Most parents have several photo albums, which are full of pictures taken of their children as they were growing up. We have always been very proud of our children and everything they did. We took pictures of them in school, in brownies and scouts, dancing, and playing sport, in fancy dress costumes and clowning around… pictures of them simply playing together or enjoying holidays, at Christmas time, on their birthdays, important and memorable occasions. We were proud of them as they grew up and we are proud of them today.
The snap shots we take are the means by which we capture memories of a special moment in time. They are not just held in our memories and our hearts but captured in order for us to share the moment and the memory, more accurately with others.
Today’s gospel is a word “snap-shot” capturing a moment in time in the life of Jesus. It is a moment in which his eternal father makes it abundantly clear that he is proud of his son. Jesus saw and heard the presence of God “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”
The moment is shared with us. The Father is proud, not just for what has been … but for what is to come. This is a snapshot of the beginning of the earthly ministry of the promised messiah and saviour of Jew and gentile alike …“Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights; I have put my spirit upon him; he will bring forth justice to the nations. 2 He will not cry or lift up his voice, or make it heard in the street; 3 a bruised reed he will not break, and a dimly burning wick he will not quench; he will faithfully bring forth justice. 4 He will not grow faint or be crushed until he has established justice in the earth; and the coastlands wait for his teaching.”
As children of the same Father, and brothers and sisters of the living Lord we need to remember and reflect upon those moments when the presence of God has been made manifest in our own lives – those moments when God has broken into our hum drum existence to claim us as His own!
May you be richly blessed with clear and undeniable evidence of your kinship with our heavenly Father.
Reverend Shan