On this third Sunday of Advent we are urged and even
commanded to rejoice. The first reading
from the prophet Zephaniah and the second reading from St Paul both speak of
rejoicing. But we need to ask ourselves
honestly: Have we developed a sort of
immunity to rejoicing? And what keeps us
from rejoicing in the Lord always?
Sometimes, during Mass my mind wanders. It may wander to what I will be doing later
that day. Or I may begin thinking about
what happened to me the day before. Let
me tell you, this is not a good thing when you are up on the altar. On more than one occasion I have almost
missed saying or doing something because I was daydreaming.
Does this ever happen to you? I suspect it does. It is natural to be reminded of other things
that we need to do: that perfect gift we
still have not found, that party we have to prepare for. Or we may be thinking of something that
happened to us. Maybe we are replaying
an event over in our minds and wishing that we had done things
differently.
Right now, nine days before the coming of the Lord
on Christmas Day, we need to focus on the present, not the past or the future. This
season of Advent is all about staying in the present and waiting. The people that John the Baptist preached to
in today’s Gospel knew all about waiting.
And St Luke says that they were filled with great expectation, thinking
that John himself might be the long expected Messiah. And then Christ did arrive but for many it
was as though the waiting had not ended.
And two thousand years later, many still live as though Christ had never
come.
We say that Advent is about the coming of Christ. And we think that means just the coming of
Christ on Christmas Day. But in truth
Advent has more to do with experiencing the reality that Christ has already
come. It is the experience that Christ
has been born in us. For what good is it
for the Creator to give birth to his Son, if we don’t also give birth to him in
our families, our parish, and our nation?
Last Sunday we had a birthday party for my youngest
grandchild, Josie. Well, Josie was all
excited when she was opening the presents.
After she opened each one she would tell us all what it was. She would say “ a pair of pants” or “
princess doll”. Then she took one gift
from the gift bag and she didn’t know what it was. She said:
“It’s oh, oh, oh, something!” And
we all laughed at her excitement at receiving something. Then, Lynn, her mother, told her that it was
a jewelry box and she opened it for her.
And Josie was even more excited as she opened the jewelry box and it
played a tune.
When it comes to the gifts that we receive from God,
we are sort of like Josie. We know that
we are receiving something but we can’t really appreciate it until someone
explains it to us. And even then we
can’t fully understand what we have received.
This is why we aren’t as joyful as we should be as
we await the coming of the Lord at Christmas.
We may know that we are receiving some great gift, but cannot comprehend
how important that gift is for us. Of
course, we have our Church, who can unwrap and explain the gift of the Son of
God becoming man to us.
We can be too busy to find the only gift which
really matters this Christmas. We can be
checking our email, texting, Christmas shopping, watching some sporting event
on TV, or just getting lost in our day to day tasks. When that happens, it becomes increasingly
difficult to experience the reality of Christ having already come. We don’t have time to just be, to spend some
time in prayer or in reflecting on the many blessings in our lives, or maybe
even writing a letter to a family member telling them that we love them.
There is often increased tension and anxiety in households as we prepare for Christmas. The season of Advent is a beautiful counter to anxiety and busy-ness by providing us an opportunity again each year to make sure we are on the right path to draw closer to God. And it’s also an opportunity to help those most dear to us draw closer to God as well.
