“HONEY FROM THE ROCK”
17th December 2017.
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THIRD SUNDAY OF ADVENT – GAUDETE SUNDAY
Reading 1: Is 61: 1-2, 10-11 the prophet declares that he has been anointed by God and sent to bring good news to the poor.
Res. Psalm: Lk 1: 46-48, 49-50, 53-54My soul rejoices in my God. My being proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit Finds joy in God my saviour.
Reading 2:1 Thes 5: 16-24 Paul tells the Thessalonians that they must never cease rejoicing and rendering constant thanks to the Lord for all that he has done for them.
Gospel: Jn 1: 6-8, 19-28John the Baptist makes it clear that he is not the Saviour. His task is a humbler one - to prepare the way for the Saviour who is already among the people, though they do not recognize him.
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REJOICE IN THE LORD ALWAYS
Today the third Sunday of Advent is called ‘Guadete or Rejoice Sunday’, flowing from the words of the Entrance antiphon, “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say rejoice! The Lord is near.” (Phil. 4: 4).A number of years ago, young college student was working as a cashier at a supermarket. One day while working at the cash register, he saw an elderly couple come in with a little girl in a wheelchair. As he looked closer at this girl, he saw that she was kind of perched on her chair. He realized that she had no arms or legs, just a head, neck and torso. She was wearing a little white dress with red polka dots. As the couple wheeled her up to the counter, he turned his head toward the girl and gave her a wink. Meanwhile, he took the money from her grandparents and looked back at the girl, who was giving him the cutest and the largest smile he had ever seen. All of a sudden her handicap was gone and all that the young man saw was this beautiful girl, whose smile just melted him and almost instantly gave him a completely new sense of what life was all about. She took him from the world of an unhappy college student and brought him into her world; a world of smiles, love and warmth. With the lighting of the third pink candle of the Advent Wreath and the priest’s wearing the pink vestments today, we are reminded that we are called to live with joy in our world of sorrows and pain.
In his book, Letting God Bless, You John Killinger concludes with the challenge: Permit God to bless you. Don't look around you and think how hard life is. Look around and see how filled with mystery and goodness it is. See how wonderful the world looks when you know God is at work redeeming it and setting up the anti-structures, so that humility and purity and compassion and longing for justice and peace will all be fulfilled and rewarded in the eternal scheme of things. Give thanks to God for the richness of existence. Then look around to see who you can share it with. That will make you even richer.
If you will learn to live this way every day, you will always have a song in your heart and the path before you will be lined with flowers. Joy will spring up inside you like a fountain, and you will lie down to sleep at night with peace in your soul. And you will say, "Blessed be the name of our God forever and ever, who calls us to a new rule where righteousness will be the order of the day forever!"
Isaiah prophesied of Jesus in the first reading: "He has sent me to bring glad tidings to the lowly, to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives and release to the prisoners." You may be a prisoner of sin, brokenhearted because of false friends, a captive in your career or marriage. You may feel lowly and put down by situations over which you have no control. Allow Jesus to enter your life; deliver control over to him. Submit to his governance and listen to his voice. The second reading from First Thessalonians reiterates, "The one who calls you is faithful, and he will also accomplish it.” You do not have to be alone. You will remain alone only if you choose separation from God.
What is joy? It has many ingredients, but certainly the chief one has to be an awareness of our being possessed by God and our possessing him. Mary said: “My soul rejoices in my God, my spirit finds joy in God my saviour.” “In my God is the joy of my soul,” says Isaiah, “for he has clothed me with a robe of salvation.”Joy has also been described as a condition of heart and mind which comes from going, reaching out to our neighbour, opening our hearts to them, becoming involved in their sufferings as well as their joys. We experience joy in the measure that we give and share it. Perhaps the greatest source of joy is the experience of forgiveness, the experience of forgiving and being forgiven. That is why the greatest joy is possessed by God, whose essential nature and work is forgiveness. We can all experience something of God’s joy in forgiving when we forgive one another, not just once, but again and again. There is one joy we can have that is impossible for God: the joy of being forgiven... by him and by those we have offended.
This Advent season, let us make the critical choice of permitting God to bless us and to fill us with a new sense of hope and purposeful living. Let us live in the assurance that the present darkness is not our final destination, that there is indeed much more yet to come. Along the way we will begin to experience joy springing up within us like a fountain, like the joy of Mary, Joseph, the Shepherds and the Kings.
Prayer: Lord Jesus, I await with expectant joy to receive your healing and freedom. Lord, make us turn to you, let us see your face and we shall be filled with your joy. Amen