CONNECTION TO A SONG OF PRAISE AND THANKSGIVING - December 24, 2004 Dawn Mass

Homily for December 24, 2004

CONNECTION TO A SONG OF PRAISE AND THANKSGIVING

          The song of praise and thanksgiving contained in Zechariah’s  Benedictus, as recorded in Lk. 1:67-79 in today’s gospel narrative, is our ninth Messianic connection.

          This song of praise  and thanksgiving, the Benedictus, has the central theme of God’s visitation, brought about by his “remembering” (etymological meaning of the name “Zechariah”) his holy covenant” to his people Israel, which is the covenant made to their ancestors, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and to the ancients prophets of Israel, by God doing the following five (5) promises mentioned in the song:

1. To save his people from their enemies and from all those who hate them, as proclaimed by the ancient holy prophets, thus, to free them from a debilitating fear of death (vv. 71 and 74);

2. To serve him in holiness and virtue in his presence all their days (v. 75);

3. To give his people knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of sins (v. 77);

4. To give light to those who live in darkness and the shadow of death (v.79); and

5. To guide the feet into the way of peace (v. 79).

          All these five acts of salvation will be brought about, as the priest Zechariah prophesied, by God’s visitation through the raising of a power of salvation (v. 69) and bringing the rising sun or the morning star (v. 78, cf. Is. 9:1, 42:7, 60:19; Ml. 3:20, Jn. 8:12, 2 P. 1:19).  This is actually a prophecy  in the full sense of the term, because Zechariah not only utters a hymn of praise and thanksgiving (vv. 68-75), but also foresees the future (vv. 76-79). (For this, please see footnote aa of Lk. 1:67 in the Jerusalem Bible.)

          God’s visitation is twice mentioned in this song of praise, as in v. 68 and v. 78. In fact, in many places in the Holy Scriptures, God’s visitation is mentioned many times (Ex. 3:16, 32:34, Is. 29:5c-6). God’s visitation is also associated, in the Holy Scriptures, with the day of Yahweh, which means, a day of terror, of punishment (Am. 3:3), or vengeance, accompanied by cosmic signs; such as, earthquakes (Am. 8:8; Is. 2:10, Jr. 4:24), solar eclipse (Am. 8:9; Jr. 4:23) and darkness (Am. 5:18). It is also a day of reckoning (1 P. 2:12).

          But God’s visitation, as the song of Zechariah wants to express, is rather one of a day of salvation or rescue (Lk. 1:68), where the rising sun of God (sun of righteousness, cf. Ml. 3:20, Is. 41:2+, 60:19)  “will visit the people” (Lk. 1:78) in order “to give light to those who live in darkness and the shadow of death, and to guide our feet into the way of peace” (Lk. 1:79).

          The light mentioned in Zechariah’s prophecy is the enlightenment or illumination as the New Testament scriptures and the Patristic writers would always refer to baptism (Cf. Hb. 10:32, 6:4, Ep. 5:14, Rm. 6:4+). And the baptism here does not only refer to Christian baptism (Cf. Ac. 1:54, Rm. 6:4+) but all the worship, lustrations and purificatory rites practiced, including the “baptism of John” (Ac. 18:25, 19:1-5).

          Through the sacrament of baptism, which include all of the above-mentioned elements, as first performed by John the Baptist and Jesus Christ themselves, and later by the early Christian churches, involves the implementation and realization of God’s visitation to save according to the five acts of salvation enumerated above which is contained in Zechariah’s  prophecy.

          The Messianic teaching on baptism therefore, gives us our ninth messianic connection to a song of praise or hymn of thanksgiving contained in the prophecy of Zechariah the priest, John the Baptist’s father.

          Tonight, during the Midnight liturgy, we shall discuss the messianic connection to the birth of the Messiah, and tomorrow, at the daytime liturgy, for the feast of the Nativity of the Lord Jesus Christ, we shall discuss the messianic connection to the Pre-Incarnate Logos, our tenth and eleventh Messianic connections.