Message from Augie

A woman once described stepping out of a long winter of grief and noticing for the first time in months, the ordinary brilliance of things.  The shape of a bare tree against the sky.   The shine of morning on a sidewalk.  “I thought something had changed out there, she said later, but it was me,  I had forgotten what unfiltered beauty felt like.

Faith has moments like that, when something of Christ’s truth or mercy breaks through with such clarity that it overwhelms.  Today’s Gospel invites such a gaze.  It asks us not simply to hear about Christ, but to behold Him.

In today’s Gospel Lesson, John the Baptist sees Jesus approaching  across the dusty ground near the Jordan and utters a single sentence that gathers up centuries of longing:   “Look there is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”.  To the casual ear, it may sound poetic but obscure.  Yet for Israel, “the lamb” was the thread running through God’s acts of deliverance, the Passover Lamb whose blood marked freedom from oppression, the temple lamb offered for forgiveness, the suffering servant who “bears the sin of many” in Isaiah’s vision.  John points to Jesus and says, in effect, “Here, all of this has come together in Him.”

Someone once said after a difficult week of news, “I just wish someone would tell me what we’re supposed to do with a world like this.”  It wasn’t cynicism, it was longing for direction.

John’s proclamation answers that longing.  If He is the Lamb of God, then our choices have a place in His redeeming work.

SO THE QUESTION:    CAN WE SAY “BEHOLD THE LAMB OF GOD” IS THE ANSWER TO OUR DAILY LIVES?

PRAYER TO ST. JUDE:  St. Jude, apostle of Christ, the church honors and prays to you universally as the patron of hopeless and difficult cases.   Pray for us in our needs.   Make use, we implore you of this powerful privilege given to you to bring visible and speedy help where help is needed.  Pray that we humbly accept the trials and disappointments and mistakes which are a part of our human nature.   Help us to see the reflection of the suffering of Christ in the trials and tribulations of our lives.   Let us see in a spirit of great faith and hop the part we even now share in the joy of Christ’s resurrection and which we long to share fully in heaven.   Intercede that we may again experience this joy in answer to our present needs.   If it is God’s dire for us (here make your request)  we know our prayers will be heard through your intercession.  AMEN