Like newborn infants, long for pure spiritual milk
so that through it you may grow into salvation,
for you have tasted that the Lord is good.

I didn’t realize a newborn baby could teach me anything. I presumed our relationship would be a one-way street – I would offer my “considerable skills“ as a mother and grandmother to my newest granddaughter, and she would be the beneficiary. 

But, instead, she has taught me a lot. She shows me the importance of trust. She trusts that her parents, grandparents, and caregivers will be there for her. She cries out, and she trusts that she will receive what she needs. She knows that she is vulnerable – that she cannot make it in the world on her own skills. She realizes she needs other people to provide nutrition, comfort, and love, or she will not survive, she will not thrive.

She also has a singular focus: whatever her immediate need is. She is not easily distracted or dissuaded. I, on the other hand, can lose my focus and become sidetracked by multitasking, by seeing alternatives, by listening to other voices.

In today’s first reading Peter tells us, now that we “have tasted that the Lord is good,” to long for pure spiritual milk, like newborn infants. Just as my baby granddaughter looks lovingly, longingly, into my eyes as I feed her the bottle filled with the pure milk she so desperately desires, I need to lovingly gaze upon Jesus in the many ways he is available to me: in the Eucharist, in his Word, in the people around me, in people in need, in nature, in community with other Christians. Peter says that doing so will help build a follower of Christ into a spiritual house for the Lord.

I need to trust Jesus the way my grandbaby trusts me, and I need to be aware that Jesus’ love surrounds me and sustains me the way my granddaughter realizes her vulnerability and dependence.

Bartimaeus exhibits that same focus, that same trust, in today’s Gospel. Realizing and articulating our own needs, may we jump up and go to the Lord whenever we hear his voice.