2nd Sunday of Advent 9.12.12 Breaking free
St John the Baptist launched his enquiry of Our Lord while still in chains. That is symbolic because ‘chains’ are often used as an image for our sins and the effect they have on us. Unless the Lord break the chains we remain in captivity. John’s enquiry effectively becomes: are you the one who can break these chains?
John was not much of a sinner himself; his chains were only physical. God sometimes broke physical chains as well (cf the release of Peter from captivity in Acts) but His main concern is spiritual.
We can be free physically but heavily ensnared by sin and its trappings.
In Our Lord’s time, the Jews expected a messiah but they thought he would be another King David who would set Israel free from foreign forces.
Our Lord, however, was more interested in another sort of liberation – from sin. It was because of this different emphasis that He was so much misunderstood, and has been ever since.
A spiritual problem requires a spiritual solution. So we hear of repentance, and living differently.
There are two stages in breaking free.
The first is removal of the guilt of sin. If we are guilty of sin our greatest need is forgiveness. Unless the Lord forgive us we cannot enter His presence. We would never be able to reach Heaven.
So we ask for His mercy and it will be freely given.
The second stage is to be set free from attachment to sin. Even if we are forgiven we might still want to commit the sin again. We have a certain hankering for sin, called ‘concupiscence’. We are attracted to sin even though we know it is wrong; even if our minds reject the sin we still want to do it.
We can be addicted to certain types of sins, like lust or anger. We confess them but still do them again. This is slavery.
It needs prayer, grace, the power of the sacraments to break the chains, to set the soul free.
When we confess we also ask Our Lord to take away these sins, in both senses - the guilt and the desire to re-offend.
And as we come into freedom that we be filled with desire for the good which is the opposite of the sin. (cf Mary, conceived without sin – she not only avoided sin; she had no desire for it)
The world has a different idea about sin. It says, the best way to deal with guilt is to deny it. Accept yourself the way you are, faults and all, and just get on with life. It is human nature to do these things; so just accept it.
If we hold such a false notion then we need to be set free from that too. What Christ commands He also enables. He came to save us, not by half, but all of us, even to the very centre of our desires.
This is real freedom; the whole package that God is offering us. He is setting us free in every way. If we were literally slaves and suddenly let go we would not walk about with some part of the original chains still hanging on to us. We would cut them off completely.
So with sin. If we are to be free of sin, to live as children of God, there can be no compromise. We are a new creation. This is what Our Lord was demonstrating.
He healed the sick and even raised the dead; but His main interest was in people’s souls. He wanted people to experience not just freedom from physical pain, but to come to full humanity as lived by Himself.
So no more sin, nor hankering for it; we are free and we will stay free.
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