Thought for the week: The essential Christian message is love, sacrifice and service

John believed Jesus would "clear his threshing floor, gather his wheat into his granary, and burn the chaff with unquenchable fire". A week further on, however, John is languishing in prison. John had preached fearlessly, confronting the Pharisees and Sadducees, and called out Herod for divorcing his wife and marrying his sister-in-law. Herod had him imprisoned, but John did not mind as he considered that Jesus would rescue him.

John’s expectations of Jesus were not what he thought they would be. After many months in prison, when John heard what Jesus had been doing: healing the sick, casting out demons and teaching people that the meek and the persecuted are blessed, telling them to turn the other cheek and to love not just neighbours but enemies, he sent his disciples to Jesus to ask if he is the one who is to come, or should they look for another.

Like John, we have expectations of God and have been disappointed in that we wanted him to be invincible and powerful, and use His divine powers to heal the sick, stop wars, and wipe out world hunger. Jesus, however, is not this kind of Saviour. His way of saving the world is through love, sacrifice and service.

An episcopal priest in Guam, Western Pacific, Irene Egmalis-Maliaman, claims “the gospel is not a fairytale with a happy ending but rather a kaleidoscope of joy, pain, hope, suffering, peace, fear, triumph, surrender, faith, doubt, disappointments, meaning, loss, and fulfilment.”

Jesus shakes up the crowd, telling them to look for God – not among those dressed in fine robes or live in royal palaces – but rather among the least and vulnerable, among God’s prophets, like John the Baptist, Mary, Joseph, Elizabeth, and Zechariah.