John the Baptist is unlike many of us in many ways. While we're more than happy to wash our hands of the responsibility for our hapless actions, and even blame others, including the devil (...the devil made me do it), we have a natural tendency to take the credit when things under our watch turn out right, though we might not have contributed effectively to those outcomes. John the Baptist, however, refused to be a “wannabe Messiah;” though his entire entourage thought him to be the Messiah and wanted to proclaim him one. He refused that accolade: “I am not the one you imagine me to be” (John 1:20).
Today’s Gospel starts with John pointing to the people, the Lamb of God. Once he saw Jesus, he proclaimed the words we hear at every Mass “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). He went further to describe the characteristics of the Messiah, one of which is that “the Spirit will come down like a dove from the sky and remain upon him; hence, he will baptize with the Holy Spirit” (John 1:32-33). John the Baptist will never take credit for a feat he didn’t perform or a role for which he hasn’t been called. He is content with his true identity as “the voice,” and not “the Word.”
But there’s something curious about this Messiah: He is a Lamb. Lamb? Imagine a football team emerging for the Superbowl with the name: “The Lambs.” That’s a name to which hard-hitting players wouldn’t want to be associated. Names like the Panthers, the Tigers, the Lions, the Wolfs, the Hurricanes, and the Cowboys rather depict strength. Isn’t it so? What is rather strange is that the one who is truly Almighty chose a rather humble name for his own team: “The Lamb.” Does it teach us something about how the Almighty sees and understands real strength and the spiritual meaning of power?
You may know that the Book of Revelation referred to Jesus as the “Lion of the tribe of Judah” (Rev 5:5), but the symbolism of the Lamb is more intimately connected with his Messianic role. In fact, the Lamb symbol does have a rich history that is associated with precise salvific events: the lamb of the Passover (Exodus 12:5), the “lamb without blemish or defect” (1 Peter 1:19), the lamb of the Last Supper (Mark 14:12), and the Lamb that “appeared as if it had been slain” (Rev 5:6). This victorious Lamb is the one of which Handel wrote in the Oratorio, “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain,” often depicted in Christian art as wounded, yet holding triumphantly a pennant victory flag. Significantly, the lamb is the animal that sacrifices everything: its wool, its skin, its flesh. It keeps nothing to itself, and hence, is God’s chosen sign of victory. Christ won the victory for us by saving us from our sins.
Some Christians, as many in our world, have difficulty grappling with this idea that Christ frees us from our sin. Perhaps they do not understand because sin is like living in a bubble. The culprits do not see it. We often do not see how sin affects us, how it damages our relationships, and causes us to hurt each other. Recent events on the national stage show that we are more likely to shove sin away and blame other people, rather than look inward to see the terrible cancer eating our lives away. The boldface lies that are enforced in print and electronic media about what constitutes the essence of the human person shows that we prefer decay and decadence than revealed truth. The lamb theology is what the world generally misses in the clamor for power and prestige. The world will readily hand the flag of victory to the Caesars, the Ayatollah's, the Washington's, etc.; but Christians declare that victory belongs to the Lamb through whom alone our sins are washed away, and Who speaks words of gentleness, love, and peace. We declare the unthinkable: that the lamb is stronger than the wolf, and the gentlest are often the toughest.
Fr. Chukwudi Jo Okonkwo