Four hundred years of no prophet challenging the judgments of the kings, unmasking the hypocrisy of priests or threatening the religiously complacent in Israel.
Like a wildfire that erupts in dry desert brush, John appears in the wasteland to the west of Jerusalem, and the searing truth of his words mesmerizes all who hear him. Drawn to him like moths to a flame, they come to listen, to examine their ways, and to repent and be baptized as a sign of their new life and their commitment to righteousness. The Baptist is apparently a fire-and-brimstone kind of preacher. He does not mince words, even likenening the religious leaders who come out to hear him to snakes fleeing before a wildfire or a harvester's sickle. And yet it is not the fact that he dresses like the prophet Elijah that attracts them, nor his peculiar diet, but his words. They are direct, brutally blunt, drawing attention not to himself, but to God, and to the One God is sending. John is self-effacing, saying he is not even worthy to be the slave of the One-to-come. Using frightening, apocalyptic language, John tells the crowds that the merits of Abraham are not enough to spare them from the wrath of God, but only a reformed life.
In the next chapter of Matthew when Jesus begins his ministry, he uses the same words as the Baptist, 'repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.' (Mt 4:17) But Jesus' ministry is not the hellfire and brimstone his cousin John expects, so he sends messengers to ask Jesus, 'are you the one who is to come, or should we look for another?' (Mt. 11:2) His response is, 'go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind regain their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have the good news proclaimed to them' (Mt. 11:4-5)
Rather than cutting down sinners, like an ax laid to the roots of a tree, Jesus walks among the vineyard of his Father tending the bruised and uprooted vines, bringing forgiveness and interior healing, along with physical healing. He is the ideal king foretold by Isaiah in the first reading, the shoot springing from the seemingly lifeless roots of Jesse, King David's father.
John the Baptist preaches that the One-who-is-coming will baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire. During Advent we await the return of Jesus, but let's not forget that his first advent has already come to pass. We who have been baptized in water have also been given a share in the Spirit. The Hebrew word that is translated as spirit is ruach, which has a double meaning in Hebrew. On the one hand it means breath, and for all living things breath means life. When God's Spirit enters us, the tired, weary defeatedness we can feel in the face of our obstacles is chased away, replaced with a sense of possibility and hope. But ruach also means wind in Hebrew. Not simply a gentle breeze, but the irresistible power of the storm. When we live in the Spirit, the weakness of human flesh is clad with the power of God, and we are capable of doing what we thought impossible, facing what we feared most, bearing what we thought unendurable. Ruach is the name given to the spirit hovering over the waters in the beginning of the story of creation. Jesus, filled with ruach, is the Father's agent of re-creation as he brings light to sightless eyes, strengthens withered limbs, and frees those enslaved by their past.
While we await Jesus' return during Advent, he has not left us orphans. (John 14:18) The same Spirit living in Jesus, abides in us, too, given to us by the Father. (John 14:16) The power of Jesus to reconcile and heal still resides in his body, the Church - in you and me.
A beautiful example of the Spirit's power is found in a new ministry at the Newman Center, the ministry of healing prayer. For up to three years, members of this community and other local Catholic churches have been in formation and discernment, preparing for this ministry using a model first presented over thirty years ago by the late Fr. Leo Thomas, a Dominican friar in Seattle. Often when people hear of a ministry of healing prayer they may expect miraculous healing of disease. The criteria for the success or failure of healing prayer is different from those of the medical community which often thinks of health only in terms of physical symptoms - - as the lack of disease. The goal of healing prayer is to help people become more whole through an experience of worship of the God who is passionately in love with each of us. This, too, is real healing. When Jesus rehabilitated and commissioned the repentant Peter after the Resurrection, he did not tell Peter to 'work miracles', but to 'tend my sheep'. (John 21:16)
The ministry of healing prayer is a gentle tending of members of Jesus' flock who are suffering for any reason: emotionally, physically, or spiritually. Those who request this ministry will gather at the Newman Center for an hour with four members of a prayer team, whose goal will be to facilitate an awareness of God's presence and focus on the supplicant's needs before finally praying. The formation the prayer teams go through helps them 'put on Christ' more effectively, so that they can listen attentively and serenely, rather than tell their own stories, and have respect and unconditional love for a supplicant. In this way they imitate Christ, whose response to those who sought him was to listen to what they wanted and needed and then to act. The ministry of healing prayer is successful when God has become real to the supplicant, and when the way they experience their situation has changed, so that they feel less alienated and have more hope. In Christ, ministry extends beyond curing disease. It leads first us and then others into God's own health: - the physical, emotional, spiritual, and relational wholeness of our triune God.
In this way, the ministry of healing prayer, like all ministry, becomes a form of nurturing. All of us have experiences which feel like an axe being taken to our roots: a serious illness, the loss of employment, an impending divorce, failure in school, the weight of loneliness. In times like these healing prayer becomes part of the nurturing we need that allows a shoot to spring up from deep within our roots where God's spirit still dwells.
In Advent we wait for Jesus to return and establish in its fullness the kingdom where the wolf is guest of the lamb and the earth filled with the knowledge of the Lord. But while we wait, let us not forget that Christ's first advent culminated in his sending us the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. Thus we are not impotent in the face of the suffering of our brothers and sisters. The Spirit dwells in us, enabling God to truly work in and through us for real nurturing and healing. Let John the Baptist's call to repent ring in our ears this week, calling us to turn from self-absorption and busyness to attentive listening and nurturing of one another. Let our Advent preparation for Christmas be a time in which we grow conscious of our wounded or neglected relationships. Rather than buying a trinket from a store, let us become aware of the genuine needs of our neighbors and co-workers: the need for kind words, an attentive ear, and undivided attention. Let us minister to one another so that we might ”grow in harmony, in keeping with Christ Jesus.“ (Romans 15:5b) Then our celebration of Christmas will be a celebration of Christ already present in Spirit, in us.
Reprinted with the kind permission of:
St. Thomas More University Parish
1850 Emerald Street
Eugene, OR 97403
Visit their website at
http://www.uonewman.org/
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