To show his debt of gratitude to the Baptist and his strict continuity with him, Jesus chooses as the first words of his public life the phrase that sums up verbatim the essence of the Forerunner’s preaching: Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. But now the word of preparation becomes the word of fulfillment. John’s message has faithfully been transitive, because he pointed beyond himself to Jesus: “The Kingdom of Heaven has come near…and there you see it approaching in the form of Jesus of Nazareth.” When Jesus himself repeats the same words, however, he speaks them as the Light that has dawned over every people, every individual squatting helplessly in the darkness. Jesus’ words are the auditory component of the real fact that the Son of God is living among men. Verse 13 says literally “he made his home in Capharnaum.” By so doing, the Son of God has reopened the gates of paradise for those who would drink of that light, that water of eternal life.
Christ Jesus among us is the walking Kingdom of Heaven. The angels who came to serve him after the temptations knew as much: they had no need of metanoia. “Repentance” means, not only to forsake our old sinful ways, since this would be a merely moral change: repentance means to put on a new attitude because we recognize the compellingly royal presence of God before us. This entails a change of vision, a change of home, a change of lover. Our constant prayer to the Father must be: “Teach us to be hungry for this living and true Bread!” Such hunger is the prime fruit of metanoia. Our very heart must churn until all we know is Jesus, whom the Father loves above all things and in adoring whom the angels find their joy.
Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis
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