Be strong, fear not! Here is your God!

+ J. M. J. +

Homily Outline for the 23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B

Be strong, fear not! Here is your God, he comes with vindication; with divine recompense he comes to save you.

God comes Himself to save us! No one who heard Isaiah’s words could have imagined anything but a military victory: the Kingdom of Israel restored, prosperous, powerful, and honored. And, yet, we see hidden here in plain view the great mystery of the Incarnation, God coming to dwell among us in the Flesh, a man like us in all things but sin.

What would God do when He came?

Then will the eyes of the blind be opened, the ears of the deaf be cleared; then will the lame leap like a stag, then the tongue of the mute will sing.

He will bring sight, we will see beauty; He will bring sound, we will hear truth; He will bring strength and wholeness, we will leap and live; He will fill us with His grace and we will sing.

God kept this promise. Jesus went among the people and taught and healed and cast out demons. We hear today of His earthy healing of a deaf man with a speech impediment: a man who could neither hear the speech of others, nor speak well himself. His communication with others was blocked and Jesus said, “Be opened,” and he spoke plainly. Those who observed were exceedingly astonished, and they said, “He has done all things well.” God’s promise through Isaiah is fulfilled.

Great! Wonderful! Beautiful! But, what does this have to do with us today? That was 2000 years ago—now we have medicine, and doctors, and hospitals, now we have hearing aids and speech therapists and technology. Why would our hearts be frightened? Why do we need God to come with vindication and divine recompense? Brothers and sisters in Christ, we need the hope that God offers us more now than ever. Yesterday, as every day of the year, over three thousand children were surgically aborted in our country, leaving their mothers and fathers wounded and in need of healing. Roughly 100 people committed suicide, and that rate has been going up for over 10 years. The number of marriages has been steadily dropping, and marriage itself is now very much under attack. Our national birthrate is below replacement in our country, which means that without immigration, our population will shrink each year. Mass attendance in the US has been dropping in many places, and the average age of our congregations increases. Each one of us faces these and other struggles in our own lives, in our own homes, among our families and friends. In the media, we hear that the steady march of modern progress continues, and while it’s true that our cell phones are more powerful than ever before, nevertheless, I think if we look around us, and if we look within, we will quickly realize that we need hope, and Divine Help, very much indeed.

I was discussing some of these issues with a group of our Knights at Keenagers as we pulled off the old wallpaper. Somebody remarked on the grimness of these statistics, pointing out that the Lord seems to be hidden in the midst of all of this. It is true that the challenges we face are very great. It certainly appears that the tide has turned against life, against family, and against faith in our so-called modern world. Many would rather ignore or justify these grim statistics rather than seriously assessing the shadowlands we have walked into as a culture and society. But, there is little honesty or courage in looking away from these hard facts, and certainly no adequate response to be found by ignoring them. I don’t enjoy bringing them to your attention, but I could not be faithful to the Lord if I were silent. The Culture of Death does seem in many places to have the upper hand over the Culture of Life.

That would never have been more true than on Good Friday, such a paradoxical name for that dark day when Jesus Christ went to the Cross as most of His disciples turned their backs. We know, however, that there is more to the story. And that is just as true now as then—there is more to the story. God’s love for us is undiminished. Even as our ears have often been blocked, and our tongues tied, God has not stopped offering us healing and strength. Vocations to the priesthood and the consecrated life are on the rise in many quarters, and some families are choosing God and faith and life even though it’s an uphill battle. Even more importantly—YOU are here today, YOU are here seeking God, seeking His grace, seeking His will. The only adequate response to God is YES! If that “Yes” becomes full, it leads to sanctity, and saints change the world, on life at a time. Each of us received that call at our baptisms: will we answer it now, and then again tomorrow, and the next day? God will open our ears to His truth, and we will be empowered to speak the truth of His love with our lives. Our world is very broken, and we are broken, too, and in this brokenness the Lord says:

“Be strong, fear not! Here is your God, he comes with vindication; with divine recompense he comes to save you.”

He comes now to this altar to save us, and through us, the whole world.

+ A. M. D. G. +