VincentWiki:Reflections/10 2007
Second Sunday of Lent, Year C
- They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb (Rev. 7:14)
God gave his word to Abram, and Abram believed. God took Abram’s faith as an act of righteousness. But as it happens not a few times to righteous believers, the father of believers could not help ask for a confirmation of the promise.
Obliging, God asked Abram to prepare various animals for a burnt offering. The sacrifice was consummated when a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between cut pieces of the animals. No one and nothing could prevent it: not the birds of prey that augured ill; nor the deep sleep that overcame Abram that perhaps signaled—as was the case with Adam’s deep sleep in Gen. 2:21—that a special divine intervention was about to take place; nor the terrifying darkness that enveloped Abram. Through a burnt offering intimately connected with the words of a more or less detailed explanation, God confirmed his promise (cf. SC 35).
