The New (Christian) Era
by Fr. David M. Knight
Thursday, November 21, 2024
Thirty-Third Week of the Year
The Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Rv 5:1-10/Lk 19:41-44 (500)
Revelation 5:1-10: The “key to the whole vision” is that Christ is “worthy to open the scroll”— “qualified to know and [achieve] God’s plan for history.” Only despair could result from a situation in which no one could come to a knowledge of the course of history, nor direct it to a goal that can give sense to human life. The situation of Christians suffering persecution would indeed be foolish and hopeless.
When the Lamb takes the scroll, the “four living creatures” who “represent the whole of creation in which God is constantly present” and the “twenty-four elders” (representing the “ideal Church in its entirety”: the twelve tribes of Israel, plus the apostles as the “twelve foundations” of the new Jerusalem), sing a “new song.”
This newness in praise corresponds to the new name given to the conqueror, the new Jerusalem, to the new heaven and the new earth, and finally to the universal renewal.... The whole universe (the four living creatures) and the Church (the 24 elders) celebrate Christ who, by the redemption, has inaugurated the new era.
All this puts our focus on the “end time,” on God’s plan for the fullness of time—the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things—to gather up all things in Christ, things in heaven and things on earth. (See Ephesians 1:10 and 3:9.)
This is what we live for. The glory of this vision is what motivates us to abandon all we have and are, as stewards of the kingship of Christ, to the work of bringing it to fulfillment.
Worthy is the Lamb that was slaughtered to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!... To the one seated on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!
Amen!
Luke 19:41-44: Jesus weeps over the “old Jerusalem” because she “did not recognize the time of her visitation”—literally of her “inspection” by her episkopus, “overseer.”
As in yesterday’s Gospel, God expects his People, his Church, each one of us, to “bear fruit.” Jesus told of a man who:
had a fig tree planted in his vineyard. He came looking for fruit on it and found none. So he said to the gardener, “See here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?”
We are stewards, and we should expect to give an “account of our stewardship.” The “good ground” for the seed of Christ’s word are those who “bear fruit with perseverance.”
Initiative: “Look to the end” with joy by being a “faithful steward.”
Reflections brought to you by the Immersed in Christ Ministry
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