BROTHERS, SISTERS, AND MOTHER OF JESUS


TUESDAY, THIRD WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME  

2 Sam 6:12-15,17-19; Ps 24:7-10; Mk 3:31-35

The Power to bring forth Jesus Christ

As we explained yesterday from the letters of Saint Paul to the two saints who were converted and raised by his apostolic grace, favour, and works, namely, Timothy and Titus, the Gospel or the Word of God has the power to transform us into Jesus Christ. This is possible because the Word is Spirit and Life. The Word as the Life is the source of all lives and author of all natures. As the bearer of the divine will of the Father from the beginning, the Word gives existence to all things and life to every living creature in their different natures. Thus, by his Incarnation, the Father has given us everything we can ever imagine and power unimaginable. Subsequently, we heard the Son of Man say at the opening of his public ministry that the kingdom of heaven is now close at hand. As Life, his coming has brought an end to the tyranny of death and the reign of he who has the power of death, with which he terrorised the human race due to our sins. As Light, the Word’s coming in our human nature has caused the eternal and heavenly day to dawn on us, whereby he has driven away our darkness of ignorance of God’s will and love for us. Those who enter into the divine largesse through faith rejoice exceedingly as if they have stumbled upon spoils of inestimable worth.

We must come to his presence to enjoy these heavenly and inestimable wealth and spiritual riches he makes superabundant for us. Only the one who meditates on the import of the divine presence of the Word can truly enter into these abundant material and spiritual goodies the coming of the Word has made available to us. As we have come to know, David was always filled with a deep appreciation for God’s presence in His word and meditated on it often, a practice he had imbibed from his youth as a shepherd boy. He, alone, was able to penetrate the riches of the divine presence given in the ark of the covenant and reverenced it duly. “David went and brought the ark of God up from Obed-edom’s house to the citadel of David with great rejoicing. When the bearers of the ark of the Lord had gone six paces, he sacrificed an ox and a fat sheep.” He danced and rejoiced before the Lord to demonstrate the unmerited gift that the divine presence is to his people, Israel. As the king of Israel, he danced to express his gratitude to the Lord for allowing him to rule his people in His place. “And David danced whirling round before the Lord with all his might, wearing a linen loincloth round him. Thus, David and all the House of Israel brought up the ark of the Lord with acclaim and the sound of the horn.” If David so rejoiced before the presence of God given in the ark of the covenant, we ought to rejoice even more before the humanity of our Lord, for God is more present to us in his Incarnation than he was in the ark of the covenant.

The Church venerates the Blessed Virgin Mary, the mother of Jesus Christ, as the new Ark of the Covenant. The reason being that just as the old ark of the covenant contained the two tablets of the Law and a jar of the manna the Israelites ate in the wilderness, the Blessed Virgin Mary similarly contained the New Law of the Christian people, Jesus Christ; He is also the bread from heaven, who gives eternal life to all who eat of him as the Word of God. Since we become containers of the Eternal Word of God by eating of him, Jesus extends the privilege of the Blessed Virgin Mary to us in a mystical sense. The Blessed Virgin Mary is unique as the mother of the Incarnate Word in a physical or natural sense. But she is a type of the Church as the mother of Jesus Christ in a mystical sense; for all the members of the Church conceive and bring forth Jesus Christ by hearing and obeying the Gospel. Thus, our Lord answered those who came to inform him of the desire of his relatives to speak with him: “Who are my mother and my brothers? And looking round at those sitting in a circle about him, he said, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers. Anyone who does the will of God, that person is my brother and sister and mother.” Hence, the Gospel transforms us into brothers, sisters, and mothers of Jesus Christ as we bring forth Christ in others.

Let us pray: Almighty ever-living God, direct our actions according to your good pleasure, that in the name of your beloved Son we may abound in good works. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. 

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