| Message for 3rd Sunday of Advent |
| Zephaniah 3:14-18 | Philippians 4:4-7 | Luke 3:10-18 |
 Two men, Charlie and Roger, got together and opened a butcher shop. The
business did quite well and they prospered. One day a preacher came to town, and
Charlie gave his life to Jesus Christ. He tried to persuade Roger to accept Christ also, but to no avail. "Why won't you, Roger?" asked the newly baptized Charlie. "Listen, Charlie," Roger said. "If I get religion too, who's going to weigh the meat?"
Roger has this going for him, he understands that believing in Jesus Christ
implies a radical change in personal and professional behaviour. Many people who
identify themselves as Christians do not seem to get it. Even some in the Church seem to feel that they are exempt from living as Jesus did.
As I woke this morning I heard about the senseless shooting of 20 children and 6 adults in Newtown, Connecticut. I couldn't help but feel for the families for whom this Christmas is going to be devoid of happiness. Happiness results from having a peaceful mind. And a peaceful mind results from enjoying the love of family and friends who care about us and knowing that we are living as God wants.
The USA is a nation that prides itself on its Christian constitution. But often its hard to see a difference in the moral behaviour
of people who go to church and people who don't. There is as much pilfering
and dishonesty among church members as among non-members. There seems to be a
widespread misconception among Christians that we can add Christ to our lives
without subtracting sin. Accepting Jesus as one's personal Lord and Saviour is
seen as a matter of changing one's belief and not much to do with changing one's
behaviour.
How many times have you heard street preachers say, "Only believe,
and you will be saved?"
What about the preachers who tell people "Before I followed Jesus my life was going nowhere but since I embraced religion I have become prosperous!"
In today's gospel we have the rare opportunity of listening to the preaching
of John the Baptizer.
"So, with many other exhortations, he proclaimed
the good news to the people" (Luke 3:18). John's preaching of the good
news has two principal components: (a) the invitation to live a Godly life, and
(b) the invitation to believe in Jesus the Messiah.
The emphasis of John the Baptist was that to accept Jesus into your life means to change and become more like Jesus.
Various groups of people
who heard John preach responded by asking, "What then should we
do?" (Luke 3:10, 12, 14).
To the crowds or the masses his answer was:
"Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever
has food must do likewise" (verse 11).
Accepting the gospel demands a
change in your personal conduct. When you see yourself as a Christian you become a person who loves to share,
rather than a person who loves to accumulate.
To the tax collectors John answered: "Collect no more than the amount
prescribed for you" (verse 13). And to the soldiers he answered:
"Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusation, and be
satisfied with your wages" (verse 14). To them he enjoined honesty and
fairness in their business dealings and professional conduct. The gospel is a
leaven that affects every aspect of our personal, business and social life. To
repent is to turn from evil and do good. "Only believe, and you will be saved"
is at best a half-truth.
To accept the gospel, to believe in Jesus the Messiah, however, does not mean simply to strive to be a good
person. It means above all to be a person of faith, a person who believes in
Jesus as the Messiah, the Son of God.
The people to whom John preached were
beginning to mistake him for the Messiah. If they did so, they would be mistaken
in their belief, their zeal and goodwill notwithstanding.
It is possible for a
believer to be full of goodwill and love for God, to be blameless in both
personal and professional behaviour, yet be in error in your beliefs. An
essential part of imparting the good news is to point out possible errors in
belief and help the believer to move from an imperfect and naive to a more
perfect and mature knowledge of the doctrine of Christ. This is what John the
Baptizer did.
The tendency among us Christians today is to emphasize the belief aspect at
the expense of moral behaviour. For John, however, change of behaviour came
first, before change of belief. The synthesis of John's preaching was,
"the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good
news" (Mark 1:15). For him repentance, turning away from selfishness to
a Godly behaviour, precedes and accompanies belief.
As we prepare to celebrate the coming of God to His people in the birth of
Jesus, let us call to mind that the basic problem with Christian faith today is
that we profess to believe but do not match it with practical behaviour.
This
self-contradiction constitutes a stumbling block for would-be believers, who are
often attracted by the person and teachings of Christ but are turned away by the
behaviour of those who claim to be his followers. John prepared his people for
the coming of Jesus by challenging them to mend their ways and believe his
message. We cannot do better than that. The best preparation we can make for the
birth of the Lord is to decide to change and be guided in our behaviour by the selfless teachings
of the gospel.
This is what is needed today to make our faith perfect so that we
can stand with heads raised high in joy at the coming of our Lord, Jesus
Christ.
Today is incidentally also the 20th anniversary of the first time I celebrated Mass. That day I can remember seeing myself as a kind of modern day John the Baptist. I felt called to tell people to keep their eternal focus on Jesus. I still feel that even though I don't occupy any pulpit or have responsibility for any particular parish, I still have a role in helping people experience the message of Jesus in a new and realistic way.
|
