3rd Sunday of Advent B
Isaiah 61: 1-2, 10-11; 1 Thessalonians 5: 16-24; John 1: 6-8 19-28Ten days from today is Christmas Eve. For the most part by the end of that day all our shopping will be done; cards written, meals planned, the house more or less cleaned up and maybe just the wrapping of presents left. Eleven days from today is Christmas.
When I was young, the celebrations began on Christmas. We all went to the midnight mass, and then had a big breakfast with a few very close friends. The rule in the house was that when everyone was up on Christmas day, the presents were distributed by dad and then could be opened. The wait was interminable. I was the first up, and it seemed that it was many hours before the rest of the family gathered around the Christmas tree. Everyone was thankful that this moment had arrived and different degrees of exhaustion set in. Still there was left all the preparations for the annual Christmas dinner feast.
It seems strange that the Church labels this third Sunday in Advent as Gaudete Sunday, which means ‘Rejoice’ Sunday. There is so much left to do; it certainly isn’t time for rejoicing is it? The readings today are about rejoicing, in fact they are insistent that everyone is to rejoice.
In the first reading the prophet Isaiah is rejoicing in regard to the restoration of Israel. They had been conquered. Previous rulers over Israel had brought only suffering and hardships upon the people because of their not being faithful to the practices of their religion. As a result they were in exile living as captives and prisoners in a foreign land. Today Isaiah is telling them that ‘the anointed one’ will bring liberty and freedom for the people because He rules by heaven’s standards. The beginning of today’s passage were the words that Jesus used to begin His ministry. Luke 4:18 share when He was in the synagogue in his home town, Nazareth, and was handed the scrolls of Isaiah, He found this passage and used it to describe His mission. Now the Old Testament hopes and dreams have been fulfilled in Jesus. A time to rejoice, give praise and be thankful.
Paul writes to the Thessalonians and is overwhelmed by all that God has done. As a result he shares that each Christian is to live in God’s presence every moment, “Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. In all circumstances give thanks, for this is the will of God for you in Christ Jesus.” The question for today is, ‘How am I to do that?’ How can I live continually in my more than hectic life every moment with an awareness of God? Am I living in gratitude for His love and His gifts?
How can I not be happy and rejoice when I look at the people who have brought me to this moment? I look at my parents from whom I learned love mostly by watching their love and devotion to each other and to the five of us children. I see my siblings…each had their own personality and hang-ups. Each had their hopes and dreams and each touched me and each other in so many ways. I learned that love meant forgiveness and ‘turning the other cheek.’ I learned that love meant being a real person and a person of love.
St Teresa of Avila had so many wonderful words of wisdom to live by…one of my favorites is her prayer: Lord, deliver us from silly devotions and sour-faced saints.” This season of busyness calls each person to pause to recall why they are so busy. If I dwell on the busyness and inconveniences than I can become sour-faced. Pope Francis warned Catholics not to become ‘sourpusses’. At this time of year it is more important than ever to acknowledge God’s total goodness to me in all circumstances of my life. Dorothy Day, the twentieth-century social activist put this so beautifully when she wrote that when we act lovingly we begin to feel loving, so certainly acting joyful brings joy to others---this makes us feel joyful. She lived by the maxim that each person is called to the “Duty of delight.” As Living the Word states, “When we bring joy to others, even and perhaps especially when we do not feel particularly joyful ourselves, we are like a mirror that reflects God’s joy in Creation. Like John the Baptist, we are not the light, but bear witness to the light. Yet even as we bear witness to God’s joy, we come to share in it ourselves, caught up in what we reflect.”
The bottom line is that this season is about love. So often in my life I examine how I am loving. It seems that at this time of year when I ask this question, I feel good because much of what I do is about loving others in gift selecting, card writing, special baking and being present to others. When I love, I am doing what God does: love. This love is a selfless love if I am loving in the way God loves. So in these ‘love acts’ that occupy the busyness of this season, I am ‘God-like.’ Do I take time to reflect on this? Do I take time to just stretch my busyness to include an awareness of the gifts and generosity of God?
Brother Lawrence was a 17th century French monk who tried all sorts of devotions and prayers to get close to God and to realize His love. He found that all of these were not right for him until he learned to practice the presence of God at every moment in his life. His two writings are The Practice of the Presence of God and Spiritual Maxims. I have found tremendous wisdom and direction from these. He wrote, “The time of business does not with me differ from the time of prayer, and in the noise and clatter of my kitchen…I possess God in as great tranquility as if I were upon my knees at the Blessed Sacrament.” What was his secret? I have found it in this little prayer of his:
“Before beginning any task I would say to God, with childlike trust: ‘O God, since You are with me, and it is Your will that I must now apply myself to these outward duties, I beseech You, assist me with Your grace that I may continue in Your Presence; and to this end, O Lord, be with me in this my work, accept the labor of my hands, and dwell within my heart with all Your Fullness…When I had finished, I would examine how I had performed my duty: If I found well, I gave Him thanks; if ill, I asked His pardon, and without losing heart I set my spirit right, and returned anew into His presence, as thought I had never wandered from Him. Thus, by rising after every fall, and by doing all in faith and love, without wearying, I have come to a state in which it would be as little possible for me not to think of God, as it was hard to discipline myself at the beginning.”
God is always with each person. It does not matter how I feel about myself. John said that ‘God is love’ so God is always loving me. There are so many times that I need to know this…do I ask God how much He is loving me now? He does, always.
So I reflect on:
- Is my life characterized by joy? What things make me joyful?
- What can I do to cultivate joy? St. Theresa the Little
Flower said that she has found her ministry, “O Jesus, my love, at
last I have found my calling: my call is love.”
“Does
anyone think of me as witnessing to the light by the quality of my
life? I listen to Jesus as He tells me that I am meant to be a light
for the world.
I ask
humbly that He may illuminate me more. Perhaps I ask Him to place
His hands on my head in blessing so that I may be more lightsome.”
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