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January 14, 2017“John the Baptist saw Jesus coming toward him and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.” John 1:29
We gather around the altar at St. Mark as the body of Christ. Just before we experience communion with God and one another, the priest holds up the chalice of the precious blood and the consecrated flesh of Christ and repeats the words of St. John the Baptist in the gospel of John, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.” We then consume the Eucharist and we are in God and God is in us. There is a lot of scripture and history behind those words, Lamb of God. The lamb as a sacrifice is a thread that binds together the story of salvation told in scripture.
In the beginning, Adam and Eve had two sons, Cain and Abel. Cain, the first born son, was a tiller of the soil and Abel tended the flocks. One day the two were to offer sacrifice. Cain brought some vegetables and Abel brought a lamb from the flock. Cain’s sacrifice was not pleasing to God, but Abel’s sacrifice of a lamb was pleasing. Cain, the first born, hated his brother for this and killed him. Cain was then banished by God for his sin.
Abraham is the patriarch of Israel. One of the last things God asked Abraham to do was to sacrifice his first born son Isaac on the mountain of the Lord. Gen. 22:14. Out of faith, Abraham took his son and prepared him for the sacrifice. At the last minute an angel stopped him and substituted a ram for Isaac. Abraham sacrificed the ram instead of his first born son.
When the descendants of Abraham were enslaved in Egypt, over three hundred years later, Moses was sent by God to free the Israelites from Pharaoh. God sent ten plagues on Egypt to force Pharaoh to let the Israelites leave Egypt for the promised land. The tenth plague involved the angel of death passing through the land of Egypt to take the life of the first born son of every Egyptian family. Moses instructed the people to kill a lamb and then smear the blood on the lintel of the door. As the Egyptians mourned the death of their first born sons, the first born sons of Israel along with their families left Egypt. That memory is recalled every time a Jewish family celebrates the Passover Seder dinner.
After Israel entered the promised land, they built a temple on Mount Zion where Jerusalem is located. For one thousand years before Jesus, the Israelites offered lambs for sacrifice at the Temple built by Solomon. The gospel of John recounts that Passover lambs were being offered in the Temple as Jesus of Nazareth was being crucified on Golgotha.
In the Book of Revelation, the river of life giving water flows from the throne of God and the lamb. At the center of heaven, according to the book of Revelation, the elders are gathered around an altar that has a lamb on it, situated at God’s feet.
Mass participates in an understanding of sacrifice that goes back to pre-history. The purpose of sacrifice is to please God, as in the story of Cain and Abel. Abraham offers a ram as a substitute for the sacrifice of Isaac as Jesus’ life is offered as a substitute for our sins. In the story of Moses, the blood of a sacrificed lamb is the mark of freedom for God’s people. We consume the blood of the sacrifice at Eucharist. In each of these stories sacrifice pleases God. The sacrifice substitutes for the life of the first born son and frees God’s people from slavery from sin. Jesus of Nazareth offers his fidelity as a substitute for our infidelity. Jesus’ sacrifice frees us from enslavement to sin.
There is something more happening in the story of Jesus of Nazareth. When Jesus is the sacrificial victim on the cross the first born of Mary offers himself. Sacrifice usually destroys the victim. The victim of the cross, instead, rose from the dead and reigns as universal king. We approach the throne of mercy through the victim of the cross. Ever since the resurrection, Christians do not sacrifice lambs. We offer ourselves as a sacrifice pleasing to God in a merciful and faithful life. The world of the sacrifice of creatures ended at the cross. We end our guilt not by sacrificing others, but becoming the sacrifice.
