THE SIGN OF EMMANUEL

HOMILY FOR THE 4^TH SUNDAY OF ADVENT, YEAR A

Rev. Fr. Ezekoka Peter Onyekachi

Every serious event is preceded by an announcement, isn’t it? According to African cultural tradition, whenever a ruler is about to deliver a message to his people, it is customary for his messenger to get people’s attention by sounding a gong. The people hear the gong before they hear the message. Today we are metaphorically hearing the sound of the gong and listening to the announcement about the birth of the Messiah. This is the last Sunday of Advent; we are standing on the threshold of Christmas. During this Advent season, we have heard the crescendo of joyous expectation regarding the coming of our Lord and Saviour. Today we join our voices to those of the prophet Isaiah and the Angel Gabriel to announce to the world that a virgin shall conceive and bear a son and shall call him Immanuel. The Child will be conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit. His mission is to save the world from her sins. This is indeed the apex of all theophanies throughout history, the zenith of all miracles and the ultimate liberation from slavery, sin and fear. 

The First Reading (Isaiah 7:10-14) champions this glorious announcement. The context is that Isaiah exhorts the earthly king to place his trust in the Lord who, to gain that trust, will show him any sign he chooses. Ahaz, the king of Judah, is in a tight spot. Syria and Israel have invaded Judah, but so far have been unable to capture Jerusalem, the capital of the Judean kingdom. Ahaz has made the decision to ally his country with a pagan nation (Assyria), both in order to protect his kingdom and to preserve the dynasty of David. In doing so, Ahaz has disregarded Yahweh (God). Ahaz himself lives a wayward lifestyle and has sacrificed to pagan idols, even to the point of sacrificing his own son. Isaiah foresees doom in this political alliance of Judah with Assyria, and opposes Ahaz. Isaiah reasons that the Davidic dynasty can only be preserved by the power of God, and certainly not by a secular political alliance. Only the power of God can be relied upon to save the king and his kingdom. Then Ahaz is instructed by the Lord to ask for any sign that would convince him to place his trust in God’s promises, but Ahaz doesn’t want to go there. He has a hissy fit, throwing God’s own offer back in His face on the spurious ground that he doesn’t want to ‘put the Lord to the test’. The Lord Himself patiently insists on giving him the most wonderful sign possible: the sign of Immanuel. 

The sign of Immanuel is given to confirm the words of the prophet about the will of God, rather than to astonish King Ahaz. Thus, God’s will is revealed: Immanuel will be born into the earthly dynasty of David as the fulfilment of God’s promise to David that his dynasty would be eternal. Transcendent God will become Immanent God - God-with-us. God will assume human flesh and will allow Himself to accept earthly maternity, paternity and lineage. This extensive dynasty will be sustained by God Himself. 

That was the sign given to Ahaz. And at one time or another, we too might find ourselves as faithless as Ahaz whose experience of war led him to lose such faith as he had. He lost confidence that God could and would save the kingdom of Judah; and, having lost that trust, he chose to rely solely upon human efforts including his own. The outcome was his political alliance with Assyria. It is, of course, indisputable that the impact of horrendous life experiences upon us may serve to undermine our faith and shake our trust in God and in our friends. We do, however, slide even deeper into pain and error whenever we harden our hearts and block our ears from listening to that inner voice, that inner voice which calls us to put our faith and trust in God because God is in control. That insistent inner voice urges us to place our confidence and trust in a power infinitely greater than our own, in total submission to the will of God. The earthly dynasty of David, which Ahaz was fighting for, was that from which God had already willed Himself to be born. God knows everything. God knows the best way forward for each one of us. Yes, He knows what is best for you and for me. Why, then, should we hesitate to place our confidence and trust in Him?

The promise of the Emmanuel re-emerges in the Gospel (Matthew 1:18-20). St. Matthew’s Infancy Narrative focuses on the person of Joseph (unlike St. Luke’s, which is built around the person of Mary). St. Matthew presents the fascinating character of Joseph, the husband of Mary, who respected both God and men. Joseph did not want to disgrace Mary who, after her formal betrothal to Joseph, had been found to be expecting a baby. According to Jewish custom, if after betrothal the prospective bride was found to be pregnant, divorce was permitted. The divorce had to be finalised in public in order to make plain to the community the reason for the divorce. But Joseph perceived that such publicity would heap disgrace upon Mary. He made the decision to preserve Mary’s dignity and honour by secretly sending her packing. It would have taken the intervention of God to overturn the decision, had He willed it. Why didn’t He? Because this inspired decision of Joseph helped to reveal to the world the vital aspect which was not apparent in Isaiah’s prophecy – the vital aspect that is the Virginal conception. The Child, the Emmanuel, the God-with-us, would be conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit. 

Mary’s pregnancy resulted from the action of the Holy Spirit. The impossible was made possible. God became incarnate. Mary and Joseph were now confronted with the great mystery of conception without consummation. They both, by their fiats, demonstrated the obedience of faith - the sort of faith spoken of by St. Paul in the Second reading (Romans 1:1-7). Without faith, we cannot please God (cf. Heb. 11:6). Unlike King Ahaz, Joseph did believe the Angel of the Lord. In so doing, Joseph counteracted the infidelity of Ahaz through his fidelity to God and by placing his absolute trust in God. Joseph, then, played a major part in the magnificent plan of God for the salvation of mankind. Remember that Mary, in her capacity as the Mother of God, could just as well have nurtured and raised the Holy Child as a single parent - but that wasn’t the will of God. Our Lord wanted to live and grow up on earth in a family, in a family of three - Jesus, Mary and Joseph - having been united in heaven in a single substance of the three divine Persons – the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The mission of the Child who was to be conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit was to save humanity from the wages of sin.

The Virginal conception would mark the beginning of the restoration of the original order that was in place at creation. In Gen 1:2. the Spirit of God was moving upon the face of the waters. This Spirit brought order to the chaos that initially existed. When the Lord sends forth His Spirit, they (the creatures) are created (cf. Psalm 104:30). Never was the Spirit of God so operative and efficacious than He was in the Virginal conception. To restore the order of peace, hope, and joy, which was reduced to chaos by original sin, it was the Holy Spirit Who caused the Virginal conception from the spark of Divine Love. In the Virginal conception, the move to recreate the human soul that was damaged by the disobedience of Adam was manifested in concrete terms. This same Holy Spirit recreates each one of us even today (cf. Isaiah 42:5): ‘I will cause breath to enter you and you shall live’ (Ezekiel 37: 5). Today the Holy Spirit even can enliven the soul that is dead in sin, revitalizing and empowering it to launch a vigorous and radical assault against sin, and then enrapturing that soul in the life of grace. Only divine love makes all this possible. May we continue to live in the love of God. Amen. God bless you.