Oculi
Sunday, March 23 (Lent III)
Mine eyes are ever toward the Lord:
For He shall pluck my feet out of the net.
Turn Thee unto me and have mercy upon me:
For I am desolate and afflicted.
Unto Thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul:
O my God, I trust in Thee; let me not be ashamed.
—Psalm 25:15–16, 1–2a
A writing for the Holy Gospel, Luke 11:14–28:
“Blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it!”
—Luke 11:28b
The Second Person of the Trinity is the Word of God. God the Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, is the very Word of God. Through this Word all things were made, and by this Word the sins of all men have been atoned for. The Word is God, and in the Word the power and love of God is made manifest to all men.
The Father made all things through this Word. The catechized Christian heart knows well the words of St. John the Evangelist in the beginning of his Gospel. By John’s Gospel alone, no less the greater message to which John testified, we understand the necessity and centrality of the Word, who is in essence and substance fully God.
Yet the Word of God is not only made manifest in the essential substance and power of the Son of God. The Word simply is, and yet the Word is also made manifest to us in tangible, perceivable, intimate ways. The Word was first spoken by the Prophets, all of whom testified to the One by whose name and in whose stead they prophesied. The Word became Man and dwelt among us, and continues to make Himself abundantly present in the Sacraments. The Word has been handed down to us in a tangible and intimate way through the sacred Scripture—God’s physical self-revelation that we may read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest.
How sacred is this Word! With the woman in Luke 11 we cry, “Blessed is the womb that bore this Word in the flesh!” Yet as our Lord concludes, “Blessed also are all those who hear the Word of God and keep it.” The Word is life; the Word has redeemed our life; all who hear and keep this Word receive life in His name.
Tomorrow, the Church celebrates the Feast of the Annunciation to the Blessed Virgin Mary, recorded in the first chapter of Luke’s Gospel. The angel Gabriel appeared to the Blessed Virgin Mary and spoke to her the promise that she would bear a Son, who would be the Son of God. Indeed, Gabriel spoke to Mary the promise that she would bear the Word made flesh. A promise of life was made—and Mary believed.
The angel’s words were tangible. They were spoken. They were heard—and they were believed. The Virgin Mary not only heard the angel’s words, but kept them. She clung to the promise that her Son would be the Son of God. She rejoiced that the miraculous birth of her Son would be the restoration of life for all mankind. She treasured up this sacred mystery in her heart. By faith she heard, and by faith she kept.
It is fitting that the alignment of this year’s sanctoral and temporal liturgical calendars places the Annunciation two days after Oculi Sunday.1 We hear first in the Gospel for Oculi Sunday that those who hear the Word of God and keep it are blessed, and we hear later in the Gospel for the Feast of the Annunciation the first declaration that the Word of God would become flesh and dwell with His creation. The Word took on our flesh and Himself the lives we live in the flesh. The Incarnation, to which Gabriel attests in the Annunciation, is the life-giving foundation of the blessedness we receive in the Word.
In the Gospel texts both for Oculi Sunday and for the Annunciation, we hear. We receive. We have life. As the Virgin Mary heard and kept, so also we hear and keep. The Word is kept by hearing, and the Word is heard by faith. Unlike the faithless crowds that demanded a sign from Jesus as He cast out demons, we need not a sign from heaven. We keep because we hear, and we hear because we believe. Great is the Word’s life-giving power, for He called us out of darkness into His marvelous light. He has called us to belief, for through His Word we are given faith to hear.
Greater still is the Word’s life-preserving persistence, for even when we do not believe, we are called back by the Word. He calls to us in our disobedience and shines His life-giving light on our path. He speaks, and we hear. We hear, and we receive forgiveness. We receive, and we are blessed. In the Word, we have life.
This is our comfort in distress. This is our sword in battle. This is our salvation. We take comfort in the spoken Word. We must gladly and faithfully hear this Word—and keep it. The Word is spoken to us, and we hear, as the pastor absolves God’s people of their sins. The Word is spoken to us, and we hear, as the Words of our Lord are spoken over the Eucharistic elements. The Word is spoken to us, and we hear, as the liturgy is prayed. The Word is constantly spoken to us, and we hear—and we believe.
