WE ARE GUIDED BY THE HEAVENLY BLESSINGS

MONDAY, THIRD WEEK OF ADVENT

Num 24:2-7,15-17; Ps 25:4-6,7-9; Mt 21:23-27

The Redeemed are guided by the Word

The reading from the Book of Numbers features the prophecy of Balaam when Balak, the king of Moab, paid him to lay a curse on the people of Israel as they marched their way to the Promised Land. But to the annoyance of Balak, the prophet Balaam blessed the children of Israel and was never able to curse them. The reason for his inability to place a curse on Israel is of good instruction to us. Num 23:8 “How shall I curse someone whom God has not cursed, how denounce someone God has not denounced?” He could not curse them because of the blessing they bore as people of God, from whom the Eternal Word would take flesh. The first reading specifies this reason. “How fair are your tents, O Jacob! How fair your dwellings, Israel! Like valleys that stretch afar, like gardens by the banks of a river, like aloes planted by the Lord, like cedars beside the waters! A hero arises from their stock, he reigns over countless people. His king is greater than Agag, his majesty is exalted.” Here, the scripture makes it clear that the blessings of Israel are due to the Saviour who would come from them. Thus, the unbounded blessings of the Saviour go back to the beginning of the Jewish race. Like a star in the historical distance, his light enlightens all before him who carries the life he would share in his human nature.

The blessings on the tribes of Israel are not conditional as depending on God and on the word of blessings, he gave to Abraham and his descendants. But they are conditional relative to each person, who is to carry and transmit that life and blessings. Each person receives the effects of the blessings according to his faithfulness to God, who spoke the blessings to their ancestors. While the given blessings remain objectively with the tribes of Israel, each person or group of people may fail to receive the blessings due to unfaithfulness to God. Based on this subjective possibility of falling away from God’s blessings, Balaam admonished Balak to devise a means to make the children of Israel sin against God. These most heavenly blessings are also given to us as the people called to inherit God through Jesus Christ. Because the blessings precede Abraham, they are for every human person created to inherit God in Jesus Christ. Saint Paul enunciated this claim in the opening verses of his letter to the Ephesians. God has blessed us with every spiritual blessing of heaven in Jesus Christ. Objectively, these heaven blessings are intact for the human race in Jesus Christ and do not depend on what we do as a race. Subjectively, it depends on each person's acceptance through faith in Jesus Christ, for what God gave as a gift must be accepted by faith or rejected by refusal to believe. Nobody can curse us when we believe in the Gospel, for we bear God’s blessings.

The objective and general gift of salvation to our human race is what we see in the presence of Jesus Christ among us. He preached the Gospel of salvation openly and revealed the Father to us as our salvation and end. By his assumption of our human nature, we have received him and the salvation he embodies objectively. Thanks to all who cooperated with the graces of God to prepare our nature for the reception of what God promised. We must mention the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, our Mother and Queen, among others. Their acceptance to cooperate with the graces of God made salvation available for us. The original blessings of God were at work in all these saints, protecting and guiding them to fruition in the salvation of each of us. In the Gospel, we see the chief priests and the elders of the people reject the objective salvation given by Jesus Christ for their subjective condemnation. “‘John’s baptism: where did it come from: heaven or man?’ And they argued it out this way among themselves, ‘If we say from heaven, he will retort, ‘Then why did you refuse to believe him?’; but if we say from man, we have the people to fear, for they all hold that John was a prophet.’ So, their reply to Jesus was, ‘We do not know.’” They rejected the salvation God freely gave them in Christ by refusing to admit and affirm the truth due to their own personal or selfish end. The same can happen if we are unfaithful to the Gospel in preference to our selfish gains. The authority of the Saviour would not protect us then. He refused the saving truth to the chief priests: “Nor will I tell you my authority for acting like this.”

Let us pray: Incline a merciful ear to our cry, we pray, O Lord, and, casting light on the darkness of our hearts, visit us with the grace of your Son. Who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever.