Vigils Reading – 4th Sunday of Advent

GOD WITH US

From a commentary by the Venerable Bede

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Matthew the evangelist gives us an account of the way in which the eternal

Son of God, begotten before the world began, appeared in time as the Son of

Man. His description is brief but absolutely true. By tracing the ancestry of our

Lord and Savior Jesus Christ through the male line he brings it down from

Abraham to Joseph, the husband of Mary. It is indeed fitting in every respect

that when God decided to become incarnate for the sake of the whole human

race, none but a virgin should be his mother, and that, since a virgin was

privileged to bring him into the world, she should bear no other son but the son

who is God.

Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and he shall be called

Emmanuel, a name which means God with us. The name God-with-us, given to

our Savior by the prophet, signifies that two natures are united in his one

person. Before time began he was God, born of the Father, but in the fullness of

time he became Emmanuel, God with us, in the womb of his mother, because

when the Word was made flesh and lived among us he deigned to unite our frail

human nature to his own person. Without ceasing to be what he had always

been, he began in a wonderful fashion to be what we are, assuming our nature in

such a way that he did not lose his own.

And so Mary gave birth to her firstborn son, the child of her own flesh and

blood. She brought forth the God who had been born of God before creation

began, and who, in his created humanity, rightfully surpassed the whole of

creation. And Scripture says she named him Jesus.

Jesus, then, is the name of the Virgin’s son. According to the angel’s

explanation, it means one who is to save his people from their sins. In doing so

he will also deliver them from any defilement of mind and body they have

incurred on account of their sins.

But the title “Christ” implies a priestly or royal dignity. In the Old

Testament it was given to both priests and kings on account of the anointing

with chrism or holy oil which they received. They prefigured the true king and

high priest who, on coming into this world, was anointed with the oil of gladness

above all his peers. From this anointing or chrismation he received the name of

Christ, and those who share in the anointing which he himself bestows, that is

the grace of the Spirit, are called Christians.

May Jesus Christ fulfill his saving task by saving us from our sins; may he

discharge his priestly office by reconciling us to God the Father, and may he

exercise his royal power by admitting us to his Father’s kingdom, for he is our

Lord and God, who lives and reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit for ever

and ever.