Jesus said to them in reply, “Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind regain their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have the good news proclaimed to them. And blessed is the one who takes no offense at me.”
In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus responds to the disciples of John the Baptist who ask him if he is the one to come, the Messiah. In Jesus’ response, there is what is heralded in each of the other readings and the Responsorial Psalm. Of the coming of God, Isaiah says, “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.” Similarly, the psalmists says, “The LORD gives sight to the blind; the LORD raises up those who were bowed down.” And in the second reading from James, he encourages his brothers and sisters to wait patiently as a farmer waits for “the precious fruit of the earth” because “the coming of the Lord is at hand.” What does that mean to me that God’s kingdom is amid the ordinariness of each day and certainly amid the extraordinary joyful expectation of this day, Gaudete Sunday?
God, help me take this in and understand it. The kingdom of heaven is coming, and the kingdom of heaven is here now. As Jesus tells the crowds: “among those born of women there has been none greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.” In Jesus’ coming, I have what no one before him had. Although no one was greater than the forerunner John, the least in the kingdom, in Jesus’ coming, is greater than John. Even today, Lord, you feed the least in your kingdom with the Eucharist and the sacraments, with us until you come again in glory. Be here with me today during the Mass, in receiving the Eucharist, and present in me through the Holy Spirit.
God of all, you heal us in mind, body, and spirit through the saving power of your Son. Help me see and hear you today so that I can do your will to give you glory.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
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