4th Sunday of Advent, Year C
For four weeks now we have prepared ourselves to welcome in a special way our Lord Jesus Christ into our lives and into our world. When we began the Season of Advent this year, we were reminded by St. John the Baptist to prepare the way of the Lord and to make straight his paths. With this instruction, we were told not to be lazy, but to be hardworking in our spiritual lives, as we prepare ourselves well for the coming of the Messiah. This preparation as we were taught entailed doing an interior purification of our spiritual lives which involved doing an examination of conscience, going to confession, praying more consistently, and practicing mortification and acts of charity.
In a few days, we will celebrate the great event of our redemption, Christmas Day. A day of joy and happiness that we are called to rejoice in the knowledge that Jesus our Savior has been born and we have been saved and redeemed from our bondage of sin and death. Today, the Fourth Sunday of advent we are reminded not only of the need to prepare ourselves, but to pay better attention to what the Christmas celebration requires of us or, to pay attention to the message implied in the birth of Christ. Today’s second reading from the letter to the Hebrews tells us exactly what we are called to pay attention to or what is required of us this Christmas season, as it states that Christ came into our world to do the will of God, His Father. Hence, the message of Christ’s first coming on Christmas Day into our world and our lives is to do the will of God. So how can we do the will of God?
With Mary’s visit to Elizabeth her cousin as we heard in today’s Gospel reading, the Visitation, the Second Joyful Mystery, she shows us how we can do the will of God. Through the example of Mary, the first disciple of Christ, doing the will of God involves: practicing love always, being faithful to God and being humble.
Practicing love always means being loving, kind, understanding and caring to others. But In order to love others sincerely, we have to first of all love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our strength and with all our mind. This is exactly what Mary did as she exemplified her love for God by traveling about 90 miles through a dangerous terrain to visit Elizabeth, and to be with her in her pregnancy.
Being faithful to God means having a steadfast loyalty to God that is not easily swayed, which involves trusting in Him and loving Him through all circumstances we face in life. This summarizes the life of the Blessed Virgin Mary, who being the first disciple of Christ, was faithful to Him till the end.
Being humble means not thinking you are better than others, or being modest and unpretentious. Humility characterizes the life of our Blessed Mother Mary, as she constantly and consistently points us to God and never to herself.
My brothers and sisters, as we come closer to birth of Christ, let us not forget the message of Christ’s coming into our world and our lives, which is, to do the will of God. So let us do the will of God by practicing love always, by being faithful to God and by being humble.
