14 January 2015
Wednesday of the First Week in Ordinary Time
The waters of baptism continually rush through us, purifying us and transforming us more and more into sons and daughters of God. These are not stagnant waters and they never dry up. Jesus reveals to us His life as God’s Son, to teach us how to be His children and, like any older sibling, to help us in all these things. Christ is alive and active in us, going about His Father’s work and making us more like Himself.
St. Irenaeus of Lyons famously wrote, “The glory of God is man fully alive”; the Letter to the Hebrews says something related, “…in these last days, [God] spoke to us through a son…who is the refulgence of his glory, the very imprint of his being…” (1:2-3) We see in Christ’s healing ministry not only the tangible reality of God’s love and mercy, but we see Him recreating mankind, bringing us fully to life. We, too, are made in God’s image and likeness; in baptism this takes on an entirely new reality, something more akin to the “imprint” of God that is Jesus Christ. In Christ we come to life and God is glorified; when we read in today’s Gospel that Jesus heals Simon’s mother-in-law, cures the sick and delivers the possessed, God is glorified. Jesus is the glory of the Father; in baptism we come to share in that same glory.
When Christ had healed the woman, she served Him; after He healed and delivered others, He went off alone to pray but everyone came looking for Him. How often do we receive grace upon grace and do nothing in response? The grace of baptism is often one of these graces; we are baptized, but do not seek to serve Him and show our gratitude for all He has done and is doing in us. We are baptized, yet we do not look for Him wherever He may be found. Follow the waters of your salvation back to its source in Christ and let the current of this tremendous grace direct the whole of your life.