Prepare And Make Straight!

Rev. Marcel Divine Emeka Okwara, CSsR

Homily for the Second Sunday of Advent, Year B

St. Alphonsus Catholic Church, Brooklyn Center, MN

Sunday, December 6, 2020

Today’s Gospel is taken from Mark. Mark was a companion of Peter. He came most likely from Palestine to Rome with Peter. He was also a friend of Paul as the Acts of Apostles tell us. That means he knew both Peter and Paul, two great evangelists of the early Church. Both Peter and Paul were killed during Emperor Nero’s persecution around the year 65 AD. Mark wrote his Gospel around the year 70, that is a few years after the martyrdom of Peter and Paul. The opening line of his gospel is: “The beginning of the good news (gospel) of Jesus Christ the Son of God.” Now, when we read those words today, we brush it off and hardly pay attention to their significance. But every one of those words is a provocation and a paradigm shift with a huge historical consequences. The Greek term used is euaggelion (εὐαγγέλιον), which means, glad tidings or glad news. Back in the day, when Caesar the Roman Emperor is victorious in war, he would send evangelists out ahead of him to announce the good news that Caesar has won. At the beginning of his Gospel, Mark is distinctively and consciously being provocative when he said he too has the good news (euaggelion). But his good news is not about Caesar, but about someone who Caesar killed and who God raised from the dead. His name is Jesus Christ— Yeshua Hamashiach. Hamashiach means “the anointed one.” Before this time, the anointed one was King David. But now Mark is saying the true and real King is Yeshua (Jesus). And as if that was not enough, at the end of his opening statement, Mark calls him “the Son of God” (Yios Tou theou). Again, in those days, it was a deeply provocative declaration to make because Yios Tou theou (the Son of God) was a Roman imperial title. The emperor was the son of God, a sign of his supposedly divine status. But in a brazen manner, Mark is saying that the emperor is not Yios Tou theou; rather Jesus is the Yios Tou theou (the Son of God). What is Mark actually doing? He is supplanting and substituting the Roman Emperor with Jesus Christ the Son of God. But it does not mean that Jesus would relocate to Rome and rule from there, rather he is the One to whom final allegiance is due. He is properly the Lord. Those old kings and the kings of today no longer matter; the One who matters from now moving forward is Jesus Christ.

About this Jesus Christ, two iconic biblical figures— Isaiah and John the Baptist have a similar prophetic message for us: Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths.”  When John the Baptist appeared in the desert and began to preach, multitude of people from Judean countryside and Jerusalem went up to him. They acknowledged their sins, repented and were baptized by him in the Jordan River. They were ready for the coming of the Messiah, Jesus Christ. Are we willing to do as they did? The problem with many modern Christians is not that they sin. Of course we are all sinners. “All have sinned and have fallen short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). The problem with so many modern Christians is that they sin and call it a mistake. But sin is not a mistake, rather a transgression. There is a difference between a mistake and a sin. A mistake is something done unintentionally like turning unto a one way street unknowingly or pouring salt into a cup of coffee thinking it was sugar or mistyping a word when using a computer. Any of these could happen because we are distracted. However, sin is more than a mistake. It is a deliberate choice to do something that one knows is wrong. As such it is a transgression. The problem with some modern Christians is that we sin and call it how God made us. We sin and then turn around to blame someone else. We sin and blame the devil: the devil made me do it. Like Adam and Eve, we don’t take responsibility for our actions. We sin and still claim to be good people. We sin and give reasons to justify our deeds. We sin and hardly and never feel remorseful or guilty. We sin and still claim we are not hurting anybody. Some even call sin fun, and any message that condemns sin is condemned and the preacher is called names like outdated, old-school, out of fashion and out of touch with the real life.

The voice of one crying out in the desert is asking us to make straight the way of the Lord and to rebuild old bridges. When he first preached, people acknowledged their sins, repented and were forgiven as well. Let’s act in like manner. This is not the time to make excuses. The one mightier than John, greater than Isaiah, exceedingly more important than life itself is coming. Prepare his way and make straight his paths.