3rd Sunday of Advent – The Lord is Near!
Comments(0) John 1:6-8, 19-28
There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light.
This is the testimony given by John when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, ‘Who are you?’ He confessed and did not deny it, but confessed, ‘I am not the Messiah.’ And they asked him, ‘What then? Are you Elijah?’ He said, ‘I am not.’ ‘Are you the prophet?’ He answered, ‘No.’ Then they said to him, ‘Who are you? Let us have an answer for those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?’ He said,
‘I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness,
“Make straight the way of the Lord” ‘,
as the prophet Isaiah said.
Now they had been sent from the Pharisees. They asked him, ‘Why then are you baptizing if you are neither the Messiah, nor Elijah, nor the prophet?’ John answered them, ‘I baptize with water. Among you stands one whom you do not know, the one who is coming after me; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandal.’ This took place in Bethany across the Jordan where John was baptizing.
We are in the atmosphere of something about to happen. John the Baptist is still on the scene, pointing where to look, where to wait, how to expect the one who is to come. We get so used to Christmas and the coming of Christ that we hardly have any sense of expectation.
Christmas will come and go like every year, and afterward people say, ‘We had a quiet Christmas, thank God.’ But Christmas is not meant to be quiet. It’s meant to explode with the roar of the crowd when its team gets the score. It’s meant to laugh with the joy of parents whose child has just been born. It’s meant to be a voice of care, compassion and love, the voice of God, in the wilderness of the world.
This could be a week of active expectancy – to do something to prepare well for the Lord. Do something for the poor each day, thank somebody genuinely each day for their place in your life, approach the communal sacrament of Reconciliation or go to confession privately, go to mass once or twice more in the week, say sorry to someone you hurt or forgive someone who hurt you.
Make the path of the Lord a path of expectation in your life as Christmas approaches. Then the Lord will not take us by surprise, then the One who is coming among us will not be unknown, then we will have a fuller Christmas and because of each one, someone else will have a happier Christmas.
Phil 4, 4-5
Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say, rejoice! The Lord is near.
