Following up on my comments of last week, I believe that the responsibility or challenge to live the gospel with our lives ties to our responsibility to “make straight the way of the Lord” – the phrase so often proclaimed in Advent liturgies. Let me explain.
The homilist I heard last Sunday said “don’t think back to Jesus, think forward to Jesus.” I think he still missed the point. Are we to just passively wait for the coming of Jesus? Will there be “pie in the sky by and by?” The preacher stated that the promises of the readings for the week would be fulfilled “on that day when Jesus comes again.”
I have a problem with this thinking……
I agree “don’t think back to Jesus,” but I disagree with “think forward to Jesus coming again.” For me, a central message of Jesus is that the kingdom is among us, that God is among us – we just don’t see! For me, Jesus was teaching us to see God present among us and to be a visible presence of God. Finally, for me, if the way of the Lord is to be made straight, every valley filled, every mountain laid low, and every crooked path made straight, it’s not something that God is going to do independently at some secret time in the future. If this is going to happen, it’s going to happen through us! To view it any other way makes us observers of life who passively, helplessly accept the sorry state of affairs of our world and pray that God will take care of things and then wait for this to happen. Thus, we are relieved of responsibility. “Sorry, my hands are tied, but God will take care of it….. someday.”
I don’t think so…….
Please understand that I do not believe we are all little gods ourselves. I know the distinction. However, I do believe we are all part of the Source of Life, Love, and Being (as Bishop John Spong would say) and, as such, we are called to make known the presence and love of God. To that end, I think we have a few valleys to fill, a few mountains to lay low, and several paths to straighten out – both in our lives as individuals and as a race of human beings on this little speck of dirt spinning in a vast universe – one of innumerable universes.
The readings last Sunday stated “the eyes of all wait upon thee.”
I remember waiting, like most sons in the Western World, for my father to have time to spend with me. Keeping a job, paying the bills, raising a family, holding a marriage together was time consuming. Individual attention was, and regrettably remains, a luxury. I realized that I would have to take care of many things on my own. And now, working with homeless young adults, I often have to help them realize that each of them has to be the one he/she is waiting for to come and rescue him/her.
And this is true, I believe, for all of us. We are the ones for whom we have been waiting. Looking for something to happen by and by, I believe, is missing the point. It sure takes a weight off of our shoulders, but, in reality, I believe the promises and hopes found in the readings of Advent are responsibilities we all share.
So, I ask myself, what am I doing to make valleys filled, mountains level, and crooked roads straight? Do I pray that God will take care of everything? Am I active enough in issues of social justice? Do I make a respectable effort to reflect the presence, love, and compassion of God? Do the people with whom I come in contact daily “see” the Gospel? Is God any more present because of my life? Can people “read the gospel” through my life?
That’s why I don’t believe it’s about looking in the past for Jesus, or looking to the future for Jesus. That’s why I believe it’s about revealing that the God of all the universe is HERE, NOW, in this place and time shadowed, not illuminated, by the current state of our world. That’s why I believe I must be a “do-er” not “wait to be a done to-er.”
The mystery of the incarnation is ongoing and ever evolving. Jesus is the fullest revelation of the mystery of God, and purest example of oneness with God. But Jesus is also an example for us to follow, not the one who does everything for us.
How do I incarnate God in this world? What gospel or “Good News” do I bring to this world through my life? Is the God of all life any more present because of me?
I liked it better when I could just wait for God to come and take care of things……………
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