The Sunday Before Theophany, St Basil, Circumcision
Mark 1:1-8
In preparing us to celebrate the Lord’s Baptism, the Church has given us portraits of two of His greatest servants from the Apostolic Age, Paul of Tarsus and John the Baptist. Who were they, and what can we learn?
The first thing we need to remember is that John was a priest. He may not have assumed any priestly duties, but under the Old Covenant, the priesthood was passed from father to son. And, the Gospel of Luke is clear in stating that his father, Zechariah, was a priest, and that his mother was of the priestly line, also. Both were descendants of Moses’s brother, Aaron.
But, the priests were more than those who served in the Temple. From their earliest age, the boys who were descended from Aaron were instructed in the Law so that they could instruct the Israelites in it. So John was born and bred as a teacher of Israel.
When the Archangel Gabriel informed Zechariah that Elizabeth would bear a son, he also said that this son would be filled with the Holy Spirit from the time that he was in the womb. And it was thus that John first recognized the Incarnate Christ. Shortly after the Archangel told Mary of her pregnancy, she went to visit John’s mother. Three months before his birth, John leapt in his mother’s womb at the presence of God having become human.
More than being a priest, though, John was a prophet. He was sent to prepare the way of Christ, to preach repentance to the people, and to baptize. Of him, Christ said, “Truly, I say to you, among those born of women there has risen no one greater than John the Baptist; yet he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he”. Why are we greater, though? As one particular commentator puts it, “In terms of the Old Testament Law, John is the greatest prophet. The New Covenant is of such incomparable value that those who share in the New Covenant are greater than John was without it”.
And John was humble. The Gospel reading records him saying that he was not fit to stoop down and untie the sandals of Christ. Under the Law, a slave owner was not even to require the slave to untie his sandals, such an action being demeaning for a slave. Yet John said that he wasn’t even fit to do that.
Paul was not of the priestly tribe of Levi, but that of Benjamin, the smallest, and often the bravest, of the Twelve Tribes of Israel. He referred to himself “a Hebrew born of Hebrews; as to the law a Pharisee”.
The earliest mention of him is not by the Roman name we normally use, but by his Jewish name, Saul. When the first deacon, Stephen, was led out of the city to be stoned, they laid their garments at the feet of Saul, and the text says that Saul approved. And after that, we read that he was one of the early persecutors of the Church, dragging people out of their homes and throwing them in prison!!!
How did such a person become a great apostle?
Well, as we read in Acts, “Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any belonging to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. Now as he journeyed he approached Damascus, suddenly a light from heaven flashed about him. And he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, ‘Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?’ And he said, ‘Who are you, Lord?’ And he said, ‘I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting’”.
Subsequently, Paul spent three years in study. He went to Arabia (possibly modern day Jordan, possibly Sinai). There he prayed and studied; according to some he studied with descendants of refugees from the First Temple’s destruction. Eventually, he returned to Jerusalem, presenting himself to some of the Apostles.
Through all of this, God was preparing him to be the Apostle to the Gentiles. And God was preparing him to write much of the New Testament.
Our Epistle comes from the end of his life, shortly before his martyrdom. He’s tired. Yet he’s hopeful, and he realizes that his life is about to be offered as a sacrifice to God.
So, we have two men, two servants of Christ, one from the beginning of his life, one who served for decades after our Lord’s Resurrection and Ascension.
Both men were fearless witnesses of Christ and His truth.
Both spoke the truth without regard to personal consequence.
Both poured out their lives as a sacrifice.
Let us always try to follow their example.
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