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Commentary of the Gospell
Joy
Read:
On this “Gaudete Sunday” Isaiah describes a world that is bubbling with joy at the coming of the Lord. It is the capacity to patiently wait for the Lord, which doubles our joy when he arrives, assures James. Jesus points to the joyful transformation in the lives of the people as the sign of his Messiahship.
Reflect:
John the Baptist had started off with a bang. Pointing to his cousin, he had declared to his disciples that Jesus, indeed, was the Lamb of God. As time went by, John wasn’t very sure. Jesus’ methods seemed to be drastically different from his own. John was all about fire and fury; Jesus seemed to be a melting heart. John wanted to cut the barren trees down; Jesus was for giving them yet another chance. Is he truly the one? As answer, Jesus invites John to look at the fruits of his ministry: the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are clean again, the deaf hear, the dead come alive! The definitive sign of the Kingdom is the wholesome, healing joy it brings.
Pray:
“Lord, make me a channel of your joy, healing, and life for others.”
Act:
Do an act that brings a smile on the face of someone around you.
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«I send my messenger before you»
On this third Sunday of Advent, called «Joy Sunday», the Word of God invites us on the one hand to joy and on the other hand to the awareness that existence also includes moments of doubt, when it is difficult to believe. Joy and doubt are experiences that are part of our life.
John the Baptist, the forerunner of the Lord, announced the coming of the Messiah, but it had not yet manifested itself as he had envisaged it, so he sent his disciples to ask Jesus whether he was the one who was to come or whether we had to wait for someone else. The answer Jesus gave them was: «Go and tell John what you are seeing and hearing: the blind see, the crippled walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have the gospel preached to them» (Mt.11,5).
How well we can recognise ourselves in those expectations that are not fulfilled, projects that after much effort are frustrated, realities that we imagined and that do not come in the way we had foreseen, and tempted by discouragement, we ask ourselves if we still have to wait for other times when circumstances will be more favourable. But the Lord brings us out of these situations by opening our eyes to reality. Jesus praises the life of John and is grateful for it, because in his own way, without fully understanding the extent of his unconditional love, he prepared with his words and his gestures the emergence of the Kingdom, from the fragile and little ones of the earth. Do we gather and reap these signs? Do we put our eyes and ears in our daily life towards the most vulnerable faces of the times we live in? Because hidden in them, it is God himself who brings us joy and salvation.
But for that we need to see the reality, the world and discover that God is with us, that He is not indifferent to our fate, that we have to listen to His voice, which manifests itself in silence, in prayer, so that we can truly be His witnesses.
Prayer: Come, Lord Jesus, deliver us from blindness, so that we may recognise you, from noise, so that we may hear you and thus bear witness that you are the Saviour of the world.
(Psalm 145) Come, Lord, save us.
«HAPPY SUNDAY TO YOU ALL».