Wednesday, 21 December 2011

4th Sunday of Advent 18 Dec 2011 Sermon

4th Sunday of Advent 18.12.11 Time

Our Lord once prophesied that when He would return the people would be as in Noah’s day, eating and drinking, buying and selling, marrying and giving in marriage. In other words they would be unready for Him because too preoccupied with everything else.

It appears that He expects us to be looking out for Him at all times, no matter what other activities we may be involved in. He knows there are many things we have to attend to. A lot of them would themselves be religious obligations, in no way incompatible with waiting for Him.

He is not asking us to do nothing but look out the window for His return. What He is asking for is that we have a clear sense of priority in our desires and expectations.

That no matter what we do in this life it be our paramount concern to do the will of God, to be on good terms with Him at all times, to be ready to meet Him, either in death or in His second coming.

From our point of view the difficulty arises that the longer things go on the more accustomed we become to our own routines and patterns. We may be aware of the Last Judgment and all that goes with that but in our hearts we are far more interested in the everyday comings and goings of life. Who wins the football, what the stock market is doing, preparing for the daughter’s wedding, planning the next holiday and a hundred other things.

If we get too comfortable with our routine we start to see any intervention of Our Lord as an interruption, an unwelcome intrusion into what we have come to see as important.

This is the attitude we must avoid. No matter what projects we have on hand, what ambitions or plans we may have formed (even good and legitimate things) – we must be ready to give it all up at a moment’s notice. If it be God’s will.

And further to this that we would not see any unusual activity from God as an interruption or a nuisance. So if your daughter is getting married the next day and the world suddenly ends you say, that’s fine with me.

Whose time is it anyway? We think it is our time to dispose of as we wish, but all of it belongs to God.

So whether we ignore God or we fit Him in somehow – these are both the wrong attitude.

What should we do instead? Give Him first use of our time. Begin and end all things with prayer, and some more in between.

Give Him first choice on all our plans and ambitions. The phrase ‘God willing’, which itself can be just a formality, needs to be re-established in its original force. I might be planning to go to Europe tomorrow, God willing. If He does not will it, I do not will it either.

There is a wrestling match going on here. His will or mine. His time or mine.

How do we yield gladly to him? If we draw close enough to Him we start to see things His way. This is what prayer does, and the sacraments. This is preparing the way, as St John the Baptist tells us. So that the way is always open, the way from God’s heart to my heart.

We have a long way to go to get this right. To live in daily closeness to God’s will, that we are ready no matter what we are doing, to get up and change course, and that without complaining or arguing.

It must be this state of mind in which we find Mary and Joseph who were both able to adapt so easily to the unusual requests made of them regarding the birth of Our Lord. How would we go if an angel appeared to us with a direct request from Heaven?

We can be sure that God’s plans for us will bring us to a much happier state than anything we could achieve by ourselves.

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