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Today’s Scripture readings perplexed me at first glance, but a line from the Responsorial Psalm shed light on the passages (a helpful hint from the Vatican’s lectionary gurus) – “Let us see your face and we shall be saved.”
The passages from Sirach and Matthew’s Gospel are all about seeing and recognizing God in our midst. In the first reading, we hear of the awesome power and glory that surrounded the prophet Elijah, one of God’s greatest messengers to the Israelites. His words “were as a flaming furnace” in their immediacy and zeal, and his miraculous actions jolted sleepwalking Israelites awake, at least for a moment.
Elijah proclaimed a message of God’s faithfulness, God’s special love of the poor, and a reminder that being a follower of God has real implications for how we treat one another. Those who get what Elijah is about are favored in God’s eyes: “Blessed is he who shall have seen you (Elijah) and who falls asleep in your friendship.” When we see and befriend Elijah’s message, we welcome God into our lives.
The Gospel reading picks up on this theme. Jesus tells his disciples that even though Elijah came with fiery chariots and a message from God, he wasn’t recognized as God’s herald. Instead, he was rejected and oppressed. It will be the same for those, like Elijah, who are called to confront the status quo: John the Baptist, Christ himself, disciples through the ages. It’s not easy to recognize God when our comfort is threatened. The job for us on our journey is to notice where God appears, to see and recognize the divine presence in all we meet, and to respond with a radical love. It is our job to see God in the beggar, the orphan, the widow, the immigrant, the estranged family member, the annoying co-worker – to find and honor God in the most unexpected people and places. This, I think, is a central message of Christmas, as we gather around the crèche and remember how shocking it is that God sent a poor, homeless, helpless child to save the world.
- Mike Laskey is the youth minister at the Church of St. Ann and a program coordinator at the Center for FaithJustice
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