"1st Sunday of Advent Year (C) 28th November, 2021"

28^th November,2021

 "1^st Sunday of Advent

Year (C)"

(Jeremiah 33:14-16)  (Ps 25:4-5,8-9,10,14); 

(1Thessalonians 3:12-4:2); (Luke 21:25-28,34-36)

 

Advent is the holy season. This is the season in which holy Mother Catholic Church calls us to prepare ourselves worthily to commemorate the anniversary of the historical coming  of Jesus Christ into the world. At the same time Church provides to  the faithful a time to reflect upon and prepare themselves for the  second coming of Jesus Christ at the end of the time.

If we all walk around and see the shopping centers and many other places, we would have seen the Christmas adornments are already up in full force, in some places even as early as from September onwards. We assuredly have heard the usual Christmas songs and the festive mood being all around us, with Christmas trades and shopping on the improvement literally everywhere. But before we jump into the craze and start to be swallowed by that Christmas celebrations, let us all remind ourselves brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ, what Christmas is strictly all about.

Christmas is not about all the bling and the parties, all the charm, food and drinks, all the partying and tunes. What is Christmas, brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ? It is, just as its name says, something about Christ, Our Lord and Saviour. It is a festivity that is about and should be absorbed on Jesus Christ, Son of God and Son of Man, Saviour of the world, Our Lord and King, Who unluckily have often been put aside and even omitted from His own celebration. It is the celebration of His birth into this world, the moment when He shown Himself in the flesh to all, after having spent nine months in His mother’s womb.

In our first reading today, taken from the Book of the prophet Jeremiah, we heard of the words of the Lord pronounced through Jeremiah concerning the salvation that God would send His people Israel, a freedom and revitalization for the people of Judah and the successors of the Israelites coming from the House of David, the Shoot of Righteousness and the Shoot of Jesse. This was the same prophecy and exposure that the Lord had given through His other prophets, especially Isaiah, Jeremiah’s precursor.

However, at the same time, God still loved them all wholeheartedly, and ever since the beginning, just as all of us human beings had collapsed into sin, He had never given up on us. He has always reached out to us, calling on us to return to Him, sending to us prophets and messengers to disclose His message of truth and love, calling on all of us, His beloved people, to turn away from our wicked and sinful ways, embracing His mercy and compassionate love, and find reconciliation through Him. In that same way, God sent Jeremiah to the people of Judah to convey the message of Hope.

Just as Jeremiah was sent to the people of Judah at the time of their blackest moments to remind them of God’s light, truth and hope, thus all of us are reminded that in Christ lies our true Hope and He is the One that all of us should be legend towards and fixing on, and not on the attraction and unnecessary celebrations that are not concentrated on Christ but rather on ourselves and our greedy requests. We must ask ourselves, when we celebrate and rejoice this Christmas, do we rejoice because of Christ and the Hope and Deliverance that He brings, or is it because of our own desire for pleasure and desire?

Today we listen in our Gospel reading today the words of the Lord Jesus Himself to His disciples from the Gospel of St. Luke, which spoke of the end of times and the coming of anguishes for those who are faithful to God, which we have heard in the past week at the end of our former liturgical year. It is a reminder for us that just as we prepare for the celebration of Christmas, which marks the moment of the Lord’s first coming and appearance in this world, two ages ago, we are also called to get ready ourselves for the Lord’s Second Coming, which will happen at the end of days.

The Lord has told His disciples and all of us to be ready for the coming tribunals and trials, to be ready for His coming whenever it will be. No one knows the time of His coming and no one has any notion when everything will happen as the Lord has expressed us, but it will surely happen and we have to be prepared for it. Otherwise, we may realize that we are held uninformed and unprepared, and have an eternity of repentance when we are judged to be lacking in faith and are cast to the eternal damnation and nightfall. And it is not because God did not love us, but rather because we ourselves have disallowed Him and His lavish offer of love and forgiveness.

Brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ, let us all make good use of this season of Advent to prepare ourselves well, in heart, body, soul and mind so that we will be ready to welcome the Lord in our hearts, into our families and houses, and make Him truly the King of our whole presence. Let us all be the conveyers of His Hope and Light, His Truth and His Love to our fellow brothers and sisters all around us. Let us be the witnesses of His loving kindness by showing that same love and bigheartedness to our fellow human beings, especially to those who are deficient in love and hated, the poor and the needy.

May our Advent journey be significant and productive, and may God be our leader and power, our compass and light, our hope and courage in the midst of the darkness and prosecutions in this world. May God bless us all and make strong, that our Advent preparation and our upcoming Christmas celebrations will be truly delightful. Amen.