5 December 2026 · Latin Rite
Open in the Daily Word appAlso: Syro-Malankara Rite · Syro-Malabar Rite · മലയാളം
“When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” Matthew 9:36
Isaiah speaks tenderly to a people in distress: God “waits to be gracious to you”; “he will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry”; your Teacher will no longer hide, and “your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, ‘This is the way; walk in it.’” He promises rain, harvest, and the day when the Lord “binds up the injuries of his people”.
Jesus goes through all the towns teaching, proclaiming and healing. Seeing the crowds “harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd”, he is moved with compassion. His response is twofold: pray (“ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers”) and send (he calls the Twelve and gives them authority). “You received without payment; give without payment.” Advent compassion becomes mission.
Theme: “This is the way; walk in it.”
God waits to be gracious; Jesus has compassion; the Twelve are sent.
“Therefore the LORD waits to be gracious to you; therefore he will rise up to show mercy to you. For the LORD is a God of justice; blessed are all those who wait for him.” Isaiah 30:18
“When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” Matthew 9:36
Apply: Bring your deepest cry to God today.
“And when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left, your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way; walk in it.”” Isaiah 30:21
“The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.’” Mark 1:3
Apply: Ask God for guidance in one decision.
“He heals the brokenhearted, and binds up their wounds.” Psalm 147:3
“Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons. You received without payment; give without payment.” Matthew 10:8
Apply: Offer a free service to someone this week.
God's compassion sends us out.
Walk in his way, and share what you have received.
Take-home resolution: Pray each day of Advent for vocations from your parish.
Dear friends, Isaiah speaks tenderly to a suffering people: he will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry; when he hears it, he will answer you. Though the Lord may give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet your Teacher will not hide himself any more (Isaiah 30:19–20).
And then a beautiful promise: your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, this is the way; walk in it (Isaiah 30:21). God guides us, not always by showing the whole road, but by a quiet word at each turning.
In the Gospel Jesus goes about all the cities and villages, teaching, proclaiming the good news and curing every sickness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. He tells his disciples: the harvest is plentiful, but the labourers are few (Matthew 9:35–38).
Then he does something surprising: he calls the Twelve and sends them out to do what he has been doing. Proclaim the good news, cure the sick, cleanse lepers. You received without payment; give without payment (Matthew 10:8).
Advent is not only waiting for Christ; it is also being sent by him. The crowds of our time are harassed and helpless too: young people without direction, families under stress, people lost in addictions. Jesus looks at them with compassion, and he sends us.
Let us pray today for labourers in the harvest: priests, religious, catechists and committed lay people. Let us listen for that quiet word behind us: this is the way. And let us give freely what we have freely received. Amen.
Children, Jesus feels sorry for people who are lost and sad. Pray today that God will send many good priests and sisters!
Lord of the harvest, you wait to be gracious to us. Show me the way and let me walk in it. Send labourers into your harvest, and make me generous, giving freely what I have freely received. Amen.
Isaiah promises a people in Zion that God will answer their cry, teach them, send rain and bind up their wounds. In Matthew that God has come to walk among the towns: Jesus sees the crowds, is moved with compassion, and sends out twelve men to do what he has been doing. The Lord who heals calls others to share the work.
Setting.
Chapter 30 begins with a “woe” against those who sent to Egypt for help instead of trusting the Lord, probably in the time of King Hezekiah, when Assyria threatened Judah. The people refused to listen: “In returning and rest you shall be saved” (30:15). They would not. Yet God waits “to be gracious to you” (30:18), and today's promise follows from that. The reading omits v. 22, on throwing away idols.
Structure.
Key words.
Verse by verse.
“Truly, O people in Zion, inhabitants of Jerusalem, you shall weep no more. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry” (30:19)
God answers before the people have put their cry into words. The first thing he hears is the sound itself.
“And when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left, your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way; walk in it.”” (30:21)
The trials of v. 20 do not vanish, but the people are no longer alone in them.
“on the day when the Lord binds up the injuries of his people, and heals the wounds inflicted by his blow.” (30:26)
The same hand that struck now binds up. Isaiah does not explain the mystery, but he ends with God as the doctor of his people.
How the Church reads it.
The Church hears “your Teacher” fulfilled in Christ, who says, “you have one teacher” (Matthew 23:8), and sits teaching on the mountain. The Bread and the Teacher come together in the Mass: the table of the word and the table of the Eucharist (Dei Verbum 21). The binding up of wounds is taken up in the Gospel of the day, where Jesus cures “every disease and every sickness”.
Setting.
V. 35 almost repeats 4:23, and the two verses frame everything between them: the words of chapters 5–7 and the deeds of chapters 8–9. Now Matthew turns to the mission of the Twelve in chapter 10, the second great discourse of his Gospel. The reading leaves out the list of names (10:2–4).
Structure.
Key words.
Verse by verse.
“When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” (9:36)
The image goes back to Numbers 27:17 and Ezekiel 34. God promised to shepherd them himself.
“The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few” (9:37)
Jesus does not say, “The harvest is hopeless.” Those who look at people with his eyes see a harvest. The first response he asks for is not organisation but prayer (9:38).
“You received without payment; give without payment.” (10:8)
The Twelve are told to do what Jesus has just done: cure the sick, raise the dead, cast out demons. Nothing is theirs by right, so nothing is for sale.
How the Church reads it.
The Catechism teaches that Christ's compassion toward the sick is a sign that God has visited his people (CCC 1503), and that he associates his disciples with his own ministry of compassion and healing (CCC 1506). St Gregory the Great, preaching on the same saying in Luke, lamented that the world is full of priests, and yet few workers are found in God's harvest (in substance). Pope St Paul VI wrote that the Church “exists in order to evangelize” (Evangelii Nuntiandi 14).
Why does Jesus say, “Go nowhere among the Gentiles”?
The Lectionary leaves out these words (v. 5b), but the question is a natural one. Jesus respects the order of God's plan: the promises were first made to Israel. So he says, “go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (10:6). After the Resurrection the same Lord sends them to “all nations” (Matthew 28:19). The Catechism says the Kingdom was first announced to the children of Israel, and is meant for all people (CCC 543).