It is important that we heed this command
of the prophet with the utmost seriousness, so to speak, that is, that we hand
our hearts over completely to the joy that is genuinely ours because, on the
one hand, we know that in the crucified and risen Lord the mystery that he
proclaims has already been accomplished. The Lord has already removed the
judgment against us, sin and death no longer reign over our world, the Lord has
not only done the astonishing, unheard-of thing of assuming our flesh, but on
the Cross, he has borne the burden of our sins cross and blotted them out, freed
us from death, and granted us a share in his own eternal life. In baptism we
have already died to ourselves, awaiting our Savior in faith and love we already
have our citizenship in heaven. This is the starting point in which our Advent
expectation plays out.
Yet, even more, we rejoice on account of
our hope, for at the same time we recognize that all this is only a beginning
of what the Lord has in mind for those who love him; not only in the next world
but in the here and now, for our God is a God who comes with gifts that
enlighten and transform, who, in his utterly gratuitous mercy, forgives, comforts,
heals, restores and renews. Moreover, he comes with the fulfillment of what we
truly desire, which is he himself; for in him, and him alone, do we find our
true joy.
Therefore, we are to let go of all sadness,
fear, and discouragement, for they have no place in our hearts, as if God’s
work could somehow be undercut or thwarted by any worldly thing, or as if he
would not follow through on what he has promised. As St. Paul tells us in the
Second Reading, “Have no anxiety at all, but in everything, by prayer and
petition, with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God.” The consequence
of such a surrender of self is the reign of the peace of God that surpasses all
understanding over our hearts and minds.
Today’s Gospel tells us that “the people
were filled with expectation, and all were asking in their hearts whether John
might be the Messiah.” The experience of Israel has much to teach us about our
own preparation for the Lord’s coming. With the appearance of John, the long
period of waiting is over, the fullness of time long promised by the prophets
has come. The anointed one is now in their midst. Yet they do not recognize
him, for he has not yet shown himself. He is here, but where is he and who is
he? How will we know him when he comes? Could John be the one?
Israel has long been living in this
uncertainty, in this tension of knowing and not knowing. Since the return from
exile, they find the age of the prophets behind them, as are the great
historical works of God’s salvation. Throughout the centuries-long period from
the time of the return from the exile, until the appearance of John the
Baptist, Israel must bear the barrenness of prophetic silence, of no mighty
deeds from God, such as it had experienced in its origins. God has sent a true
famine on the land, “not a famine of bread, nor of thirst for water, but of
hearing the words of the Lord.” (Amos 8:11-12) The promises of the prophets
have failed to be fulfilled, the small remnant that returned from exile could
hardly feel itself representative of the twelve tribes. All is uncertainty. Israel
waits for the divine glory to manifest itself once again in her midst. The
divine it once knew continually withdraws, never becoming present reality.
Israel cannot go back to what it once knew, and what it is moving toward it
cannot yet reach. This is a period of deep trial. Israel is being disciplined
in a very difficult experience: God’s freedom to speak or not to speak, to act
or not to act. The remnant must remain firm within this middle pause,
meditating on and interiorizing the immense riches of all that it has received,
but in waiting, not anticipating the Lord’s next act.
For Israel cannot force the divine glory
into the open. On its own, it is incapable of drawing the various lines of its
tradition together so that they converge on a particular figure. Only God can
provide the synthesis, and Israel must not anticipate a solution but endure in
patient expectation and hope. Otherwise, it will place an obstruction before
God’s solution and become its opponents. Thus Israel’s task is to remain firm,
in patience, in this unresolved longing.
Israel was prohibited from forming images of
God, God himself was to provide this image. Man himself has been revealed by
God to be made in his image, but because he is not God, he cannot know what it
means to be in the image of God unless God shows him. Von Balthasar says that
man’s fundamental creaturely state as image is to be at a twofold remove – from
God and from nothing. He is not God, and he is not nothing, but, as image, he is
a schwebende Mitte, an oscillating, floating, or suspended middle. Rooted
in the cosmos, the tensions in which he finds himself between essence and
existence, spirit and body, man and woman, individual and community cannot be
resolved on his own. All attempts to do so end in aporia, confusion. As
such, man is undefinable. On his own, he can find no place on which to stand. Man
finds his measure only in the measure that God has given him, in God’s true
image, his only-begotten Son. Only God can establish for man the proper measure
of likeness and unlikeness, of distance and nearness to God, in which he may
live to the full his condition as creature. Only in his Son do the various
tensions of human existence find their meaning and flourish.
For Guerric of Igny, the condition of the
righteous man is one of suspensa expectatio, suspended expectation. As
such, it is a state of joy and of hope, for everyone who hopes in the Lord will
not be disappointed, for the Lord has said that he will come, and he is true to
his promise. Man’s call is to live in the between, to be in suspense between
heaven and earth. Living on earth, he is already a citizen of heaven, awaiting
the coming of his savior. Already our being is with the Lord, for our nature,
which the Lord took upon himself and offered on our behalf, is already
glorified with him. By that power that was his of lying down his own life, the
Lord freely chose to hang from the cross, so that being raised up over the
earth he might draw us to himself and hang us also above earthly concerns. We
participate even now in the life of the glorified Lord, insofar as we live from
the cross, insofar as we hang on the Lord suspended between heaven and earth in
the already and not yet.
“A man can wait for the Lord more
trustfully if his conscience is so at rest as to let him say: ‘Every smallest
possession of mine, Lord, is entirely yours, for I have treasured up in heaven
all my powers, either by giving them to you or by renouncing them for you. At
your feet I have laid down all that is mine, knowing that you will be able not
just to keep it safe, but to restore it to me multiplied a hundred-fold and add
to it eternal life.’”
The way to dwell most fruitfully in this
suspended middle is to “hang” on the Lord, to lay up all our powers, our
intellect, our will, and our senses, in the glorified Lord, God’s divine image,
in whom our glorified humanity already dwells. In him, these powers of ours, are
not only kept safe but restored to us multiplied a hundred-fold, already in
this life. And where our treasure is our heart is also. “Let your hearts go
then, let them go after their treasures; let your attention be fixed on high
and your expectancy hang upon the Lord so that you can justly say with the
apostle: ‘Our abiding place (our conversatio, in the Vulgate), is in
heaven, from where we are expecting the Savior to come.’”
When we make this humble self-gift of
handing over our powers wholly to the Lord, our hearts will follow. We will
come to love this new abiding place, in which we exercise these powers, received
back from the Lord functioning in a new way, more in conformity with his own
powers. To hang on the Lord in this way is to live as he did, who laid up his
divinity and his humanity in the Father, placing them wholly at his disposal to
do with them as he willed. In this way, more conformed to the divine image, we
will serve him and our neighbor, and those most dear to us, in greater freedom,
our souls will rest in greater peace, and when he comes, in whatever way he
comes, we will be ready for him and, by his grace, we will see him and will
receive him with joy.
This Sunday's homily by Father Timothy.
