St. John the Baptist’s job is to point out the Messiah.  He’s the last and the greatest of the prophets, and he has the unique and remarkable privilege of bringing all prophecy to its fulfillment and completion.  For centuries, the prophets said, salvation is coming, salvation is coming.  Keep watching, keep waiting, salvation is coming.  John the Baptist has the privilege of saying, Salvation is here.  He says it even before his birth, when he leaps in the womb of his mother Elizabeth, after the pregnant Virgin Mary comes to visit.  Already, even before he can speak, he speaks the truth.  He points to the Christ.  And now, in the scene we’ve just heard, he points to him directly.  “Behold the Lamb of God.  Behold him who takes away the sins of the world.”  We hear those beautiful words at every Mass, just before we express our humility as Christ prepares to enter into the dwelling places of our hearts at Holy Communion.  “Behold the Lamb of God.  Behold him who takes away the sins of the world.”  

Like so many things in our Catholic life, this is one of those phrases we hear all the time, but that we really need to pause with from time to time, and consider just how remarkable a statement it truly is.  “Behold the Lamb of God; behold him who takes away the sins of the world.”  John is saying something rather surprising here.  The Messiah that most people expected was a strong warrior who would free the chosen people from their bondage to the Roman Empire and usher in a time of earthly prosperity and peace.  But John the Baptist points another way.  He doesn’t say, Behold the Warrior of God, who takes away every enemy of the people.”  He says “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.”  John says to his followers, and to us: There’s actually something even more remarkable happening here.  This is not about temporary earthly prosperity.  This is about eternal, permanent, irrevocable salvation.  He’s not Julius Caesar.  He’s not General Patton.  He’s a sacrificial lamb.  That should surprise us.  It definitely surprised John the Baptist’s audience.  That means, this is way more important than we even thought.  All of this business, with this guy from Nazareth whose birth we just got done celebrating, it’s not going to be just about our fixing our relationship with the rest of the world; it’s going to be about fixing our relationship to eternity.  It’s going to be about fixing our relationship with Almighty God.  The true enemy isn’t the Romans, or the Egyptians, or the Babylonians.  The true enemy is sin.  And this savior’s salvation isn’t going to come through his dominance, but through his self-sacrifice.  

The problem with all of the actual sacrificial lambs in salvation history up to this point, is that they came nowhere close to making up for the sins of the whole world.  Too small a sacrifice.  Only a perfect sacrifice, an astronomically cosmic sacrifice, could repair our whole human race’s relationship with God; no lamb would suffice.  Except one.  The Lamb of God.  God Himself.  And now we see what our Messiah is really here to do.  The prophecy is completed as John says: our Messiah is here, and he’s not the kind of Messiah you were expecting.  He’s so much more.  He’s not just going to fix the right-now.  He’s going to fix everything.  He is the sacrificial lamb, a sacrifice pure enough, perfect enough, to repair every sin of every person in the whole world throughout all of time.  “Behold the Lamb of God; behold him who takes away the sins of the world.”  Our only response can be, “Lord, I am not worthy…but only say the word, and my soul shall be healed.”