Second Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year A) Lamb of God

In Today's Gospel, John the Baptist proclaims, “Behold the lamb of God”. Jesus is the lamb for sacrifice - the lamb who takes away the sin of the world. Jesus is the lamb. The lamb is a weak animal, so innocent looking and cute. It is the symbol of innocence. Thousands of lambs were offered as sacrifices in the temple of Jerusalem before and during the time of Jesus. Even at the very beginning seen in the Bible, we could see the sacrificing of lambs. Abel the son of Adam also offered a lamb to please God. Why were these innocent lambs being put to death? Was God pleased with these sacrifices? Everything prophesied in the Old Testament is fulfilled in the life of Jesus. Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Last Sunday we celebrated the Feast of the Baptism of our Lord. Before receiving the baptism, Jesus said to John, “It is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness”. Jesus is fulfilling the Old Testament through His life. The greeting of John the Baptist referring to Jesus, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world was also to fulfill the Old Testament. When Abraham was about to sacrifice his only son Isaac on the mount of Moriah, Isaac asked him, “I see that you have the coals and the wood, but where is the lamb for the sacrifice?” Abraham just answered, “God Himself will provide one.” The words of Abraham came true through John the Baptist when he exclaimed, “Behold the lamb of God...” as he pointed to Jesus. Jesus is the lamb provided by God for the sacrifice. God did not want Abraham to sacrifice his only son instead He gave His own only Son to be sacrificed. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, to die for our sins, to forgive us, to reconcile with us. Jesus is the Lamb of God, the innocent one, the one who takes our sins away. Other than the sacrifice of lambs and animals, the people of Israel had another penitential rite. On the Day of Atonement, the priest would select a goat, and then he would put both his hands on the goat’s head and confess over it all the evils, sins and rebellious acts of the people of Israel, ritually transferring these to the goat’s head. It would thereafter be driven off into the desert. The goat is believed to carry all the people’s sins away with it into some uninhabited land and will die there, either starved to death or killed by another wild animal. Thus, the term ‘scapegoat’ issued. The goat did not die for itself but on behalf of the people. You can read this in Leviticus chapter 16. The lamb sent by God to take away our sins is Jesus. He is the innocent one, yet He carried our sins, our pains, our sorrows, our weaknesses and our guilt unto death. The Prophet Isaiah says, “But he was pierced for our sins, crushed for our iniquity.” He bore the punishment to make us whole; by his wounds, we are healed. We have gone astray like sheep without a shepherd, all following our own ways; But the Lord laid upon him ‘the guilt of us all’ (Isaiah 53:5,6) in order to lead us home. An animal is certainly not capable by its own strength and hardiness to take upon itself such an oppressive weight, that of the sins of the world. But it was His mission to do so, to die for us, to shed His blood for us, without defending himself, without uttering a word against His offenders. We can read in the Acts of the Apostles that ‘He was like a sheep that is taken to be slaughtered, like a lamb that makes no sound when its wool is cut off’. He did not say a word even though He was humiliated and justice was denied Him. No one will be able to tell about His descendants, because His life on earth had come to an end. It was just after His baptism that John proclaimed Jesus as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. John was referring to Jesus’s second baptism. As we read in Luke 12, 50 “There is a baptism with which I must be baptized and how great is my anguish until it is accomplished.” His suffering and death was His second baptism. So similarly, through our baptism, we become the children of God. God repeated the same words at our baptism too, “you are my beloved son / daughter.” As baptized children of God, Jesus wants us to also be meek like lambs of God to be ready for our second baptism. What does it mean for the Church, for us today to be disciples of ‘Jesus the Lamb of God’? It means putting meekness in the place of malice, love in the place of hate, humility in the place of pride, service in the place of prestige and above all, accepting our sufferings like a Lamb of God. It is good work! We Christians must do this. That is to lead pure, innocent, humble, selfless lives by obeying Christ’s commandment of love, appreciating the loving providence and protecting care of the Good Shepherd for His Church. Let us be ready to die like a sacrificial lamb by sharing our blessings of health, wealth and talents with others in the family, the parish and community. Appropriately, this is what we pray every day in our Divine Renovation prayer ‘to use our gifts and talents to become active apostles’. Through our illnesses, pains and sufferings we are bearing witness to Christ, by offering our sufferings for the salvation of souls and for the reparation for our sin sand those of others, to suffer in obedient silence like the Lamb of God, without complaining, without uttering a word of defense or defiance. This is living as the Lamb of God, as Jesus has shown us.