Reflection on The Lamb of God
For the agrarian Jews of Jesus’ time the sacrifice of a lamb demonstrated how serious they were about atoning for their sins. Jewish law dictated that a lamb had to be killed at least once a year, at Passover. Such a sacrifice cost the shepherd big time. Lambs were currency. This was tithing writ large.
Saying Jesus is the Lamb of God is a shorthand way of telling us two things. The first is that Jesus is God’s most precious gift; God’s own self, given to the world that we might know how serious God is about us. God can give us nothing more than Jesus. As a result of Jesus’ innocent suffering and death there is no need for any lambs to be religiously slaughtered ever again. We need to keep hearing this message because some Christians get caught into glorifying Jesus’ suffering so much they get trapped in their own world of pain and go looking for more. Jesus never sought out suffering. He bore what came his way. And the same must be true for us. Christians are not meant to be smiling masochists. Most of us don’t need to look for more suffering in our lives because we share in the Lamb of God’s sacrifice in the ordinary downs of our lives.
Secondly, John would have known that ‘talya’, the Aramaic word for sheep, is the same word used for servant. The first hearers of this Gospel would have known it too. Jesus, then, is the servant who brings us the truth we need for life, who answers our deepest desires to know that our existence has meaning and purpose and he opens up for us the life beyond this one, where there will be no more weeping or sadness.
Jesus shows us that when we are baptised into his death and enter his service we also share in his resurrection and glory because he bears, and bears away, the sins of the world.
© Richard Leonard SJ
Saying Jesus is the Lamb of God is a shorthand way of telling us two things. The first is that Jesus is God’s most precious gift; God’s own self, given to the world that we might know how serious God is about us. God can give us nothing more than Jesus. As a result of Jesus’ innocent suffering and death there is no need for any lambs to be religiously slaughtered ever again. We need to keep hearing this message because some Christians get caught into glorifying Jesus’ suffering so much they get trapped in their own world of pain and go looking for more. Jesus never sought out suffering. He bore what came his way. And the same must be true for us. Christians are not meant to be smiling masochists. Most of us don’t need to look for more suffering in our lives because we share in the Lamb of God’s sacrifice in the ordinary downs of our lives.
Secondly, John would have known that ‘talya’, the Aramaic word for sheep, is the same word used for servant. The first hearers of this Gospel would have known it too. Jesus, then, is the servant who brings us the truth we need for life, who answers our deepest desires to know that our existence has meaning and purpose and he opens up for us the life beyond this one, where there will be no more weeping or sadness.
Jesus shows us that when we are baptised into his death and enter his service we also share in his resurrection and glory because he bears, and bears away, the sins of the world.
© Richard Leonard SJ
