Mass readings for Monday in the second week of Advent:
Isaiah 35:1-10 (God himself will come and save you.)
Responsorial Psalm: Isaiah 35:4f
Luke 5:17-26 (healing of the paralyzed man)
My 4-year-old grandson brought a book to his mother and asked her to read it aloud. "What's it about?" she asked. He answered, "How Johnny defeats Clement." Clement,
as you probably guessed, is his older brother, and besting Clement — at running or riding a bike — would for Johnny be vindiction, divine recompense. And in that, he's just like the rest of us, though we've learned to disguise our desires with coats of pious paint.
So what are we to do with the song from the mouth of the prophet Isaiah, who promises, "Here is your God,/ he comes with vindication;/ with divine recompense/ he comes to save you"? Because the promise is not about settling scores, with us as the score-keepers. The recompense of God is abundance and healing — eyes that see, ears that hear. This is a holy way to walk "for those with a journey to make," which is to say, all of us wounded and thirsty and weak-kneed pilgrims. We're even comforted that "no fools go astray on this path," good news, it would seem, for foolish us.
But is this good news? By recompense, we mean, somebody pays. The powerful who witness Jesus offer forgiveness to the paralyzed man are not glad to see this outpouring of mercy. They want a credentials check and punishment for the one who can't produce the proper paperwork. So Jesus, the very hymn of Isaiah walking among them, makes visible the recompense of God. "I say to you, rise, pick up your stretcher, and go home."
In the darkness of Advent we ask for light, that our blind eyes would be opened. Opened to see, not as we see, but as God sees. We ask that our frightened hearts be strengthened to put away fear and receive a mercy we can neither imagine nor perhaps yet even desire. A mercy in which there is no longer beast of prey or prey, just the ransomed, going home, singing and crowned with everlasting joy.
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