The mystery of God-With-Us is the final, fullest proof of God's desire to become Someone very near to us. In Jesus, the Word of God becomes our flesh. Every facet of His human journey speaks to us of the nearness of God. He walked with us not only in the Temple, but in the carpenter shop, at the family table, in the desert and on the mountain top. He recognized the image of the Father in the members of His family, in the townspeople of Nazareth, in the poor, the lepers, the crippled, the deaf and the blind who flocked to Him. He embodied the very compassion of God in His reaching out to the tax collector, the prostitute, the Samaritan woman at the well, the thief on the cross.
When He was being "cross-examined" by a lawyer about the real meaning of the Law, He spoke of the love of God and of neighbor. When asked to define "neighbor", He told a simple story of compassion, whose hero was not a revered priest or levite, but a detested Samaritan - an outcast from society.
The inescapable lesson for us is simple, and yet sometimes disturbing. As our first reading proclaims the presence and the love of our God is "something very near" to us. It is already in our hearts and in our mouths. We feel it and are touched and moved by it in the ordinary events, people and places of every day. These events, these people and these places may not often be the kind where we would expect to meet our God. He is often uncomfortably near us in situations and persons where we would prefer not to see Him.
Christ challenges us to lose ourselves in concern for others. If we truly love as Jesus has loved us, then we don't look at risk, or color, or public opinion, or all of the other excuses for walking away.
Jesus calls us to be a compassionate people, not only to celebrate our joys together, but also to take on the trials and sufferings each one of us has to bear. The message of the Gospel constantly reminds us that together all things are possible. No longer is our relationship to God a one-on-One proposition. God is our Father and we are His children. Together we are a family, a community. We relate to God only in communion with one another. When one has reason to celebrate, we are all filled with joy. When one of us is hurting or in pain, we all hurt and we all cry out.
The love of God is as close to us as our dearest friend, or our worst enemy. We see it in the bright shining eyes of children on a summer playground and in the dirty hands and faces of the poor and oppressed. It touches us in our greatest joys and in our deepest sorrow. It is never farther away than our next breath, or sigh, or burst of laughter.
Just exactly who is our neighbor? It is He. And He is God. And God is love - something very near indeed.
