EXERCISING THE AUTHORITY OF GOD

WEDNESDAY, FIRST WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME

Heb 2:14-18; Ps 105:1-4,6-9; Mk 1:29-39

The Authority from God

The author of the letter to the Hebrews explains the dynamics of dominion or authority we receive from God. Since every power or authority comes from God, who is the source of existence and life, to know and work in harmony with the immutable will of God is to have the authority of God. So, the possession of authority is not self-originated or self-directed by a rational creature, for it is only a mediated authority. We own the authority to the extent we own or appropriate the will of God for his creation. The authority the Son of Man exercises comes from his total conformity with the will of the Father. Psalm 40 puts this consecration in the mouth of the Son when coming into the world. The power of the blood of the Lamb flows from this consecration of the Lamb to the will of the Father; it is, therefore, the same power of God the Father as directed toward our salvation from sin and evil. He exercises this power or authority over us because he shares in our human nature. The Son of Man is superior or first in our common human nature because it is original in him and polluted or disoriented in us. Thus, the authenticity of our human nature in him gives him natural authority over everyone sharing the same nature. He can act on any person by the purity of our nature in him; the same purity makes him able to mediate the divine power better than any of us.

Subsequently, the power of purity of nature and mediacy come together in the Son of Man to make his power to save us utterly certain. In the latter sense, he is also the Incarnate Wisdom because he is the Eternal Word made flesh. These are captured in the reading as follows: “Since all the children share the same blood and flesh, Christ too shared equally in it, so that by his death (consecration) he could take away all the power of the devil, who had power over death, and set free all those who had been held in slavery all their lives by the fear of death.” The power of the devil over man is the inverse working of the power of truth. He works in us through the absence of the knowledge of the divine will that perfects our nature. The lack is formidable in a rational nature, made to mirror and contain God. Because Satan is the first to forsake the divine truth that is the rational light, he rules the region of ignorance through the power of rational darkness or lies. He coordinates the absence of truth in rational creatures to form a formidable kingdom of darkness. His most dreadful weapon is deception; thus, the Lord calls him the father of lies for he deceives the whole world by his lies. By this weapon, he gives death, which is the absence of the Eternal Word, to souls. The Son of Man, by the stated powers, sets us free by revealing the will of the Father to us through his ministry in human nature.

As in our reflection on Monday, our first religious obligation is to pay attention to Jesus Christ and learn the Father’s will for our eternal salvation. It is by understanding the will of the Father in Christ and through him that he sets us free from the lies and power of the devil through which he deals death to us. Christ is our compassionate high priest because of the Father’s will—the holiest thing—he gives us. “It was essential that he should in this way become completely like his brothers so that he could be a compassionate and trustworthy high priest of God’s religion, able to atone for human sins.” He overcame the temptations through his knowledge and doing of the Father’s will, to which he is consecrated from the beginning, as we celebrated on Sunday. Understanding our nature and what we lack, he supplies them by being present to us in our shared humanity. He reveals God to us and the truth about our nature. Truth sets us free from the captivity of devils and forces of darkness. “The whole town came crowding round the door, and he cured many who were suffering from disease of one kind or another; he also cast out many devils, but he would not allow them to speak, because they knew who he was.” They know him to be the righteous One, who comes with the will of the Father and purity of our human nature.

Let us pray: Grant us, Lord, the grace to see the truth about our human nature in the Son of Man and know your holy will concerning our nature which your Son shared with us, that we may abandon the seeking of our will and follow him in his sacrifice that leads to full communion with you. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever.