In Old Testament history, a long period of preparation transpired before the coming of the Messiah. Many great figures and various events prefigured the deeply yearned-for moment when the Savior would arrive. The last of those great figures was John the Baptist, the cousin of Jesus, the last in a long line of Old Testament prophetic figures.
All the prophets pointed toward Christ through their preaching and writings, and John, the immediate precursor to the Messiah, spoke of the imminent coming of Christ explicitly, preaching an uncompromising message of repentance. He lived as a holy man in the desert and was sought out by many for spiritual advice. In the Gospel passage for this Sunday, he gives practical suggestions for how to live a holy life. At the core of his message is the principle that we are to make our everyday lives holy, ensuring that everything we do is consistent with God's Commandments.
The same teaching was also the central message of the pontificate of Pope St. John Paul II. He emphasized the universal call to holiness of all the believers by virtue of our baptism into Christ. We are all called to holiness. We are all called to sainthood. Historically, holiness was associated with leaving everyday life behind and joining a religious order or the priesthood. But we need holy people in all walks of life. We need saints who are teachers, techies, librarians, lawyers, doctors, homemakers, delivery drivers, and the list goes on - all the different areas of life. True, some occupations and ways of life are deeply at odds with the values of Christ. In such cases, we need to make a fundamental change. But whatever is not contrary to Christ we need to do for Christ.
We need to live our day to day lives for Christ. We need to offer our daily work, no matter how small or great, to Christ. By doing so, we bring Christ into the ordinary rhythm of life and allow Christ to sanctify everyday existence. We become channels of Christ's sanctifying grace for the transformation of the world.
By consecrating our work to Christ, we also join in God's creative work. In our little way, we help to implement God's cosmic plan of building creation. God works through us to bring his vision to fruition.
Therefore, we should embrace our station in life, the work that has been given to us. We should do it with a zeal for serving God and for building up his creation. The nature of our work will shift as the different seasons of our life unfold and sometimes we might actively be working on shifting from one way of life to another. But we should always put the responsibilities of our present work front and center, making sure that we carry them out fully and conscientiously whether that is parenting or professional work or being a student or running a business or being a construction worker. Whatever it is, we should offer each act of work as a gift to Christ.
John the Baptist has dire words for us if our life is not aligned with the ways of God. Some have assumed that his strong words are merely the result of his connection with the Old Testament prophetic tradition, where the prophets tended to speak rather harshly. Perhaps John was speaking as an Old Testament prophet, in contrast with Jesus, whose message would be less dire.
But we need to remember that Jesus himself also gave us dire warnings if our life does not align with him. He frequently spoke in terms of a dichotomy. On the one hand is the eternal life and unending joy that he offers to us. On the other hand, darkness and destruction. Why, we might ask, would Jesus speak so? Do such words not contradict his message of compassion?
The answer is that the message of Jesus is very much compassionate. He is the source of all life. He is the source of all truth. He is the source of all goodness and love. He is the solution to the problems of our lives, of the whole world. Indeed, we can see that as Christ is pushed out of our culture more and more, our society is becoming increasingly more broken. Christ is inviting us to be healed, to receive restoration and true, unending, eternal life. To turn away from his offer is to cut ourselves off from the only source of life. To turn away from Christ is to plunge ourselves into darkness. Christ does not want us to suffer. He wants us to have the fullness of life, the infinite joy that only he can offer. That is why he gives us such warnings. He does so out of true love for us.
We should also remark that, as the Second Vatican Council teaches, if some do not choose Christ through no fault of their own, their failure to do so will not be held against them. In that case, in their final hour, Christ will judge them on whether or not they chose that which they recognized to be good according to the best of their ability. But even if they might receive the grace of Christ at the end of their lives, they will be missing out on so much grace, so much healing love during their time on earth. We must, therefore, never cease to proclaim Christ to all.
In addition to our words and the example of our actions, one important way to proclaim Christ is through the joy of the Christian life. As St. Paul instructs us in the Second Reading, we should rejoice in the Lord always. If we are truly grounded in Christ, we will feel deep spiritual joy in all circumstances. That does not mean that we will never experience earthly sorrow. But we will receive a profound sense of existential joy, which makes us glad to be alive, to be a part of God's plan.
But how do we reach such a state of joy? The answer is gratitude. At the heart of joy is the willingness to give thanks to God for all things, for all the blessings in our lives. Indeed, to have true joy, we should give thanks even for our suffering.
That does not mean that we should never try to prevent or alleviate the suffering we experience. But all of us will encounter suffering that we cannot change, no matter how hard we try. We will all have some sort of Cross of great weight to bear in the course of our earthly lives. Paradoxically, the more we accept such suffering and unite it with the suffering of Christ, the more joy we will feel, the more free and at peace our heart will be.
In my personal life, for many years I raged against the Cross that I needed to bear in my life. But one day, on a pilgrimage to the holy site of Medjugorje, my perspective changed through the words of a priest. He said in his homily, "The Cross is the wisdom of God." And though I have surely heard those words before, when I heard them there in that holy place, a transformation started within me that helped me to embrace suffering and to unite it with the Cross of Christ.
Since that time, I have been saying the following prayer daily: "Lord God, I offer up my suffering. I give you glory, honor, and praise for my suffering. I thank you for deeming me worthy to suffer for you." No other prayer has brought me so much joy and peace.
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The readings for the Third Sunday of Advent, Cycle C are:
Zep 3:14-18a
Is 12:2-3, 4, 5-6
Phil 4:4-7
Lk 3:10-18
The full text can be found at the USCCB website.
Photo Credit: Advent Wreath in Bad Ischl, Austria (c) 2019 by Zoltan Abraham.