Reflection on the Third Sunday of Advent (B) ~ Gaudete Sunday

Gaudete Sunday

Is 61:1-2a, 10-11
Luke 1:46-48, 49-50, 53-54 (Is 61:10b)
1 Thes 5:16-24
John 1:6-8, 19-28

Rejoice! God is alive! This is the message of the readings for today. In the beautiful Isaiah reading, we hear the joyous words of God's anointed one who will bring glad tidings to the poor, who will heal the brokenhearted, proclaim liberty to captives and bring release to prisoners. All of these are attributes of a Messiah to come.

In his letter to the Thessalonians, Paul reminds his converts not to quench the Spirit, but to pray unceasingly and to give thanks for every blessing. Paul prays that God will make these men and women perfectly holy so that they will be blameless when Jesus comes again. So we see that in both the Old and the New Testaments, people were waiting and hoping for the arrival of Jesus... either for his birth or his coming at the end of time.

Now the scene shifts to John's Gospel which describes the uncertainty that the priests and Levites felt concerning John the Baptizer who had accumulated a large following and who was baptizing them with water... Could he be the long-awaited Messiah?

But no, John admitted immediately that he was not the Christ. In fact, John was aware that he was "the voice of one crying in the desert, make straight the way of the Lord" as Isaiah had predicted. He realized that he was not worthy even to untie the strap of the sandal of the one who was to come and he told this to his questioners.

In these final two weeks of Advent, we can rejoice that our Savior will soon arrive... We will commemorate his coming birth and we also look to the future when Jesus will come again in glory. The Virgin Mary, soon to be a mother, rejoices because God has blessed her for all ages. We can praise our God with the same words that she spoke: "The Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is his Name." (Luke 1:49)

He has done great things for us too! And for them, we rejoice!