Near indeed is our salvation
Today's Mass Readings
“Our God will come to save us!” exclaims today’s beautiful excerpt from Psalm 85. “Kindness and truth shall meet; justice and peace shall kiss. Truth shall spring out of the earth, and justice shall look down from heaven.” Isaiah reflects this joyful anticipation, describing all that is to come – the blooming of flowers, the blind seeing, the deaf hearing, the mute speaking, the streams flowing – it is a marvelous picture indeed! In the gospel passage, meanwhile, we have not so much a poetic description as a serious story of a man in need of healing. So persistent are those who carry the man’s stretcher that they actually approach Jesus by breaking into a house through the ceiling. When the man’s stretcher is lowered directly in front of Jesus, he tells the man, “Your sins are forgiven.” Many of the bystanders are offended that Jesus would presume to be able to forgive sins. Rather than argue the point, Jesus gives them a sign of his authority to forgive sins: he heals the man, saying to him, “Rise, pick up your stretcher, and go home.”
sign. Jesus gives us a sign of God’s presence in the world. But more than that, Jesus is the sign, he is God among us! “Our God will come to save us!” we can exclaim with the psalm response. Jesus is the one who makes the blind see, the deaf hear, the mute speak, the lame walk! Are we willing to hear this message? Are we willing to step into the love God offers us in his son Jesus, who will come to us as an infant, minister to us, be crucified, rise from the dead, and ultimately come once more? Are we willing to turn out minds and hearts to this promise, to live our lives as though this is what really matters?
As we begin this second week in Advent, may our willingness to live as children of God be spoken in the words of today’s psalm: “I will hear what God proclaims; the LORD –for he proclaims peace to his people. Near indeed is his salvation to those who fear him, glory dwelling in our land.” Near indeed is our salvation! May our lives bear witness to this promise!
_- Maria Morrow