Thursday of the Third Week of Advent

Thursday of the Third Week of Advent

(Isaiah 54:1-10; Luke 7:24-30)

When John’s disciples came looking for Jesus in Luke’s gospel, they asked if he was “the one who is to come.”  They wanted to know if he was the one to bring about God’s kingdom.  Jesus told the disciples to report to John the cures he was performing, the dead he was raising, and the poor whose hopes were being uplifted by his preaching.  With the report, John must decide if he will accept Jesus as the Messiah for his works.

Today’s gospel announces that those who repented of their sins and were baptized by John accepted Jesus as God’s righteousness.  This appears to be another way of calling him the “anointed one” or Messiah. It also sees these people standing in God’s favor.  The Pharisees do not repent of their sins, nor are baptized, and much less acknowledge Jesus as Messiah.  They, of course, stand outside God’s favor.

The passage calls us to do two things.  First, we must repent of our sins – constantly.  All of us have faults that need correction with the help of God.  Second, like Jesus, our leader, we must work to cure others, perhaps not of physical hurts but of emotional ones.  Likewise, we must raise people from the dead; that is, we must work to bring people back from the spiritual death of serious sin. And we must preach to the poor words and deeds that uplift their spirits.