The Lamb of God

John the Baptist, when he saw Jesus passing by, he pointed him out to his disciples with these words: “Behold the Lamb of God.” This second time John recognized Jesus. The first time was when Our Lady met her cousin Elizabeth; he didn’t remember it. This time John wanted to show his disciples who the Messiah was. He wanted his two best men to follow Jesus, to offer them to him. John and Andrew took the hint, followed Jesus and became his apostles. Do I point Jesus to others? Do I give Jesus the best of me?

Why did John use this expression? It is a representation foreign to us. It doesn’t make sense to us to see God as a lamb. But for the Jews it was something very familiar, coming from their own tradition. Isaiah had compared the sufferings of the Messiah with a lamb going to the slaughter. The blood of the paschal lamb was painted on the door of the Israelites to protect their firstborn against the angel passing by. It became a promise and a figure of Christ, the true Lamb. Every year the Paschal Lamb was sacrificed in the Temple recalling their liberation from the Egyptians and their covenant with God. In the book of Revelation Jesus appears victorious and glorious as the slain lamb, surrounded by angels and saints.

Three characteristics of the lamb can be applied to Jesus. First, the humble and meek condition of a lamb, who goes about in a simple and trusting way. In the same way a lamb goes to the slaughter without saying anything, as a gentle animal going to its fate, Jesus during his Passion kept silence; he let them do whatever they wanted, without rebelling against the will of his Father God. Second, the spotless whiteness, and the soft and pleasant touch of the wool of a lamb. It reminds us of the purity and innocence of Jesus in front of his accusers, who with amazing violence and force, expressed their hatred in their treatment of Jesus. Third, the offering and satisfaction produced by the lambs sacrificed in the temple of Jerusalem. It is fulfilled in the person of Jesus, who came to give himself up for each one of us. Now no more lambs have to die anymore. Jesus died once and for all.

Every time the priest during Mass lifts the host in front of us before Communion saying “Behold the Lamb of God”, we are reminded of this reality. The priest presents Jesus to us in a very graphical way; he shows him to us, he points him out, like John the Baptist. Once a priest told me that sometimes he felt like Pontius Pilate, introducing Christ to the crowd: “Here is the man.” Ecce Homo. He feared that the crowd could answer again: “Crucify him.” We don’t want him to rule over us, we don’t want his kingdom. The priest should try to hide his face behind the host, to disappear, and let Jesus shine: he is the one; what are you going to do with him? It is a good moment to make an act of faith. Do I believe that behind the appearances of bread is hidden the Son of God? If I believe that, my life has to change accordingly.

“Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” He is the only one who can take all our iniquities, imperfections, shortcomings, frustrations, away. We can leave them behind for ever. He’s got the power. All we need to do is to believe in him and let his mercy rain on us; apply his forgiveness through Confession to that baggage all human beings carry with us. Today is a good moment to unload the weight of that rubbish that makes us bent over, weighed down, unhappy.

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Baptism of Jesus

With the Baptism of Jesus, Christmas time comes to an end. It is a pity because we love Christmas and we have to wait for another year; but we are beginning a new year, with all the excitement that this brings about. Today Jesus begins his public life, a life where he manifests his divinity and gives us the good news of the Gospel. And he starts in the same way we begin our Christian life: washing away with water our original sin.

Jesus is God, sinless; he didn’t need to be baptised, but he wanted to go through John’s baptism, to purify the waters and give them the power to cleanse us. John the Baptist didn’t want to baptise him; he wanted to be baptised by Jesus and we understand him. They almost had a fight, but John was sympathetic to Jesus’ request. The early Church was a bit ashamed of this baptism, finding difficult to understand it, because Baptism is meant for the salvation of sinners. Eventually they realised that Jesus, like in his death on the Cross, took with him on his shoulders all our sins, our iniquities, our infidelities, and buried them in the waters of the Jordan River. In the same way the waters of a river wash down everything in its path, the same happens to us when we are baptised.

