2 Jan 2024
In the Offing
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For 2 January 2024, The Memorial of Saints Basil the Great and Gregory Nazianzen, Bishops, Doctors, based on John 1:19-28
This is the testimony given by John when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, ‘Who are you?’ He confessed and did not deny it, but confessed, ‘I am not the Messiah.’ And they asked him, ‘What then? Are you Elijah?’ He said, ‘I am not.’ ‘Are you the prophet?’ He answered, ‘No.’ Then they said to him, ‘Who are you? Let us have an answer for those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?’ He said,
‘I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness,
“Make straight the way of the Lord” ’,
as the prophet Isaiah said.
Now they had been sent from the Pharisees. They asked him, ‘Why then are you baptizing if you are neither the Messiah, nor Elijah, nor the prophet?’ John answered them, ‘I baptize with water. Among you stands one whom you do not know, the one who is coming after me; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandal.’ This took place in Bethany across the Jordan where John was baptizing.
Scripture passage from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright 1989, 1993, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
03 January 2024 @ 12:47 am
Thank you for this beautiful interpretation of an interesting phrase. I’d never thought of it that way before.
03 January 2024 @ 4:04 am
Brilliant! Thank you.
04 January 2024 @ 3:29 pm
“I am greeting Christ. He is very near.” I visualize this message in the accounts of the wise men and the shepherds as they come to visit the new born king. Applying this homily, they are directed to find the baby “in the offing”. To know Christ, is near and, as John says in these scriptures, “among you,” warms the heart.
P.S. I appreciated the phrase “sea of humanity”. It goes along way with thinking about being a “fisher of men.”
Thank you