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Second Sunday of
Advent C 2021 The living Word of God is
always being spoken in the midst of the circumstances of our own lives and in
the reality of the Church and the world we live in. Our spiritual lives do not take us out of
the world; rather we are called to transform the world we live in into the
reign of God. Recall the words of
Scripture: “That God so loved the
world that he send his only begotten to save the world.” Please note how today’s Gospel begins: “In the fifteenth year of
the reign of Tiberius Caesar, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and
Herod was tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip the tetrarch of the
region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias was tetrarch of Abilene,
during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the Word of God came to
John the son of Zechariah in the desert.” It is important to note
that the evangelist is placing the ministry of Jesus in the wider historical
context. The point is the sacred
ministry of Jesus emerged right in the midst of secular history. Secular history does not get in the way of
the Word of God. Rather, for us to hear the
Word of God proclaimed in this moment of history means we need to know the
circumstances of our own history.
God’s Word is being spoken in the midst of the circumstances of our
own lives and in the reality of the church and the world we live in. We cannot absent ourselves
from the challenges of life. Rather,
we need to recognize how Jesus is being birthed in the secular history of our
lives. This is such an important point. I don’t like and you don’t how the world
has been turned upside down dealing with this pandemic that seems to affect
us all. The message of the
institutional Church doesn’t speak to the lives of some younger families. For some of your children and grandchildren,
the Church doesn’t seem to be a big part of their lives. In 2021, this is the Church that Jesus
chooses to be born into. We are called not to leave
the Church. Rather, we are called to
transform the It is in the messiness and
the questions and the fears of our lives that God chooses to be born. This is the story of the first Christmas
and it is the story of Christmas in 2021. The evangelist Luke in
today’s Gospel tells us that the Word of God was spoken to John the Son of
Zachariah in the desert. Say that
again! Where was the Word of God
spoken and to whom? Note that the
Word of God was not pronounced by the religious and political leaders of the
day. It bypassed them all. The Word of God did not come from the
Palace of the Temple. The Word of God
came from an outsider in the desert.
The Word of God came to John in the desert. This certainly leaves us to
pause and ask where we hear and recognize the Word of God spoken to us. We make a grave mistake if we don’t listen
and seek to hear the Word of God spoken to us from the outsiders of our
lives. Who are the outsiders of
our lives? Who are the people who
don’t look like us, who do not share the same religious beliefs, who do not
have the financial resources we have and so forth? Just maybe, these are the people who
proclaim God’s Word to us. Who is your John the
Baptist? Who is the person in your
life that is pointing you in the direction of Jesus? Who reveals the face of God to you? So now in December, while
everything jingles with excitement
about the Christmas holidays, the Church invites us into an Advent desert
with John. The desert is the
antithesis of the suburban malls. No
matter how much money you have, there is nothing to buy in the desert. Far from the city lights whose twinkling
lights grab our attention, the desert allows us to fix our gaze on the stars,
the beauty that is beyond our reach and yet has been created for our delight. The Advent desert is where
our soul can expand, where we can remember what we really thirst for. How do we fashion a desert for ourselves in
this Advent season of busyness and parties and celebrations? |
I like to think of Advent as
a time of listening to what God is birthing in me. I need to quiet down and listen. During this gift of time that is the four weeks
of the Advent season, may we find moments of quiet each day to listen to how
God is speaking to us.
The prophet Isaiah describes
John as one crying out in the desert:
“Prepare the way of the Lord.”
Every valley shall be filled and the winding roads shall be made
straight. Instead of seeing this mission
as part of highway reconstruction, John the Baptist calls us to repentance and
metanoia. For John real change comes
from within. The prophet Isaiah refers
to the geography of the heart. This is
where change needs to occur. We are to
clear the path to welcome Christ who is born into our hearts as truly as Jesus
was born in Bethlehem.
But this inner change is not
just about our personal salvation. The
inner change is always in the context of community, of church, of the ways we
love and serve people. As St Paul writes
in the second Scripture reading in his letter to the Philippians: “I pray always with joy in my every prayer
for all of you, because of your partnership for the gospel from the first day
until now.”
Jesus seeks to be born again
within our own hearts in 2021. Jesus’
humble birth within us may be likened to his humble birth in the Bethlehem
manger. May we be Spirit-filled in
embracing the Savior within us and may be missioned to sharing the love of
Jesus in ways that will transform our Church and our world.
May God give you the gift of
listening to the ways that God is birthing within you.
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