Homily for Friday, 5 December 2014– Ferial

Friday of the 1st Week in Advent

Readings of the day: Isaiah 29:17-24; Psalm 27:1, 4, 13-14; Matthew 9:27-31

Before restoring their sight, Jesus asks the two blind men in our Gospel reading today, “Do you believe that I can do this”? Is it not remarkable how readily the men answer, “Yes”?

I wonder how many people today would immediately answer “yes” if they were suffering some other affliction or illness and someone who could relieve their suffering asked, “Do you believe that I can do this”?

We know some people who would and who have had such faith and trust, not only in Jesus, but in doctors, nurses, and others to relieve their suffering. But do some people not give into despair, especially if they have been waiting for relief; for healing for a long time to no avail? If somebody were to say to another who had been suffering for a long time, “Do you believe that I can do this; that I can relieve your suffering,” would we not understand if the response by the person suffering were cautious or even cynical: “I have tried everything; gone to many doctors, and you say you can heal me immediately”?

And yet this is what Jesus asks of the blind men: “Do you believe that I can do this”? Remarkably, they immediately answer Jesus, “yes,” and they see again.

This scene in Matthew’s Gospel and our Advent season are an invitation to us to trust in God’s power to heal; to save. Our first reading, from Isaiah, also invites us to the same trust. In “a very little while,” Isaiah says, “the deaf shall hear…; the blind shall see”; evil and tyranny will be no more; the people will keep God’s commandments; revere God and love one another.

We could become cynical at this message. We could point to all the suffering and pain in the world and wonder why God has yet to act to alleviate this suffering. Or we could, as many of us do even amid their own suffering, notice as Isaiah says, “the work of [God’s] hands” already “in [our] midst.” Even better, we could be God’s hands of healing and alleviation of suffering in our world through our prayer, through our words, and through our actions.

God is already working in the world to heal; to save us. God gave us his only Son about two thousand years ago through a young woman, Mary, who also said yes to God’s prompting: “I will save the world through my Son, Jesus Christ. Do you believe I can do this?”

“Yes.”

We, too, are invited to say “yes.” We believe that God can do this; that God heals; God alleviates our suffering; God saves; that God is already doing all this. We say “yes” because we believe and we are here to show that God works through us. We are God’s hands in our midst; especially in the midst of people who are in need; who suffer. Yes, God, we believe you can do this because you are healing and saving us already, through your Son, through your Spirit, and through us.