Tag: <span>John the Baptist</span>

June 24, 2021June 23, 2021

No Man Greater

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

“Amen, I say to you, among those born of women there has been none greater than John the Baptist.” (Mt. 11:11)

This is the superlative fashion with which Jesus refers to John the Baptist. What would it mean to us to receive such a striking compliment from the Son of God?

And indeed, as today’s psalm tells us, John was “wonderfully made.” The first reading foreshadows the greatness to which Jesus alludes, and as we celebrate the birth of the Baptist, it shows us that this greatness is with John from the beginning:

The LORD called me from birth,
   from my mother’s womb he gave me my name.
He made of me a sharp-edged sword
   and concealed me in the shadow of his arm.
He made me a polished arrow,
   in his quiver he hid me.

It would seem that John was special from the start.

Are you likewise special from the start? The answer is a resounding “yes,” IF you fulfill your destiny. Your mission as a follower of Jesus is no less great than John’s, as Jesus Himself says in the same verse in Mt. 11: “yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.”

All that stands between us and the same destiny to greatness enjoyed by John the Baptist, a destiny his from eternity, is our unconditional and daily “yes” to God. When spoken to God, the word “yes” is like a roller coaster car that one enters in the dark, not knowing where it will take one.

So it was for John. That “yes” brought him to a grand prophetic mission, and after that to a death tragic and gruesome, yet glorious in the eyes of God.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Tell Jesus that you do not doubt the glory of your destiny, and that you want the destiny He wants for you with all your heart. Tell Him He has free rein, a blank check to take your life wherever He wishes.

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January 10, 2021January 1, 2021

Anointing

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

What we see at the Baptism of Jesus, momentous as it is, is the tip of the iceberg. We can well focus on the supernatural manifestations, whereby the Holy Spirit descends upon Jesus visibly in the form of the dove, and God the Father proclaims Him His Son, in whom He is well pleased.

But there is a lot of depth to what is going on here. Per usual, the Old Testament sheds deep light on what is happening in the broader context of the economy of salvation, as we see in our first reading.

Of course, we know that Jesus was born to carry out the mission of our salvation–for no other purpose. Still, it is at the critical moment of His Baptism–which He with good reason insists upon, in the face of the Baptist’s protests–that Jesus as man formally accepts this mission, the mission of salvation described for us in the first reading. Or rather, as the second reading from Acts describes, He accepts His anointing for this mission. It is God the Father who does the anointing, and the oil of anointing is the Holy Spirit Himself. By accepting God’s will for Him to be baptized by John the Baptist, Jesus formally accepts His own divine anointing for His mission of salvation.

Why at this moment does the Father decide to manifest Himself, and state that He is pleased with His Son? As Jesus says elsewhere, the Father is always pleased with Him, because Jesus always does what pleases Him. But here, we may confidently infer that the Father is specifically saying that He is particularly pleased with what Jesus has just done, for the first time formally as God-Man, in taking on His difficult mission.

Following Christ, all the way into eternal life, is costly. He demands from us core transformation, for the sake of radical exaltation. But today we espy one consequence of our acceptance of His invitation to this radical gift of self to Him that may otherwise elude us. Since in His saving act, Jesus has made of us adopted children of God, we inherit with Him the ability to please the Father by accepting His mission for us, by accepting His will.

And so, we may confidently affirm that when we say “yes” to the life that God is asking from us, the Father, in all His solemnity, is saying of us as well that He is “well pleased.”

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Imagine one of the moments when it was challenging for you to say “yes” to God, and imagine the true joy that your “yes” brought to God the Father, the sovereign of the universe. Marvel that He would ordain things such that He could derive authentic joy from you, and ask Him never to let you be parted from the path of pleasing Him.

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January 9, 2021January 1, 2021

The Spectrum

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

John the Baptist bears witness to Jesus, not only as the Messiah of Israel, but also the one whose presence is the source of joy and happiness, He who is personal fulfillment–in fact, his own personal fulfillment. And He does it in today’s Gospel passage, in one of most beautiful testaments to Jesus in the entire Gospel: “The one who has the bride is the bridegroom; the best man, who stands and listens for him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. So this joy of mine has been made complete. He must increase; I must decrease.”

For the Baptist, Jesus is not just the object of his special mission. He is the source of John’s personal joy.

John the Baptist is a beautiful example of what John the Evangelist speaks of in today’s first reading: “We know that anyone begotten by God does not sin; but the one begotten by God he protects, and the Evil One cannot touch him.”

