HOMILY WEEK 02 04 – Year I
Living in an Intimate Covenant Relationship with God
(Heb 7:25-8:6; Ps40; Mk 3:7-12)
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A young man shared a dilemma with a friend. He was in love with two young women. One was a wonderful baker, and the other a wonderful poet, and he did not know which to marry. His friend commiserated with him, “You do have a problem – you don’t know whether to get married for batter or for verse!”
“Jesus is the mediator of a better covenant.”
Those words from the first reading invite us to enter into an ever more intimate covenant relationship with God the Father through Jesus Christ as Son of God, the Messiah and Eternal High Priest.
Throughout salvation history, it seems God’s main concern was to have an intimate covenant relationship with his creatures, starting with a couple (Adam and Eve), then a family (Noah), followed by a tribe (Abraham), then with a nation (Moses).
There was a problem with the covenant with Moses, however. In the words of Hebrews, it was only a “sketch and a shadow of the heavenly one.” It was based on the Law, rigid, exacting, legalistic, a matter of reward and punishment: keeping the law one would be blessed – break it and one would be cursed. The Law could only name and punish sin, not transform it. It led to a sacrificial and externalist temple religion that did not change hearts and actually became a corrupt, oppressive religious system.
A shift occurred when God entered into a covenant with David – it was a covenant of unconditional love. No matter what David did or did not do, God would be with him. And David sinned – adultery and even murder – but he repented, experienced the unconditional love of God as forgiveness and healing, and that transformed him into the only true King Israel ever had. This is attested to by the fact that Jesus was never called a son of Moses or Elijah, but only the son of David.
In the Gospel, we see the new Israel, the Son of David, the new Temple in action. Teaching and healing, Jesus makes his way around Galilee as he begins his ministry. The Gospel takes pains to point out that people were coming to him from all around. They were supposed to be going to the Temple for sacrificial worship, and instead they were flocking around Jesus because there they found authoritative teaching, compassion, unconditional love and healing – so unlike the Pharisees and scribes. No wonder the religious leaders were outraged and jealous, and plotted to destroy Jesus. Yet they of all people should have recognized in Jesus of Nazareth two signs of the long-awaited Messiah – he would draw all nations to himself, and begin restoring God’s fallen creation, symbolized by all the healing he was doing.
The reading from Hebrews presents Jesus as the eternal High Priest who lives to intercede for us. How fortunate we are, that now we can “approach God the Father through Jesus” as Hebrews states. But to live out an intimate covenant relationship with God is a challenge, as is entering into an intimate relationship with anyone. It demands humility, vulnerability and honesty, and that can be frightening for some. In fact, all too often in the past, the Church has been more like the Mosaic sacrificial, rigid, judging and demanding religion, than what Jesus showed us and asks of us.
One of our venerable elder Oblates, the late Fr. Valentine Fix, shared this question with an Oblate brother who complained about others visiting rather than spending more time in silent adoration after a celebration of the Eucharist: “Brother, which tabernacle does Jesus enter at communion?” That question helped this brother to be less judgmental of, and upset, by his brothers and sisters who were enjoying fellowship with each other after the celebration of the Eucharist.
The Eucharist is a foretaste of what is to come – a heavenly banquet where we will see God face to face. In the meantime, may our celebration strengthen our faith in Jesus as Son of God, Messiah, the eternal High Priest. May it help us come to the Father through him, and live out an intimate covenant relationship with the Father as Jesus did.
