Please read the passage before the commentary.
This is the second Sunday in Ordinary Time. Last weekend we celebrated the feast of the Baptism of the Lord. That was thew last day of the Christmas season. It was also somewhat of the first Sunday of Ordinary Time. I should tell you that that there is nothing ordinary about Ordinary Time. They are all celebrations of the extraordinary events of the life, death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus. Ordinary Time is more like ordered time. We number them by weeks, from first week to the thirty-fourth week.
If last Sunday belonged to Christmas, but considered as the first week of ordinary time, then this week, the second of ordinary time is like an added day of the Christmas season: it continues with the third manifestation of the Epiphany. Epiphany celebrates the magi, the baptism of the Lord and his manifestation to John the Baptist’s disciples or the wedding feast of Cana.
Today John the Baptist points to Jesus as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the Word. The disciples listen and go looking for Jesus.
The prophet Isaiah spoke the Word of God. God said through him, “You are my servant, in you I will manifest my glory. I formed you from your mother’s womb. I made you my servant, even more than a servant; I made you a light for the nations so that my salvation can extend to the farthest ends of the world.” These are God’s words spoken to us by Isaiah.
This Word of God is spoken not only for the Lord Jesus. It is spoken for each of us. It is spoken for each of you kids out there. It is spoken for each teenager, for each adolescent, for each young adult out here. It is sppken for each adult, for each parent, for each grand parent. God has formed each of us in our mother’s womb to be a light of salvation to the ends of the earth.
The Christmas-Epiphany celebration has morphed into the Ordered Time labelled Ordinary time. The object of Isaiah’s prophesy about Jesus has morphed into prophetic words about us.
Jesus took on our human nature so that we could take on his divine nature. Jesus became our light so that we could become light to others “to the ends of the earth”. Do not leave from here without being light to yourself and to others.