In the Gospel, we hear about St. John the Baptist being in the desert and receives the Word of God. What was he doing out in the desert? It's not like us today where we may go for a hike in the desert. You didn't do that back then. It was a dangerous place, there is no reason to do anything like that. And yet he was out there. So we don't have that part of the story. We can imagine the Holy Spirit sent him out to prepare to receive The Word, it's what the desert hermits did, Monks do. That makes sense, we just don't have that. Regardless, in the desert he receives the Word of God.
And Luke before that goes through a lot of trouble to let you know by the way, that this is a history book. In the 15th year of this guy, and the this guy was tetrarch and this guy was governor, I mean there are 4 of 5 references. At this time, John was in the desert and received the Word of God. It's history. We are all living in history as you well know, and each of us needs to kind of be in that desert to receive the Word. John's the model, he's detached from the world, enough, radically actually for John, it's a radical example, complete detachment, alone in the desert, we don't know if he was alone, just go with that. Out in the desert away from the communities, and the cities. And there in the silence of the desert, inthe isolation he is able to be detached enough from the world to receive the Lord. And then of course goes on as the pre-runner to fulfill the prophesy of Isaiah. Awesome. His mission.