Do you remember your Baptism? Most of us were baptised when we were babies and we don’t remember anything. Some of you maybe have videos of the moment and maybe you can see yourself crying because the water was too cold and you were sleeping peacefully beforehand. But it is a good moment today to think about what happened to us at that moment. If we could see the change in the soul of the baby, the moment the water is poured onto his head, we would be amazed and greatly surprised. It is an automatic transformation, from a soul closed to any grace from a God, pitch black, surrounded by darkness, to a completely clean surface, full of light and shining, everything bright and white. Suddenly the sky is open and God appears like the sun in all it’s splendour, telling us that we are his children, taking us into his strong arms. Almost similar to what happened during the Baptism of Jesus, when the heavens opened and the voice from above declared: “This is my beloved son.”

We are baptised in the name of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Today we have the great manifestation of the Holy Trinity. We see in action the workings of the three divine persons, fully present. The Father represented in the voice, Jesus, the Son being baptised, and the dove, the Holy Spirit. It is the first time in the New Testament, that we have a graphic image of them, acting before our senses in an exterior manner. It is a good representation of what happens to our soul when we are baptised, when we are in a state of grace, when we share friendship with God, that the whole Trinity comes to our soul and abides in us.

Baptism means to immerse. Today we can have our immersion, we can plunge ourselves into the immensity of God. We can die a bit to ourselves, to become a new creature, ready for this new year which begins for us, full of hope and promises. We come out of the water like the Phoenix, renewed and transformed. In the same way the water of the River Jordan touched Jesus’ skin, today we allow Jesus’ grace to touch our soul, washing away all our imperfections.

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Epiphany

The three wise men saw the star and followed it. This is the story of their lives, of their encounter with God, of their place in history. It is an amazing one; by following a star, they met a baby, and they discovered the Messiah. Humanly speaking it was crazy. Why did a passing star provoke that reaction on the Magi? How do you follow a star? Where or when is it going to stop? These are questions that belong to our lives. We too discovered a star, we are following it, and hopefully it will lead us to Jesus. It is crazy, but it is a divine adventure.

How do we discover the star? Good question. It is not easy. The three wise men dedicated their lives to astronomy, to the study of the sky, looking for clues to their own existence. Man has always looked at space to try to understand where we come from and where we are going to. We too need to spend time discerning the signs, the sparks, the footprints, God has placed in our way, to discover his will for us, to find our path, to hoist our sails towards the right wind. It is a work of prayer, contemplation, silence and reflection.

It is not enough to discover the star, but we need to follow it. Many people see the star but they don’t do anything about it. Others begin to walk, but they get discouraged; they stop and they go back. It is not easy to persevere on an unknown quest. We don’t know how long it is going to take, where it is going to finish, if it is really the right path, or we lost our way; perhaps we even missed an important crossroads. Sometimes the road goes through a desert, through a rough terrain, across wild plains, deep gorges, dense jungles. Other times there are robbers waiting for us, to attack us when we are distracted; there are beasts ready to devour us, unexpected rivers in flood, precipices that stop us from going ahead, fires raging from the bush threatening our path, sand storms, plagues of locusts and lightning strikes. From time to time, the star disappears behind the clouds and we think she is not there anymore.

As Pope Francis says, “Jesus allows himself to be found by those who seek him.” We know that we are not alone, that he travels with us, even though we don’t see him. To seek him we need to leave behind whatever slows us down; to travel light, we cannot carry much weight, to be able to keep pace with the star; and to keep our eyes fixed on the horizon, without getting distracted with the marvellous things we come across in our way. The devil is trying to slow us down, to get us stuck in the mud, to deviate us from the right direction, to turn us back to where we came from. If we persevere, we will find him. Whatever happens, the star is always up there.

We arrive at the crib empty handed. We came naked from our mother’s womb and we leave without anything. Pope Francis’ grandmother used to say that the shroud we are going to be buried in won’t have any pockets. What can we give to baby Jesus when we arrive in his presence? We haven’t got much. All we can do is to offer ourselves. It is easy; a baby brings out the best in us.

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