couple, to a woman whose pregnancy, in the eyes of most people, would be at best questionable, and the fatherhood of the child unknown or unbelievable. Our text says, however, that Joseph was a just man, so he did not react in a way that we might expect. Into this doubtful situation the Messiah is born, quite unlike the grand expectation that many people had, and have, of what a deliverer, a Messiah, is supposed to look like.
The very ordinariness, the improbability of the situation, are clues to what God is revealing to us here. Our deliverance, our salvation, are not to be found in grand world-changing schemes. Our salvation is in the local, the particular, the ordinary, the very human world around us. God chose poor, unknown people in a backwater corner of the Roman empire, put them into a situation in which they could rely only on Him, and they responded with faith. They took what God gave them in the situations in which they found themselves, and did what God asked them to do. With faith and courage they gave up conventional understanding, in this case the usual view of a suspicious pregnancy, and allowed God to lead them to a new understanding. And we are here today as a consequence of their willingness to open themselves up to a new awareness of God working in them and in the world.
Likewise, we too are being given an opportunity by God, this Nativity and always, to open ourselves to the new situation which he has promised us: Emmanuel, God With Us, our true destiny, transformation into the people God wishes us to be.
In nomine etc..
A homily for the Vigil of the Feast of Christ the King.
In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti. Amen.
We've reached the last Sunday after Pentecost, or the last Sunday after Trinity, the Feast of Christ the King, here in the church named for Christ's past and future appearance, his Advent, in his Incarnation, and his appearance, his parousia, at the end of time. On the Cross we see his title "King of the Jews," and in the statue before us, we see him robed as a king in western medieval European style, wearing a crown and carrying an orb. In the Cross, the statue of Christ the King, and in the fact of our gathering here today, we see the signs of Christ's kingship, fully arrayed. "Jesus proclaimed the coming of God's Kingdom and the fulfilment of Israel's...hopes." All were, and are, called to repent and to believe in the good news. The Kingdom, in this teaching, is the action of God, when his sovereignty and power are manifested. To enter God's Kingdom is to experience his power.
The Kingdom of God has already begun, it has already been realized, but the end has not yet come, and so the Kingdom has not yet been fulfilled. With the coming of Christ, God's reign has been inaugurated. It arrived with the coming of the Son of Man. Origen, the third-century theologian, says that Jesus himself was the Kingdom, by whom the blind received their sight, the lame walked, lepers were cleansed and the deaf heard, the dead were raised up, and the poor had good news preached to them. The miracles were fulfilments of God's promises and signs that the Kingdom was present.
The Kingdom is in the future as well. We ask for the Kingdom to arrive in the Lord's prayer: adveniat regnum tuum, your Kingdom come. At the very end of the Revelation to John, we read "Maranatha!" "Come, Lord!" The Son of Man who has come is the Son of Man who will come. With the Second Coming, Christ's work will be consummated. We can understand New Testament teaching of the Kingdom by being aware of the tension between the Kingdom that is already here and the Kingdom that has not yet arrived.
These two aspects of the Kingdom, the 'already here' and the 'not yet,' are distinct but not separate. The victory over death has been won by Christ, but his reign will appear fully at the end. The coming of the Kingdom will be the second coming of the Son of Man. With the coming of the Son, eternal life has already begun. As John's Gospel says, in chapter 3, "Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life." But there will also be a future resurrection, a last day, a final judgment, and a future coming of Jesus. Jesus says, "I will come again, and take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also." As preparation for the final coming of the Kingdom, Jesus exhorts his followers to be ready, to watch, to have patience, to be confident. As Paul says in today's reading from the Letter to the Colossians, "May you be prepared to endure everything with patience, while joyfully giving thanks to the Father...[who has] transferred us into the Kingdom of his beloved Son."
Jesus proclaimed the Kingdom in parables which reveal that the day of salvation has arrived, that the new age has begun, that the new wine is available, that the Messiah has come. For example, in one parable, the Kingdom is like a tiny mustard seed which becomes a tall tree. The Kingdom grows and transforms from a small beginning, under God's power and guidance.
In the parables, Jesus gave his disciples "the secret of the Kingdom of God," which was the knowledge that the end of the age had already arrived. This secret was to be revealed and proclaimed to all who would hear it. To learn the secret, Jesus's hearers were called to repent and believe the Gospel.
The miracles of Jesus also point to the present and future Kingdom of God. Jesus performed healings, exorcisms, resurrections, and transformations of nature. These are all manifestations of the powers of the age to come. They are signs of the Kingdom. They are not faith-healing, or examples of the power of mind over nature, or magic. They are signs of God's presence in his own creation; they are also, of course, demonstrations of Jesus's Messianic activity.
Jesus's exorcisms also bear witness to the Kingdom of God. Jesus defeats the demons, and by extension defeats the powers of Satan and death. The nature miracles, like the feeding of the five thousand and walking on water, show that God can and does control nature and human life. The miracles of Jesus are manifestations of the saving power of God and the revelation of Jesus as the bearer of the Kingdom of God. They reveal the arrival of the Messianic age, and the kind of Messiah Jesus is.
Between Jesus's calling of the Twelve, and the Resurrection, he brought a new community, the New Israel, into existence. It is worth noting that in this New Israel, Jesus showed a new, radical attitude toward women: he conversed with them, he healed them on the Sabbath day, he travelled with them, and he came to those who did not travel with him, to stay with them and to teach them.
After Jesus's death and resurrection, and the descent of the Holy Spirit, the Church came into existence. Saint Paul in his First Letter to the Corinthians, refers to this new community as "us on whom the ends of the ages have come." The Letter to the Hebrews mentions those who "have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come." The Church, as the Body of Christ and the Temple of the Holy Spirit, exists in the period between Jesus's resurrection and his second coming.
The Kingdom and the Church are related, but they are not identical, although many Christians down the centuries have been tempted to think so. Rather, the Church proclaims the Kingdom, and is a sign of its presence, both now and in the future.
And so we have, in the Scriptures, and in the Church, clear signs and teachings of Christ, our King and our God, and of his Kingdom. Maranatha. Come, Lord Jesus. Remember us O Lord, when you come into your Kingdom.
In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti. Amen.
