Third Sunday Advent

Third Sunday Advent
December 12, 2004

"Strengthen the hands that are feeble, make firm the knees that are weak, say to those whose hearts are frightened: Be strong, fear not! ... then will the lame leap like a stag, then the tongue of the mute will sing." (Isaiah 35: 1-10). "You too must be patient. Make your hearts firm, because the coming of the Lord is at hand... " (James 5: 7-10) "What did you go out to the desert to see? A reed swayed by the wind?" (Matthew 11: 2-11)
The prophet has a vision of the messianic time when we will be strengthened and healed in body and spirit. St. James advises us to be patient and courageous. Jesus praises John the Baptist's strength and recognition that the age of the Messiah is at hand.
The prophet's promise to the lame and the mute is that we will be not just walking and talking, but leaping and singing very soon. For all of us, especially for my friends with degenerative diseases and chronic mental and spiritual afflictions, this is a promise which we almost dare not consider out of fear that our hopes will be let down. It is nearly too much to consider and yet here is the promise that it will be so. Our trust really is all or nothing. Either it is true and it will happen, or we are doomed. No wonder faith is challenging and difficult.
Jesus asks his followers what they were expecting when they went out to the desert looking for John. No doubt, laying eyes on this radical, fanatical prophet of the imminent coming of this new age, they were surprised by his words and appearance. His greatness certainly was not in his appearance. It was that he recognized in Jesus the Son of Man, the promised one. What are we hoping to see when we go looking for the Messiah? Jesus, the rabbi, reverses our expectations: "the least in the Kingdom of Heaven is greater than he. The forgotten, emotionally unstable, spiritually homeless and hopeless are God's favorites. The great, the powerful, the holy, the successful, the intelligent, the beautiful, will have to go to the back of the bus in the Kingdom.
There is an emphasis on courage in these passages. I have been told that I must be a courageous person. This is not so, if what it is taken to mean is that I'm not afraid. It has often been pointed out by those who have been in the terror and chaos of war that anyone who is not afraid is either a fool or a liar. We act with courage when we go ahead in spite of our fear and dread. Neither have I ever been renowned for my patience. Like most of us, I want this age of universal peace and healing right now. Christians and Jews of Jesus' time were sure that the messianic age would happen in their lifetimes. Here we are still waiting and knowing that it is coming soon, but in God's time. As Jesus words about John the Baptist suggest, this hope for a new world is not for the faint of heart, and yet it is precisely for the faint of heart. It is not for the impatient, and yet our impatience may help to bring it about.
I continue to count on and delight in our circle of mutual support, prayer and encouragement while we wait for and work toward the New Age.