Indeed, we believe because we have heard.
Luther on Luke 11:14-28:
“This is a beautiful Gospel from which we learn many different things, and in which nearly everything is set forth as to what Christ, his kingdom and his Gospel are: what they accomplish and how they fare in the world. In the first place, like all the Gospels this one teaches us faith and love; for it presents Christ to us as a most loving Saviour and Helper in every need and tells us that he who believes this is saved. For we see here that Christ had nothing to do with people who were healthy, but with a poor man who was greatly afflicted with many ills. He was blind, as Matthew says; also dumb and possessed with a demon, as Luke tells us here. Now all mutes are also deaf, so that in the Greek language deaf and dumb are one word. By this act Christ draws us to himself, leads us to look to him for every blessing, and to go to him in every time of need. He does this that we also, according to the nature of love, should do unto others as he does unto us. This is the universal and the most precious doctrine of this Gospel and of all the Gospels throughout the church year. This poor man, however, did not come to Christ without the Word; for those who brought him to Christ must have heard his love preached and were moved thereby to trust in him. We learn therefore that faith comes through the Word; but more of this elsewhere.
“Secondly, it is here demonstrated how Christ and his Gospel fare in the world, namely, that there are three kinds of hearers. Some marvel at him; these are pious and true Christians, who consider this deed so great that they are amazed at it. Some blaspheme the Gospel; these are the Pharisees and scribes, who were vexed because they could not do the like, and were worried lest the people should hold Christ in higher esteem than themselves. Some tempt him, like Herod desired a sign after his own heart, that they may make sport of it. But he answers both parties; at first, the blasphemers in this Gospel, and later on the tempters, saying that no sign shall be given this wicked generation except the sign of the prophet Jonah, of which we read in the verses following. He answers the blasphemers in a friendly way […]”
—Martin Luther, Sermon for the Third Sunday in Lent, Luke 11:14-23, taken from Martin Luther’s Church Postils.
Hymn of the Day for Oculi (LSB 659):
1 Lord of our life and God of our salvation,
Star of our night and Hope of ev'ry nation:
Hear and receive Your Church's supplication,
Lord God Almighty.
2 See round Your ark the hungry billows curling;
See how Your foes their banners are unfurling
And with great spite their fiery darts are hurling,
O Lord, preserve us.
3 Lord, be our light when worldly darkness veils us;
Lord, be our shield when earthly armor fails us;
And in the day when hell itself assails us,
Grant us Your peace, Lord:
4 Peace in our hearts, where sinful thoughts are raging,
Peace in Your Church, our troubled souls assuaging,
Peace when the world its endless war is waging,
Peace in Your heaven.
Text: Matthäus Apelles von Löwenstern, 1594-1648, tr. Philip Pusey, 1799-1855.
Collect of the Day for Oculi:
We beseech Thee, Almighty God, look upon the hearty desires of Thy humble servants and stretch forth the right hand of Thy majesty to be our defense against all our enemies; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with Thee in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.
The Church year is comprised of two concurrent liturgical calendars: the sanctoral and the temporal calendar. The sanctoral calendar includes feasts of the Blessed Virgin Mary, saints’ and martyrs’ days, and other minor commemorations throughout the Church Year, all of whose feast days are fixed. Thus, the Annunciation, for example, always falls on March 25. The temporal calendar is comprised of the liturgical seasons and respective feasts around which these seasons are anchored. Though the calendrical pattern is identical each year, the seasons and feasts of the temporal calendar are not fixed, and their placement often depends on the date of Easter. The feasts and seasons of the temporal calendar are centered on the Paschal Mystery of Christ, including His Incarnation, Passion, and Resurrection. For this reason, the Feast of the Annunciation and Oculi Sunday rarely occur so closely.