Last week we heard about the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist. Today, we hear John say about Jesus: “Behold, the Lamb of God.” The only other place in Scripture where Jesus is called the Lamb of God is in the Book of Revelation.

These are also the words the priest says at every Mass as he holds up the consecrated Body of Christ just before Communion: “Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who takes away the sins of the world.” Notice, however, that at Mass the English translation in the Roman Missal says “sins,” while the Bible says “sin” in the singular.

Not sure why the English translation chose the plural, but it is important to think of it in the singular. That is because Jesus did not come simply to forgive your individual sins, important as that is. He came to heal something deeper, the underlying condition of sin in which we all live.

Think of your individual sins as symptoms of an illness: a runny nose, a sore throat, body aches, chills. Those symptoms are real, and they matter. But they are not the illness itself. The illness is the virus.

In the same way, our individual sins are real, but they flow from a deeper condition, a wounded way of relating to God, to others, and to ourselves. Our relationships are broken. In our tradition, we call this condition original sin, which can be described as disobedience to God, as we reject the limitations that come with being created beings, leading to feelings like anger, shame, pride, and envy, which, without a way of dealing with these things, lead to becoming slaves to sin.

So, Jesus comes not just to treat the symptoms, but to heal the disease. And the way he does that is contained in this title given to him by John the Baptist, Lamb of God, which led to two important changes: how we worship and how we are healed.

First, it changed how we worship. In the Jewish context, the lamb was closely associated with the Temple. The most important act of worship of the year was the Passover, a festival that took place once a year to commemorate the Exodus out of Egypt. The festival began with a pilgrimage to the Temple and the sacrifice of a lamb. The Temple was symbolic of the presence of God, and the lamb was symbolic of repentance for sins, protection from God, and hope of future deliverance. It could point to healing, but it could not accomplish it.

When John calls Jesus the Lamb of God, he is making the claim that Jesus replaces both the symbolic Temple and the sacrificial lamb. In Jesus, the symbols finally become a reality. As fully human and fully divine, only Jesus brings about God’s actual presence, and only Jesus can give true forgiveness, protection, and deliverance from sin.

This realization is what led Jewish believers in Christ to stop going to the Jewish Temple and to separate themselves completely as they formed a new, distinct Christian community. The Gospel of John is written during this transition, and soon after, they began to gather in homes. If Jesus is the Temple, and Jesus is now in them, and where two or three are gathered in his name, there he is, then the Temple is the gathering of believers in Christ, the Church.

If Jesus is the Lamb who offered himself as a sacrifice once and for all, then the slaughter of lambs is no longer needed. Instead, they began to understand the breaking of the bread and the partaking of the chalice, the Eucharist, as their participation in the sacrifice of Jesus, which they began to celebrate weekly on Sunday, the day of the Resurrection. A new form of worship emerges.

Second, Jesus, as the Lamb of God, offers real healing to our relationship with God.

Healing takes place in the form of transformation, and Jesus does so in two ways: the transformation of fear and the transformation of evil.

First, the transformation of fear. For most of human history, the sin of the world created a sense of fear of the divine. This fear manifested itself in the form of a sacrifice-based relationship, which is why most ancient religions have some sort of sacrificial ritual, be it of humans, animals, or harvest, offered to the gods to keep them happy and far away.

To say that Jesus is the Lamb of God is to say that God does not want our sacrifices to keep him happy. Instead, God sacrifices himself for us, so that we might have joy. This transformed religion from one based on our fear of God to one based on the love of God for us.

We call this the gift of faith. Faith in Jesus is the confidence that comes from knowing and trusting that God loves you, that God loves me in spite of everything I may have done, that God’s love is not fragile, and that it does not disappear when I fail. It completely dispels any fear of God. Jesus, the Lamb of God, takes away the sin of the world by transforming fear into love.

Second is the transformation of evil into good, of disorder into holiness. When you hear the word holiness, do not be put off. Often people associate holiness with perfect human behavior, which makes holiness seem so out of reach. Think of holiness as wholeness, becoming more authentically the person you are, the person God created you to be.

This transformation happens through the cleansing of our consciences, through the renewal of our minds, through coming to accurate knowledge of ourselves. This is the work of the Holy Spirit in us, the Spirit that Jesus breathes into us through Baptism. Yes, anyone can pursue self-improvement. There are many tools to understand your psychology and personality that do help, but only the Holy Spirit can reveal the deeper truths about us.

The transformation of evil into good happens through prayer. Think of prayer as the humble act of placing ourselves before God and saying, “I do not see clearly, show me the way.” When Jesus encounters the blind beggar, he asks him, “What do you want me to do for you?” and the blind man responds, “Lord, I want to see.”

To pray is to let the Holy Spirit bring light to our minds and hearts, to the truth God wants to reveal. That is a risk, because God might reveal sin we do not want to let go of. But if I trust in God’s love for me, then prayer becomes the place of mercy, where I allow God to move me from sin to life, from disorder to order, from evil toward good. I become more whole, more holy.

A method of transformative prayer that is very effective is the Spiritual Exercises and the Fourteen Rules of Discernment of St. Ignatius. Over the past two weeks, I have shared with you two transformative prayer experiences I had using these exercises.

As a brief introduction, the rules are about recognizing and identifying the different movements within us. Some draw us toward God, toward truth, toward love. Others pull us away. Prayer is about learning to recognize the difference.

Ignatius calls these movements consolation and desolation. Consolation is anything that increases faith, hope, and love. It brings peace, even when life is difficult. It draws us outward toward God and others. Desolation is anything that drains hope, isolates us, darkens our view of ourselves or God, and makes us want to give up.

One of Ignatius’ most important rules is this: never make major decisions in a time of desolation. When you are discouraged, anxious, or spiritually dry, that is not the moment to change your commitments, your prayer, or your direction in life. This is what we are tempted to do, and most people stop praying, but that is precisely the time when we need more clarity from the Holy Spirit.

Each rule is incredibly helpful in understanding the movement of the heart in the spiritual life. They are a powerful tool for transformation that has given us thousands of saints over the past 500 years.

As we continue this new year, let that be our focus: be confident in the love that God has for you. Be confident that God continues the work of transformation in you, so that this year you can be a little more whole than you were last year.

We know this because we have come to know and trust in Jesus, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world. Blessed are those called to the table of the Lord.