I See

A Reflection on the First Reading for Sunday, October 20th, 2024:
Twenty-Ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time

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Isaiah 
53.10-11

Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him with pain.

When you make his life an offering for sin,
    he shall see his offspring, and shall prolong his days;
    through him the will of the Lord shall prosper.

Out of his anguish he shall see light;
    he shall find satisfaction through his knowledge.
    The righteous one, my servant, shall make many righteous,
    and he shall bear their iniquities.

Pause. Pray. Reflect.

What do You want me to see, Lord. Not what do you want me to tell. That’s how I come to Your word today. The pitfall of a writer is to want to explain before I’ve even exposed myself to You.

I see Your desire, Your will, for this to happen. This crushing. This is the lens You offer for me to see what comes next. You sought it out in the seeking out of me. Love drove You to it, and through it. The Cross as a nexus of desire and determination to get us back to You.

My Always Three, Always One, Always Beloved, how do I understand “You” and “Him” when both are “Us”? I hear Isaiah say, “….you make his life an offering… .” How does this circle of loss and gain work? You lose Your life. You give Your Son. You make the offering. You are the offering. You receive the offering. You are this circle of Three facing each other in one act of Divine Love. I see the hope for the fruit come from this act as You gaze at Yourself – the desire in Your heart made possible for each of us to draw near, and then nearer, and then still closer, as Your desire for us prospers.

I see that as Your circled Self stands in this moment of pain, You see light on the horizon of the singularity in Your centre. You experience Divine satisfaction at the completeness of what You have done. You have made, You have given, and You are the way home. 

And so I find, as I come to Your word, I come to You.

What do You see? A daughter who has far to go, but who’s facing the right way. And so You see righteousness. Not for what I’ve done or even what I’m doing, but Whom I’m facing, and through the lens of the Cross.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.

As it was in the beginning. Is now. And ever shall be. Amen.




Noreen Smith

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