Advent 3
December 11, 2016
Our Need for God
Last
week as I was walking back from St. Benedict’s along Cove Rd. while praying the
Rosary, a car pulled up beside me and the passenger side window rolled down. A
woman leaned out the window and said, “You’d better be praying hard. Lots of
crazy stuff happening in the world today!” Then she rolled up the window and
the car drove off.
That’s a
theme I hear regularly – people who are concerned about the state of the world
in which we live. There’s a lot to worry about: the economy, the breakup of
families, terrorism, getting sick, corrupt politicians, and so much more. Back
in October, TIME magazine ran a cover story about the steadily-increasing rise
in teenage depression and anxiety – attributing the cause to be increasing
pressures at school, social media bullying, and broken families. But I would
attribute it – and a lot of our own anxieties – to a lack of faith in God.
We were
not made to live life on our own. If we were on our own, we would literally be
at the mercy of so many forces beyond our control – our boss could fire us, we
could get sick and die, we could get our identity stolen and lose all our
money. Without faith, all of that becomes just meaningless suffering. But with
faith, we are in the hands of a merciful God. Negative things can happen, but He
brings great good out of them for those with faith.
Thus,
the encounter of today’s Gospel. Let’s break down this story a bit. First, John
the Baptist tells his disciples to ask Jesus if He is the Christ. Whoa, wait a
minute! Didn’t John already know? Of course he did – he is the one who pointed
out, “This is the Lamb of God!” when Jesus walked by, and who was ashamed to
baptize the Lord because he insisted the Lord should baptize him instead.
Clearly John knew who Jesus was! Then why did he tell his disciples?
The key
is, he wanted his disciples to become Christ’s
disciples. They were still hanging around John, when John wanted them hanging
around Jesus. John’s role was to point everyone to Jesus, because the answer to
the desires of every human heart is Jesus.
And who
is Jesus? What was His mission? Was it, as our Gospel lists, to give sight to
the blind, healing to the lame, hearing to the deaf? All of those things were
for one purpose only – to bring others to faith that Jesus is the Messiah. Jesus
is less interested in providing free health care than He is in providing faith
in Him! Ultimately the free health care is nice, but it doesn’t solve the
deeper thirst of our souls – thirst to know God!
Pope
Benedict in his book, “Jesus of Nazareth”, asks a very important question –
what did Jesus come to bring? He answers that Jesus came to bring God. In fact,
we call Him “Emmanuel” – God with us. When we see Jesus Christ, we see the Face
of God. We understand that we are loved by Him, we come to know who we are and
what our purpose is in life (to become holy and spend eternity with God).
My
friends, John’s prophetic role is the same as ours. John said, “He must
increase; I must decrease.” John existed to glorify God and to lead others to
Him. We, too, should glorify God with our life and lead others to Him.
We’re
probably smack-dab in the middle of Christmas shopping season. But why would
you buy someone a new tie and neglect to give them the faith that leads to
eternal life? Bring souls to Christ – through your prayers, your example, and
sharing what your own faith in Christ means to you. The world needs hope, so
the world needs Jesus Christ – He is the only hope for the salvation of the
world!
No comments:
Post a Comment