Saturday, December 19, 2015

The O Antiphons: O Root of Jesse



December 19

O Root of Jesse, standing as a sign among the peoples; before you kings will shut their mouths, to you the nations will make their prayer: Come and deliver us, and delay no longer.
Isaiah 11:10 and Micah 5:2 and Romans 15:12



Ours is an incarnational faith. How many times have I heard that! Jesus was, and arguably is, present to us in the flesh. He lived and died on this earth, as a human being. Never a wispy, semi-angelic being whose experience of earthly life is, at best, vicarious, Jesus understood everything about this life. Here is a God who has bloodlines, appetites, a neighborhood. If there is any doubt, the art work today shows a plant with a root, piercing the earth, drawing sustenance from it. 

Those of us who enjoy police procedurals on television will understand that Jesus' DNA would have been all over the place in his day and just after. Traces of his physical being existed. The Word made flesh indeed, intentional, knowable, easy to be with. 

In the Hebrew Scriptures, references to the "peoples" and the "nations" are understood as meaning Gentiles, those outside the preferment of God's people Israel. Isaiah is known for drawing these others into the blessing of God. Standing within the tribe of Judah, a descendant of Jesse and Jesse's son David, Jesus shuts the mouths of those in authority and receives the prayers of all humankind. 

No comments:

Post a Comment