Today's meditation: Voice of one crying in the desert

Voice of one who cries in the desert: "Prepare the way for the Lord, smooth out the way for our God in the steppe" (Is 40: 3).
He openly declares that the things reported in the prophecy, that is, the advent of the glory of the Lord and the manifestation of the salvation of God to all humanity, will take place not in Jerusalem, but in the desert. And this was accomplished historically and literally when John the Baptist preached the salutary advent of God in the Jordan desert, where precisely the salvation of God was manifested. In fact, Christ and his glory clearly appeared to everyone when, after his baptism, they opened the heavens and the Holy Spirit, descending in the form of a dove, rested on him and the voice of the Father sounded, bearing witness to the Son: «This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Listen to him »(Mt 17, 5).
But all this must also be understood in an allegorical sense. God was about to come to that desert, always impervious and inaccessible, which was humanity. This was in fact a desert completely closed to the knowledge of God and barred to every righteous and prophet. That voice, however, requires us to open a way towards it to the Word of God; he commands to smooth out the rough and steep terrain that leads to it, so that by coming he may enter: Prepare the way of the Lord (cf. Ml 3, 1).
Preparation is the evangelization of the world, it is comforting grace. They communicate to humanity the knowledge of God's salvation.
«You go up on a high mountain, you who bring good news in Zion; raise your voice with strength, you who bring good news in Jerusalem "(Is 40: 9).
Previously there had been talk of the voice resonating in the desert, now, with these expressions, allusion is made, in a rather picturesque way, to the most immediate announcers of the coming of God and his coming. In fact, first we speak of the prophecy of John the Baptist and then of the evangelizers.
But what is the Zion to which those words refer? Of course what was formerly called Jerusalem. In fact, it too was a mountain, as Scripture says when it says: "Mount Zion, where you have taken up residence" (Ps 73, 2); and the Apostle: "You have approached the mount of Zion" (Heb 12, 22). But in a higher sense Zion, which makes known the coming of Christ, is the choir of the apostles, chosen from among the people of circumcision.
Yes, this, in fact, is Zion and Jerusalem which welcomed the salvation of God and which is placed on the mountain of God, it is founded, that is, on the only begotten Word of the Father. She commands her to climb first on a sublime mountain, and then to announce the salvation of God.
In fact, who is the figure who brings happy news if not the ranks of the evangelizers? And what does it mean to evangelize if not to bring to all men, and above all to the cities of Judah, the good news of Christ's coming to earth?

of Eusèbio, bishop of Cesarèa