4th Sunday of Advent, Year C
Today’s gospel reading tells us the story of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary to Elizabeth, the Second Joyful Mystery of the Rosary. This story of our Blessed Mother Mary reminds us of the demands of discipleship. Her example clearly emphasizes how we can better answer our call to discipleship. So what are these demands of discipleship shown us by Our Blessed Mother Mary in today’s gospel reading. They are as follows:
Service to God and to our neighbors. Mary by her "yes" to God, that is her answer - "behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it done to me according to your word" affirmed her dedication to her service to God. Then by embarking on a rigorous and dangerous journey to visit Elizabeth and staying with her to help her out in her pregnancy shows us how dedicated we should be in our service to God.
Humility. Mary was always humble and showed her humility in everything she did. Remember, Humility is a modest or low view of one's own importance to direct attention to God and this was always what Mary did so as to have it be about Christ and not about herself.
Hope, which is a feeling of expectation and desire for a certain thing to happen, leads us to work very hard in our spiritual lives and abandon ourselves in God for Him to lead us closer to Himself and make us better disciples of His.
Trust, which is a firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something, helps us let go and let God be in charge of our lives by constantly relying on Him and finding our strength in Him.
Faith, which is our belief in God that should be shown in our thoughts, words and actions, makes us continually seek God, believe in Him, proclaim Him, and show Him to the world in all we do.
My brothers and sisters, as we come closer to the celebration of the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ, it is time to make changes in our spiritual lives by paying attention to the demands of disciples shown us by our Blessed Mother Mary in today’s gospel reading. So let us become better disciples of Christ by actively serving God and our neighbor, by being humble, by always hoping, trusting and deepening our faith in God.
