With the Christmas Season behind us, we now find ourselves in Ordinary Time. We will celebrate five Sundays before we land on Ash Wednesday on February 18.

How do we understand Ordinary Time, which is the longest season in the whole liturgical calendar? Ordinary does not mean plain or Sundays without any special distinctive features. On the contrary, ordinary means an ordered time, a listing of ordinal or sequential numbers. It is the way in which we count the days until the Second Coming of our Lord. On these Sundays, we enter into the rich and life-giving mission of Jesus. We listen attentively to his teachings and miracles and allow his force to penetrate our lives.

Today, we open up Ordinary Time with the Second Sunday. There is no First Sunday in Ordinary Time because the Baptism of the Lord replaces it, which is fitting. Our mission and Christian life are rooted in our baptism, and we enter Ordinary Time keeping in mind the Baptism of Jesus, our own baptism, and the journey ahead.

This Sunday, we learn about Jesus being the perfect sacrifice, and he calls us to be like him. The prophet Isaiah reminds us that God thinks of us from the womb. He makes us his own and appoints us to a mission even before we are born. The Father spoke of Jesus as his Beloved at his baptism and revealed him as servant, Son, and Lord. He came to free exiled Israel from the slavery of sin and call the nations to walk in his light. He is the new exodus.

In the Old Testament, God’s people sacrificed a lamb. They spread the blood of the Lamb over the doorpost of their homes, and death passed them over (Exodus 12:1–23, 27). Jesus is the new Lamb of God. We proclaim this truth at every Sunday Eucharist, “Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.” Jesus is the Paschal Lamb sacrificed for our ransom for our futile conduct (1 Corinthians 5:7; 1 Peter 1:18-19).

Sacrifices, oblations, holocausts, and sin-offerings were given to God’s people to teach them to worship and love God. In the fullness of time, God sent his Son, and the Son said, “Here I am, Lord, I come to do your will” (Psalm 40). Jesus is the perfect offering of love and mercy.

The Father sees us today and sees his Son in us. Baptized in the life of Jesus, God calls us to live from his love. God loves you now. God loves you in your mess and problems and invites you to respond to him. Give Jesus the joy of being your Savior.

Christianity is not a self-help program where we feel better about ourselves. Christianity is about being a light to the nations. The Father sees us and says, “I will make you a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth.” God calls us to be light, to live in it, and radiate that light to those who live in darkness, and this is the Christian ethos. Jesus does not deal in superlatives; he speaks of our identity. In Jesus, we are no longer defined by what we do, but by who we are: his sons, his daughters, and his light for the world.