Greetings,
June 24 is the feast of the Birth of John
the Baptist. I certainly realize that
most Protestants have ignored the various commemorations of the lives of the
great leaders of the people of God.
However, to learn from these great people of faith is to profit from
their experience and to be inspired by their teachings, their sacrifices, and
their lives. The following is from a
sermon by Saint
Augustine,
bishop:
The Church observes the birth of John as a
hallowed event. We have no such
commemoration for any other fathers; but it is significant that we celebrate
the birthdays of John and Jesus. This
day cannot be passed by. And even if my
explanation does not match the dignity of the feast, you may still meditate on
it with great depth and profit.
John was born of a woman too old for
childbirth; Christ was born of a youthful virgin. The news of John’s birth was met with incredulity,
and his father as struck dumb. Christ’s
birth was believed, and he was conceived through faith.
Such is the topic, as I have presented it,
for our inquiry and discussion. But as I
said before, if I lack either the time or the ability to study the implications
of so profound a mystery, he who speaks within you even when I am not here will
teach you better; it is he whom you contemplate with devotion, whom you have
welcomed into your hearts, whose temples you have become.
John, then, appears as the boundary
between the two testaments, the old and the new. That he is a sort of boundary the Lord
himself bears witness, when he speaks of the
law and the prophets up until John the Baptist. Thus he represents times past and is the
herald of the new era to come. As a
representative of the past, he is born of aged parents; as a herald of the new
era, he is declared to be a prophet while still in his mother’s womb. For when yet unborn, he leapt in his mother’s
womb at the arrival of blessed Mary. In that
womb he had already been designated a prophet, even before he was born; it was
revealed that he was to be Christ’s precursor, before they ever saw one
another. These are divine happenings,
going beyond the limits of our human frailty.
Eventually he is born, he receives his name, his father’s tongue in
loosened. See how these events reflect
reality.
Zechariah is silent and loses his voice
until John, the precursor of the Lord, is born and restores his voice. The silence of Zechariah is nothing but the
age of prophecy lying hidden, obscured, as it were, and concealed before the
preaching of Christ. At John’s arrival
Zechariah’s voice is released, and it becomes clear at the coming of the one
who was foretold. The release of
Zechariah’s voice at the birth of John is a parallel to the rending of the veil
at Christ’s crucifixion. If John were
announcing his own coming, Zechariah’s lips would not have been opened. The tongue is loosened because a voice is
born. For when John was preaching the
Lord’s coming he was asked: Who are you? And he replied: I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness. The voice is John, but the Lord in the beginning was the Word. John was a voice that lasted only for a time;
Christ, the Word in the beginning, is eternal.
Yours
& His,
DED
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