The joy that John the Baptist derives from Jesus, and his focus on Him as his reason for being, makes it much more unlikely for the Baptist to offend God by breaking the Commandments than, for example, a mediocre Christian whose focus is on worldly self-gratification and whose attitude toward the Commandments is bare-minimum compliance.

In the first reading, John the Evangelist bears unequivocal evidence to the doctrine of two tiers of sin–those which are deadly, and which remove the life of God from the soul, and those which are still sin but are not deadly. For those we observe committing latter sort, John encourages us to pray, that God may infuse His life into them.

When John says he is not encouraging prayer for such an infusion for those we observe committing deadly sins, he is simply observing that God is being chased out of that person’s life and therefore–due to His respect for human freedom–He has no “foothold” from which to infuse an increase of His life within the soul. Now, John is not discouraging us from praying for the conversion of sinners who have committed grave sins and are spiritually dead. But when we pray for such persons, we are, as it were, begging God to knock (and knock hard) at the door of their hearts, and ask for admission–we are not asking to infuse life from the position of one already dwelling within their hearts.

When we read through today’s first reading and through today’s gospel, we observe a dramatic spectrum of souls in relationship to God: Everything from those who have ousted God from their lives, and who can only receive an infusion of His life again if they accept His solicitations of readmission, to souls like John the Baptist, who live habitually from Christ as a source of happiness, and could not imagine seeking happiness anywhere else.

Where lie we on this spectrum?

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Ask Jesus to infuse you with His life; ask Him to make Himself more and more your sole focus in your quest for happiness. Ask Him to infuse His life likewise into your loved ones who are living the Christian life. And regarding those–your loved ones and others–who have effectively dismissed Him from their lives, beg Him with all the zeal of which you are capable to continue knocking at the door of their hearts, trusting that when He does so, His offering is always compelling in its attraction.

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December 19, 2020December 15, 2020

Manly Men

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

Today’s readings draw a beautiful parallel between the Old Testament Samson, and the New Testament precursor of the Lord, John the Baptist. They depict the announcement of each by an angel to his parents.

Later in life, the Baptist was described by Jesus as never surpassed by any man born of woman (cf. Mt. 11:11).

And indeed, if we take a look at the lives of Samson and John the Baptist, the parallels we find are those of a man of God characterized by an abundance of virility and strength, and even a sort of wildness representing that particular aspect of wildness found in the male nature: Samson never cut his hair, and John the Baptist lived in the wilds, off locusts and wild honey. Both men endured, in different ways, the most rugged of trials.

Samson, as he grows older, is gifted with superhuman strength. John the Baptist’s iron strength is shown by his resistance to Herod and bravery in the face of martyrdom.

John is described as the voice crying in the desert, “Make straight the way of the Lord.” (cf. Mk. 1:3) We imagine him almost single-handedly leveling mountains and straightening paths so that Jesus will find the ground prepared when He begins His ministry.

Both men, Samson and the Baptist, end up sacrificing their own lives to be faithful to their roles in salvation history.

God, the Creator of the male nature, loves that nature in all its fierceness, its striving, its strength, its determination, its competitiveness: In all its virility. To the man who embraces what God has created him to be, builds it up, and surrenders it in a complete gift of self in the service of Jesus Christ and the vocation to which he is called, belongs a choice role in God’s providential plan for history–whether he perceives the full glorious context of that role at every moment, or not.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Pray for the men in your life, and for your own manhood, if you are a man. Ask God for the gift, not of suppression of what makes you/them manly, but of its full upbuilding, and for the grace to gift a fully-formed man to the whole-hearted, loving service of the Lord and His people.

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December 14, 2020November 29, 2020

No One Born of Woman who is Greater

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

These days, we see Gospel readings about John the Baptist, the great precursor, and how he prepared the way for Jesus.

One of the most beautiful things about John the Baptist in the Gospel is not so much what he does and what role he plays, as what particular, special love Jesus loves holds for him. And how for John, his own identity really isn’t about himself–it’s about Jesus.

Yesterday, we see John answering questions about his identity. He is asked if he was “Elijah,” “the Prophet,” to which he simply answers, “No.” He responds that he is simply the “voice crying in the desert.”

Yet, in another place, Jesus says of John: “And if you are willing to accept it, he is Elijah, the one who is to come.” (cf. Mt. 11:14). John says he is not Elijah; Jesus says he is. Who is right?

Well, Jesus is. But John did not see himself as a great prophet–he could only consider his own identity in relation to Jesus, not as some great standalone figure.

