3RD SUNDAY HOMILY OF ADVENT: YEAR C

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3RD SUNDAY HOMILY OF ADVENT: YEAR C

HOMILY THEME: REJOICE FOR THE LORD IS NEAR

BY: Fr. Mike OLUMBA

Zeph 3:14-18a; Phil 4:4-7; Lk 3:10-18

The Prophet Zephaniah invites us to shout with joy. Paul in his letter to the Philippians (4:4-7) invites us to be always joyful. And he repeats it: “Be joyful”. They do not invite us to be joyful because we have all that we need to live, or that because we won a lottery. They do not invite us to be joyful because we have no problem in life waiting to be solved. They invite us to be joyful because The Lord is quite close, at hand. Here is our reason to be joyful. (Just like a child told that Nna/nne mmirichukwu ya abiaruola/As children, here we are told that, our godfather/ godmother comes to visit us).

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The image of John the Baptist shouting in the desert/wilderness of his country is at the heart of the liturgy of this time or period of Advent. In humility and poverty, the Precursor/Forerunner/Announcer/Otimpku of the Messiah did not stop shouting in the desert to call all to conversion. He was the archetypal prophet/the prophet par excellence, the one who jumped up in joy in her mother’s womb seeing his closeness to the presence of Jesus. It was him who accepted in humility to fade away in front of the one that he announces. (He was once told by his disciples, that “the One that you baptized few days ago is now on the other side of the river baptizing, and people are rushing towards him!” He will simply answer concerning Jesus;”He has to increase and I, I have to decrease” and eventually disappear. Unlike the other prophets who announced the coming of the Messiah, John was exceptionally lucky and destined to be the one who pointed out to us the Messiah: “Behold the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world”. Those who honour him with the name of the “Blessed” could be allowed to enjoy their admiration for this Desert monk/prophet.

It is in the desert, this privileged place that John the Baptist fixes for us an appointment. It was here that spiritual experiences and essential events in the life of the people of God took place. These experiences had the desert as their context and as their environment.

The desert is at first a place of truth. The aridity of the desert requires and obliges the truth of the heart. And it is in this sense that the desert is also a place of choice and of radical commitment. (It was often in the desert that God like a lover, took Israel his beloved, and his people to speak to her like a lover).

In the desert, freed from everything that is not essential and forced to see and to keep only the unique necessity, man is confronted with his fundamental questions about his being, his life and his mission.

But the real desert is not at first geographical. It is at the heart of our world when solitude seems to take the upper hand over togetherness; and where and when temptation to despair appears stronger than the apparent hope. But once more, it is there, and at such moments that God can also meet us.

Today as at yesterday the voice of the prophets of God still rings in the deserts of the world to keep God’s promise and to renew unceasingly the novelty of love. It may be the case for us if we follow the advice of John who prepares us to meet the Messiah who comes.

And those who came to be baptized by John asked him: We have listened to your homily, but “What must we do concretely?” John had understood well that the real enjoyment is “shared enjoyment”. Think of a beautiful novel you read or a nice film that you watched. The joy is not complete until you share it with another. We cannot be joyful all alone. We cannot dance joyfully in front of people that are in mourning. That’s why John the Baptist answered them thus: “The one who has two clothes, let him share with the one who has none: (so that the other does not die of cold) and the one who has enough to eat, let him do the same (so that the other one does not starve to death)!”

We cannot get dressed doubly comfortably with clothing to spare for tomorrow and the day after tomorrow when our neighbours are dying today of cold.
We cannot eat to our heart’s content, celebrating parties with reserves that will last till next week when our neighbours are starving today.

When it came to the turn of soldiers, John answered them: Do not treat anyone violently! Do violence to no one! Use violence against none to take away his things or his life: And be contented with your salary: Here is an advice that still remains valid till today, 2000 years later after it was given! With weapons given to us for public protection, which we often turn against the public, we sometimes still believe that we are above everyone and even above the law, without fear of God or respect for man, being able to decide on our own who will live and who will die. The Prophet John really knows something about humanity. (Though worse in some places, but with weapons in hands, white, black, green or red, soldiers are soldiers everywhere!) And in some aspects, perhaps humanity has never changed in 2000 years!

To us then, what is it that we have to clean up and clear up in our life, in my life? What do we have to do? What do I have to do?

(Faced with the woman caught in the obvious offence/sin of adultery, after asking that the one without sin be the first to throw the first stone (John 8:1-11), Jesus wrote on the ground. For certain commentators of the scripture, he was writing the sins of men. Although it is in public, Jesus was however having a personal and private dialogue with each person present. By reading what he wrote, each person was reading of his private sins. After reading such, the concerned person left. And finally, all those assembled there, at first carrying different sizes of stone for the lapidation of the woman, all left one by one after having heard Jesus speak to them one by one).

Let us pray:
–That the Lord knowing what our life is like, and what corrections are needed, may tell us at the depths of our hearts what suits our states of life!
–That he may show us the path which we need to take in order to go to the Father!
–That we can live a holy and joyful life under his guidance while waiting with joy the coming of our Lord, together with our brothers and sisters also awaiting his coming throughout the world – Amen

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