DECEMBER 10, 2023

SUNDAY OF THE SECOND WEEK OF ADVENT

A YES TO GOD IN MY DAILY LIFE (II)

OPENING PRAYER:

COME HOLY SPIRIT. I welcome you into my heart as Mary did. Come with power. Help me to offer my own yes to God the Father, saying with trust: “May it be done unto me according to your word.”

TODAY’S THOUGHT:

Joseph, too, is available to God right in the midst of his ordinary workday. Laboring in his workshop, his toil is available to be used by God. The mousetraps that he is crafting are a reference to the writings of St. Augustine, who described the Cross of Christ as a baited trap that ensnared the devil:

“The Devil exulted when Christ died, and by that very death of Christ the Devil was overcome: he took food, as it were, from a trap. He gloated over the death as if he were appointed a deputy of death; that in which he rejoiced became a prison for him. The cross of the Lord became a trap for the Devil; the death of the Lord was the food by which he was ensnared. And behold, our Lord Jesus Christ rose again.”(1)

Jesus' death on the Cross was the bait that ensnared the Devil. Jesus could die only because he took on our human flesh and entered fully into our human condition. Our seemingly "ordinary" human condition became the very way that Jesus overcame sin and death and the Devil. Joseph's role in that seemingly "ordinary human life" of Jesus was huge: entrusted as foster father, Joseph formed Jesus and taught him his trade. All of the ordinary, daily things that Joseph taught Jesus would end up serving our salvation.

Luke tells us: “The child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favor of God was upon him” (Luke 2:40). The “ordinary” work of Mary and Joseph contributed invaluably to the growth and strengthening of Jesus as well as to his developing wisdom.

Your yes to God in the ordinary things of life can also be used in amazing ways!

TODAY’S PRAYER:

God loves the ordinary and chooses to work in ways that surprise us because they are so ordinary. Pray through these words of St. Paul to the Corinthians, in which Paul reminds us that no one is too ordinary for him. Let these words bring you confidence in offering your yes to the Lord today in the midst of your daily duties and responsibilities:

1 Corinthians 1:26-31
²⁶"Consider your own calling, brothers. Not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. ²⁷Rather, God chose the foolish of the world to shame the wise, and God chose the weak of the world to shame the strong, ²⁸and God chose the lowly and despised of the world, those who count for nothing, to reduce to nothing those who are something, ²⁹so that no human being might boast before God. ³⁰It is due to him that you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, as well as righteousness, sanctification, and redemption, ³¹so that, as it is written, “Whoever boasts, should boast in the Lord.”

FOR YOUR REFLECTION:

Moving to the panel on the right of the altarpiece, we have Joseph working in his shop. This portrayal of Joseph shows him as the provider. In many other works of art, Joseph is often presented as feeble, sleeping, or insignificant. But Campin has given Joseph dignity. He has painted him as the provider of the holy family, a hard worker who participates in the salvation narrative.

Board of Spikes

Joseph is drilling holes into a small, square board. Northern European artists of this time sometimes portrayed Christ as carrying the cross with a rope tied around his waist. Attached to these ropes were boards that looked just like the board that Joseph is making. In the holes of the board, spikes were inserted so that, as Christ walked, they would bang against his legs, adding another layer to his suffering. We can see the boards like this in the painting by Hieronymus Bosch below. Christ is stepping on one, and the other is hitting his ankle:

Those boards are just one reference to the future work that Christ will take on behalf of humanity. The saw in the bottom left of the Altarpiece panel is believed to reference the sword that the Apostle Peter will use to slice the ear off of a Roman Soldier on the night Jesus is arrested. And the other tools spread throughout the workspace are references to other moments of the Passion narrative.

The Mousetrap

The most remarked upon detail of this panel in Campin’s altarpiece, however, is the mousetrap. There is one on the workbench and another sitting on the window sill as if advertising Joseph’s work to passersbys. The mousetrap is a symbol for Christ dying on the cross and trapping Satan.

St. Augustine, several times, made the analogy between a mousetrap and Christ. “What is this trap, made by a Carpenter who works in wood? God’s trap for the devil is the cross. And who is the bait, placed on the trap? It is Jesus. He himself becomes the bait.”

When Christ came, Satan saw his opportunity to do damage, perhaps even kill Jesus. But it was a trap, it is in Christ’s death on the cross that Satan loses all.

CONTINUED PRAYER:

Offer one of the “Prayers of Surrender and Abandonment.”

Augustine of Hippo, Sermons on the Liturgical Seasons, ed. Hermigild Dressler, trans. Mary Sarah Muldowney, vol. 38, The Fathers of the Church (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1959), 392–393.

The Gospel of Yes Daily Reflection for Dec. 10, 2023