Scripture Sharing, Second Sunday of Advent, Year A – December 8th, 2019

    This Sunday the Church presented us with a beautiful selection of readings, all pointing towards the imminent hope of the coming Messiah. One Sister opened our discussion with an interesting point she read about this week’s Gospel. It appears odd that John the Baptist denounces the Pharisees and Sadducees so passionately when it seems that they are actually repenting – after all, aren’t they coming to be baptized as well? Not necessarily, according to the commentary Sister read. While St. Matthew notes that the crowds are going to John to be baptized, the Pharisees and Sadducees are simply coming to him, as if to “check him out.” Read in this context, the Baptist’s cry of “who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?” takes on an ironic tone that underlines the Pharisees’ and Sadducees’ spiritual blindness: the wrath is coming, but they are not really fleeing, only observing with an aloofness that will ultimately do them no good.

Another Sister was struck by the dual imagery of fire in John’s proclamation. On the one hand, God will “burn [the chaff] with unquenchable fire,” but on the other hand, the Messiah comes to “baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.” This paradox of fire as both destructive and creative is based on a deeper truth about God’s infinitely powerful love. If we reject His love and resist it, then it will consume us; if we “abide in [His] love” (John 15:9), however, then it purifies us and ignites a similar burning love in us. The choice is ours!

A line from the First Reading stood out to another Sister: “His delight shall be the fear of the LORD.” She saw this as reflecting Christ’s total joy, as the Son, in being perfectly obedient to His Father. Though as God both Persons are equal in majesty and power, the Incarnate Word declares over and over His devotion and submission to the Father – a submission that springs not from compulsion, but from Infinite Love. “My food is to do the will of Him Who sent Me,” Jesus declares in John 4. It is our goal to share in this incredible “delight” that springs from “fear of the LORD,” asking Christ to open our eyes to the joy of obedience that brings true freedom.

Finally, as Passionists, we couldn’t help but notice a number of ways that the First Reading alludes to the Paschal Mystery. A Sister who likes to consult the Douay-Rheims translation of the Bible was delighted to discover that the line the NAB translates as “His dwelling shall be glorious” is rendered in the Douay-Rheims as “His sepulcher shall be glorious.” What a beautiful connection with Christ’s Resurrection, which is the apex of His messianic mission prophesied in this reading! Another Sister focused on the image of the “root of Jesse.” In a commentary on the Servant Songs of Isaiah, St. Augustine interprets the unsightly root as the Suffering Christ, Whose Passion led to new life just as the buried root sends forth a beautiful plant. Finally, a Sister saw echoes of the Passion in the line, “the root of Jesse, set up as a signal for the nations – Him the nations will seek out”. Doesn’t this fit well with Our Lord’s famous declaration that “when I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all men to Myself?” (John 12:32) And truly, it was His redemptive Passion and Death that drew to Himself both Jews and Gentiles to form the Church.

We’re glad you’re keeping up with us for Scripture Sharing; be sure to stop by next week, as we discuss the readings for the Third Sunday of Advent – Gaudete Sunday!