When the incarnated Christ appeared on earth for the first time in Judea and Galilee about 2,000 years ago, a significant number of people did not listen to him. Nor they listened to his forerunner, John the Baptist, who announced the imminence of the incarnated Christ’s public appearance, thus, called people to prepare for it. In the Gospel Reading of Friday of Second Week of Advent (Matthew 11:16- 19), we hear Jesus expressing his lamentation of this matter with woes.
Why do we read this Gospel narrative during Advent
as our preparation to welcome the incarnated Christ in our hearts?
So that we prepare ourselves for the arrival of the
incarnated Christ in our hearts, as John the Baptist preached: repent and
cleanse our sinfulness – so that we will listen to the one, whom we welcome
into our hearts, the incarnated Christ.
In the First Reading (Isaiah 48:17-19), we hear God promising
to teach how to prevail in His blessings and guide His people in the right way
(v.17). Furthermore, God describes the blessings to those who listen to His
teaching and follow His way (vv. 19-19). And this promise of God was first announced
by Isaiah to give post-exilic hope for the Israelites and was reflected in John
the Baptist’s teaching to prepare the way (e.g. Matthew 3:2-3) as the way to
meet the incarnated Christ at his public appearance so that people would learn
from his teaching and walk in the right way as guided by him.
Though the incarnated Christ, as prophesized in the
Old Testament (e.g. Isaiah 7:14; Micah 5:1 (5:2 in Protestant version); Malachi
3:20 (4:2 in Protestant version), was already in public, his salvific words,
signs, and presence, were readily available to the public at that time, some
did not recognize Jesus as the prophesized incarnated Christ, born of the
virgin (Isaiah 7:14). And these people did not listen to John the Baptist’s
call to prepare for the public appearance of Christ, either. They ridiculed
both John the Baptist and Jesus. So, Jesus said, “To what shall I compare this generation? (Matthew 11:16a)”, as he
began rebuking those who did not listen to Jesus nor John the Baptist, therefore
never repent and convert (Matthew 11:16-27).
In his reproach to them, Jesus described those who
did not listen and repent as children sitting in the market places and calling
to each other (Matthew 11:16b) and as those who remained aloof and indifferent
to playing the flute to dance for joy and singing a quinar (elegy) for lamentation (Matthew 11:17). Not only they did
not listen to Jesus and John the Baptist, they ridiculed John as possessed
(Matthew 11:18) and Jesus as a glutton and drunkard, as well as, a friend of
tax collectors and sinners (Matthew 11:19ab). However, whether they listened to
him or not, Jesus said that his ministry works were to be the vindicating
divine wisdom (Matthew 11:19c,cf. 25-27; James 3:13-15; cf. 1 John 5:20).
Back when John the Baptist was busy with his
preparatory ministry for the public appearance of the incarnated Christ, John
said to the Pharisees and Sadducees, who were considered as hypocrites:
You
brood o vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce good
fruit as evidence of your repentance. And do not presume to say to yourselves,
“We have Abraham as our father”. For I tell you, God can raise up children to
Abraham from the stones. Even now the ax lies at the root of the trees.
Therefore every tree that does not bear god fruit will be cut down and thrown
into the fire (Matthew 3:-10).
It was like John the Baptist telling these
hypocrites, “You #&%! You think you are smart enough to get away with God’s
judgement, huh? Guess what? You will not, unless you repent and prepare
yourselves to receive Christ in your hearts and produce good fruits!
So, this is why John the Baptist said:
I
am baptizing you with water for repentance, but the one who is coming after me
is mightier than I. I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you
with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fan is in his hand. He will clear
his threshing floor and gather his wheat into his barn with unquenchable fire
(Matthew 3:11-12).
Though Matthew did not tell whether these
hypocrites, the Pharisees and Sadducees, repented and receive baptism from John
and converted their hearts to receive Christ, upon hearing these words of John
the Baptist, it was likely that many of them ignored John the Baptist’s call
for conversion as the way to receive Christ, whose public appearance was
imminent. Otherwise, Jesus would not have said what we read in the Gospel
Reading of Friday of the Second Week of Advent, Matthew 11:16-19.
God the redeemer will teach us what is good for us
and lead our way!
It means that God the redeemer comes to us as the
incarnated Christ in Jesus and teach us his Gospel (Good News) and leads us as
our Good Shepherd to the verdant pasture, which is the Kingdom of God where we
are redeemed.
Do we listen to our teacher, who is divine and,
therefore, the incarnated Christ, whose coming was announced by John the
Baptist?
Or, do we think that this is nonsense and therefore
reject God’s call to listen to His teaching through His Son and go on our ways
and get lost – and become the objects of the woes of Jesus (Matthew 11:16-27)
and John the Baptist (Matthew 3: 2-12 )?
Here is the deal offered by God! Thus said God
through Isaiah:
If
only you would attend to my commandments, your peace would be like a river,
your vindication like the waves of the sea, your descendants like the sand, the
offspring of your loins like its grains, their name never cut off or blotted
out from my presence (Isaiah 48:18-19).
Who would really decline this?!
So we know what will come with the incarnated
Christ, whose arrival in our hearts that we have been preparing for Advent
Season. We know the deal that God has offered us through His only begotten Son,
being sent to us.
And we will take heed to the words of the incarnated
Christ and follow the way that he leads. For this, we are preparing for his
arrival in our hearts during Advent Season.
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