+PREPARE THE WAY OF THE LORD 2nd Sunday of Advent 2024
Our lives, my brothers and sisters, are to be a continual preparation for the coming of the Lord. While Christ became incarnate two thousand years ago and will be the one we encounter the day we part from this life, he is also coming daily into each of our lives, sharing with us his own divine life. We do well, amid many distractions, to be aware of this loving presence and gentle message with which God seeks to fill our hearts.
This is beautifully communicated in St Paul’s prayer for the Philippians that we just heard: “that your love may increase ever more and more in knowledge and every kind of perception, to discern what is of value, so that you may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God.”
This is what John the Baptist sought to convey as he went throughout the whole region of Jordan to prepare the way of the Lord, making straight his paths so that all flesh might see the salvation of God. What took place over two thousand years ago, is now taking place in our lives as we learn to walk in the ways of divine love, discern what is of lasting value. As we seek to do good for others, to be really sensitive to the needs of those with whom we live, a work of God that is often unnoticed but has a transforming effect on our society. For this is what makes it the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ. Itt is not about us but about the glory and praise of God, working within our lives in view of an everlasting reward.
And isn’t this what the prophet Baruch had in mind when he says “take off your robe of mourning and misery; put on the splendor of glory from God forever: wrapped in the cloak of justice from God.” In a real sense, what took place over two thousand years ago is to continue to take place in each one of our lives as we let the Holy Spirit overshadow our hearts, infiltrate the whole of our lives. Love as we know from elsewhere in St Paul’s writings: “is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous, love is not pompous, it is not inflated, it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury.. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all thing, endures all things.”
This kind of love seeks to fill the whole of our lives, is not something we do occasionally, when we are in the mood, feeling good, but it is something that we are to allow to take place all day long, morning, noon and at night. For this kind of love is the work of the Holy Spirit, ever seeking to take up residence in each one of our hearts.
John the Baptist’s call, the voice of one crying out in the desert to prepare the way of the Lord is just this call to open our hearts to this divine Presence. To hear it, is to see every valley of low self esteem to be filled up, every mountain of pride and looking down on others to be made low, to where the rough ways of self-deceit are made smooth and all flesh sees in us the salvation of God.
Isn’t this an immersion into the sacrifice that we are about to celebrate. What takes place at this altar is to take place all day long in each of our lives as we surrender to the presence and outpouring of the Holy Spirit.
This Eucharist celebrates the very moment Christ died on the cross out of love for us, giving up his very own life for the transformation of our world and of each of our lives. May the Love poured out here on this altar fill each of our hearts for the praise and glory of our God.
Bar 5:1-9; Phil 1:4-6, 8-11; Luke 3:1-6