But Jesus is always ready to call out John’s special role, and his greatness. “I tell you, among those born of women, no one is greater than John…” (cf. Lk. 7:28)

John was very much aware of his littleness, his unworthiness to untie Jesus’ sandal straps. (cf. Lk. 3:16) But based on the way He talks about John, even leaning on the Baptist’s witness in today’s gospel as evidence for His own authority–based on all that Jesus says about John in the Gospel, when He looks at John, all He sees is greatness.

Is it possible that this is your relationship with Jesus as well? That when you come to Him, you offer Him your nothingness out of gratitude, acutely aware that on your own you can do nothing for Him and have no worth or power whatsoever? And yet, that when Jesus looks at you, all He sees is glory-bound greatness, one with an exalted eternal destiny, one who is helping Him to save humanity?

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Ask Jesus for trust–trust in His perspective of you, not so that you will lose your humility and sense of nothingness, but so that you will more and more place all your hope for happiness in Him, in His love, in His ability to make you what He sees you to be.

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December 6, 2020November 19, 2020

Prep

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

“A voice cries out: In the desert prepare the way of the Lord!”

The second reading, from the second letter of Peter, provides a key to unlock how the first reading and the gospel fit together today.

The time between Christ’s first coming and our day can feel eternal to us: Two millennia have gone by, after which humanity barely recalls what happened all those years ago. It may seem like Jesus’ Second Coming, if it hasn’t occurred already, probably never will.

But Peter tells us that a thousand years are like a day for God. So, in “His time,” two days have gone by since Jesus’ Incarnation. And it won’t be long at all before He comes again.

With this key in mind, we see that today’s first reading from Isaiah and the gospel from Mark can be read on two different levels. On the one hand, they have their immediate audiences. Isaiah assures the people of Israel that the Messiah will be coming soon. John is that voice crying out in the desert, that everyone should get ready, because His arrival is imminent.

But on the other hand, these messages apply equally directly to us who live in this seemingly longer span of “God’s time.” It is no less urgent for us to prepare a way for the Lord in our hearts, because–two thousand years later–He is ready to visit us as He did the whole world at the Incarnation, and establish a very real relationship with us, as real and intimate as His relationship with humanity became when He took on flesh. And soon, very soon from God’s perspective, He is coming to take us with Him to perfect that relationship, exalt it, and bring it to definitive fulfillment.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Reread the first reading and the Gospel passage in the light of God’s invitation to you through them to reject sin in your personal life and truly prepare a way for Him in your heart, and then walk that way in your daily prayer with Him. Recommit to Jesus that you are one hundred percent all in with Him, and ask Him to bring about His Messianic plan through you.

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August 29, 2020August 13, 2020

A Life “Wasted”

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

What a tragedy, the final days of St. John the Baptist. The life of the last and, if we are to take Christ’s words literally, the greatest prophet (cf. Mt. 11:11), was tragically and needlessly cut short on the ridiculous whim of a man utterly enslaved to his vacillating and nonsensical passions of lust, fear, and vanity.

How much John could have done to bring the nation of Israel to its true Lord, Savior, Messiah, Jesus Christ, if Herod had been even a slightly less absurd little man, and had pointed with honesty to John’s wisdom as a signpost for his nation.

Or at least, John’s death could have been itself more glorious and significant if Herod had opposed him publicly for his difficult stances, if John had been able to give greater testimony to the truth under persecution from a worthier opponent.

But no, a sniveling king puts him to death secretly in prison to please a dancing girl at one of his parties.

And yet, this is the wisdom of the Gospel, this is glory and power of the chosen of God of whom St. Paul speaks in the first reading, and whom today’s psalm sings as blessed.

It is time for us Christians to stop dreaming of Palm Sunday, and to embrace the glorious ignominy of the cross, where our true power lies. In our comfortable world of today, we must constantly remind ourselves that our joy and happiness do not lie here. Even if we are not imprisoned or suffering agony, we can live this wisdom by sacrificing ourselves for others in the state to which Jesus Christ has called us today, whether it is eminent or mundane, stimulating or tiresome, apparently important or apparently trivial. We can give our life as He did, as John did, today, and it is by this gift of self that we add actual grace, through the power of Christ’s own sacrifice, to the economy of salvation.

It is counter-intuitive. It makes no sense. And yet, it does; it is foolishness to the world, and yet it is the wisdom of God, who has chosen the foolish of the world to shame the wise.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Tell Jesus that you cannot adopt His mindset, His wisdom, on your own. Beg Him for the gift of the Holy Spirit that is the gift of wisdom, His wisdom. Ask Him to see how your life, today, can be glorious and fruitful in the light of that wisdom. And trust Him to make it so, even in the midst of your weakness.

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