But who do you say that I am?

28 SEPTEMBER (Lk 9,18-22)

The Messiah of God is presented in the robes of a Suffering Servant. Isaiah say of him: “He was spurned and avoided by men, a man of suffering, accustomed to infirmity, One of those from whom men hide their faces, spurned, and we held him in no esteem. Yet it was our infirmities that he bore, our sufferings that he endured, While we thought of him as stricken, as one smitten by God and afflicted. But he was pierced for our offenses, crushed for our sins, Upon him was the chastisement that makes us whole, by his stripes we were healed. But the Lord laid upon him the guilt of us all. Though he was harshly treated, he submitted and opened not his mouth; Like a lamb led to the slaughter or a sheep before the shearers, he was silent and opened not his mouth. Oppressed and condemned, he was taken away, and who would have thought any more of his destiny? When he was cut off from the land of the living, and smitten for the sin of his people, Because of his affliction he shall see the light in fullness of days; Through his suffering, my servant shall justify many, and their guilt he shall bear. Therefore I will give him his portion among the great, and he shall divide the spoils with the mighty, Because he surrendered himself to death and was counted among the wicked; And he shall take away the sins of many, and win pardon for their offenses” (Cf. Is 52,13-53.12).

The Psalm also talks of the indescribable suffering of the righteous of the Lord: “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me? But I am a worm and not a man, A reproach of men and despised by the people. All who see me sneer at me; They separate with the lip, they wag the head, saying, “Commit yourself to the LORD; let Him deliver him; Let Him rescue him, because He delights in him.” Many bulls have surrounded me; Strong bulls of Bashan have encircled me. They open wide their mouth at me, As a ravening and a roaring lion. I am poured out like water, And all my bones are out of joint; My heart is like wax; It is melted within me. My strength is dried up like a potsherd, And my tongue cleaves to my jaws; And You lay me in the dust of death. For dogs have surrounded me; A band of evildoers has encompassed me; They pierced my hands and my feet. I can count all my bones. They look, they stare at me; They divide my garments among them, And for my clothing they cast lots” (Cf. Psalm 22 (21) 1-32).

By divine revelation, Peter knows who Jesus is: “The Christ of God,” his Anointed. But, he does not know the truth about the Lord’s Christ. He thinks him glorious, victorious, as one who would have freed his people from slavery to the Romans, as one time Moses had freed the children of Israel from the bondage of Pharaoh. Jesus is not a new David and not even a new Moses. His mission is infinitely more, divinely beyond.

Once when Jesus was praying in solitude, and the disciples were with him, he asked them, “Who do the crowds say that I am?” They said in reply, “John the Baptist; others, Elijah; still others, ‘One of the ancient prophets has arisen.'” Then he said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter said in reply, “The Messiah of God.” He rebuked them and directed them not to tell this to anyone. He said, “The Son of Man must suffer greatly and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed and on the third day be raised.”

The Messiah of the Lord is a won by love, charity, mercy, and compassion for man. Not toward one man, one people, one nation, one language, one tribe, and one race. He is won by the piety for every man, from Adam to the last to be born on our earth. He did not come to liberate man from man, but man from his sin. When sin is removed from a heart, this man can live well even in hell. The grace of God, his light, will act as a sweet and light breeze for him.

Jesus removes sin taking it all upon himself in a concrete, real, and physical way. Physically he overloads himself with sin, because he is physically humiliated and crucified, physically abused and scourged, mocked and derided; by sin. It took, overcame, and removed it. Now, with his grace and truth every man can overcome sin, can remove it from the world; however, by taking it all upon himself in a physical, and not only in a spiritual way. It is physically that one overcomes sin. As long as the Christian thinks only to a spiritual way, never might it be overcome; for it is in the body that it is overcome because it is in the body that it is nailed on the cross.

Virgin Mary, Mother of the Redemption, Angels, and Saints make us be victorious over sin.