Newspaper Page Text
The Southern Cross, Page 8
Faith Alive I
Thursday, October 5, 2000
FOODFORTHOUGHT
All contents copyright©2000 by CNS
One psalmist said that “the Lord sets captives free” (146). Remember that whenever you're feeling like a captive
— the captive, perhaps, of difficult circumstances beyond your control.
A psalmist also said the Lord “neither slumbers nor sleeps” (121). Remember that if you ever suspect God is
overlooking you. And should you ever wonder if God has abandoned you, remember these words of Psalm 145: “The
Lord is near to all who call upon him.”
The Lord “bears our burdens,” we hear in Psalm 68, while Psalm 108 reminds us the Lord has been known to
change a “desert into pools of water.” Has the world around you ever felt like a desert?
Read quickly, the Psalms can sound like prayers by long-ago people quite unlike us. Read reflectively, the
psalmists’ needs begin to sound much like our own.
And the Psalms remind us what God is like — that God “refreshes” our souls (23), rescues us from “distress” (54),
promises that though we “sow in tears” we’ll “reap rejoicing” (126). In fact, we’re told, God “does wonders” for his
faithful followers (4).
David Gibson
33 Editor, Faith Alive!
By Father Lawrence Boadt, CSP
Catholic News Service
hen Jesus proclaims in his
Sermon on the Mount that “not the
smallest letter of the
law, not the smallest CNS photo by BillWittman
part of a letter, shall
be done away with
until it all comes
true” (Matthew
5:18), he is helping
his disciples under
stand that every
thing he teaches is
rooted in the revela
tion God gave to Is
rael beforehand and
which can be found
recorded in the Old
Testament Scrip
tures.
This is not a small
point in the Gospel
message, but is criti
cal to understanding
why we would believe
in Jesus as Savior
and Lord.
St. Jerome, the
great fourth-century
translator of the
Bible into Latin, once
said that “ignorance
of the Old Testament
is ignorance of
Christ.” Indeed, all
four Gospel writers,
as well as St. Paul,
were convinced that
everything they
wrote concerning
Jesus’ words and
deeds for our salva
tion either was fore
told by the Scrip
tures, explained by
them or fulfilled
their hopes.
This can be shown
by a number of fac
tors.
—First, the New
Testament quotes or
alludes to Old Testament passages
more than 350 times.
—Second, not only do New Testa
ment writers refer almost every as
pect of Jesus’ ministry to the Old
Testament, they almost universally
see all the passages they cite as pro
phetic.
In Acts 2, for example, St. Luke
records the first sermon of Peter on
the day of Pentecost. Astoundingly,
Peter says that when King David
composed Psalm 16, “he was a
prophet” (Acts 2:30).
Scholars generally agree that
Luke wrote his Gospel for pagan con
verts who would not have known
much about the Jewish Scriptures,
esus ... is helping his disciples understand that
everything he teaches is rooted in the revelation God
gave to Israel beforehand ... in the Old Testament
Scriptures. This is... critical to understanding why
we would believe in Jesus as Savior and Lord.”
his prophets, as the holy Scriptures
record — the Gospel concerning his
Son” (1:1-3).
A third aspect of the Old Testa
ment message also was critical to
the early church: Jesus was the
Messiah according to God’s plan.
The center point of the Gospel of
Mark comes when Jesus asks the
disciples who they think he is, and
Peter blurts out that Jesus is the
Messiah (8:29).
This same moment of recognition
is reflected also in Matthew 16:16;
Luke 9:20; and John 10:24-25. It
—1. Jesus says to the
disciples going to
Emmaus, “How slow you
are to understand all the
prophets have an
nounced” (24:25), and so,
“beginning with Moses
and all the prophets, he
interpreted for them ev
ery passage of Scripture
which referred to him”
(24:27).
—2. Then, a short
time later when the dis
ciples were in the Upper
Room, Jesus stood in
their midst and an
nounced, “Everything
written about me in the
law of Moses, the proph
ets and psalms had to be
fulfilled; then he opened
their minds to under
standing the Scriptures”
(24:44-45).
Beyond the Gospels,
we find the same sense
of Jesus completing and giving
sense to prophecy in Paul’s writ
ings. He opens his Letter to the Ro
mans by saying that he had been set
apart to proclaim “the Gospel of God
which he promised long ago through
sums up God’s promise to David: “I
will raise up a son after you, sprung
from your loins, and I will make his
kingdom firm” (2 Samuel 7:12).
A fourth significant reason why
the New Testament valued the Old
concerns Jesus as “the Son of God.”
As the Letter to the Hebrews begins,
“In times past, God spoke in many
and varied ways to our ancestors
through the prophets, but now in this
final age, he has spoken to us through
his Son.... This Son is the reflection of
the Father’s glory” (1:1-2).
To support this claim, the most
radical and exalted of all Jesus’ titles
in the Scriptures, Hebrews cites 2
Samuel 7:14; Psalms 2:7, 45:7-8,
8:5-6 and 110:1.
Mark begins, “The Gospel of Jesus
Christ the Son of God” (1:1). And
Mark ends by having the centurion at
the cross declare, “Truly this man
was the Son of God” (15:39).
Moreover, all three Synoptic Gos
pels record that at his baptism Jesus
heard the voice declare that he was
“God’s beloved Son” (Matthew 3:17;
Mark 1:11; Luke 3:22).
But even more than these, John’s
Gospel proclaims Jesus’ divine
sonship throughout. Readers quickly
will recognize that John’s claim for
Jesus as the Son of God always is
based on the Old Testament, citing
Proverbs 8:22-25 and Exodus 33:20 in
Chapter 1; Wisdom 16:5-7 in Chapter
3, etc.
We can conclude by saying that
the basic themes of salvation in the
New Testament are the same as
those of the Old, and the reason is
simple: The same God who revealed
divine mercy and taught Israel its
lessons of faith now is revealing
that same mercy and teaching in
Jesus, shown by Scripture to be the
Savior, the Messiah and the only
Son of God.
(Paulist Father Boadt is president
of Paulist Press.)
yet he regularly emphasizes for them
that Jesus fulfilled what the prophets
had written.
Thus, when Jesus first returns to
his hometown of Nazareth, Luke
notes that he announces to his family
and friends that the
prophecy of Isaiah is be
ing fulfilled in his minis
try (4:14-21).
Later, in Jesus’ final
appearances after the
resurrection, Luke un
derscores this twice
again:
The Old Testament roots of
Jesus’ teaching