Eucharistic Gospel Reading for the Third Sunday of Advent: Year B
John 1:6-8 and 19-28:
“There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light.” (John 1: 6 to 8)
These verses kind of break through in the prolog of the Gospel according to John. This Gospel account was speaking about Jesus, the actual word of God when this introduction of John the Baptist just bursts in. However, I find it to be another layer of the “In the Beginning,” voice. John dedicates himself to be the connection between the Hebrew and Christian Testament. The voice of Isaiah, which is indirectly the Voice of God, speaks through him. John the Baptist breaches the distinction between prophet and saint. He becomes both.
When they, the priests and Levites, asked John, “What do you say about yourself?” He said, “I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’” as the prophet Isaiah said,; (John 1:22 and 23).
In the beginning of our Bible we have the words, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. And the earth was a formless and desolate emptiness, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters. Then God said, Let there be light”; and there was light;(Genesis 1:1 to 3.) To me, this our prayer from God bringing about our creation. So, Isaiah, and John the Baptist echo our historic creation in order that these Holy words might take root in our souls.
As we come to realize that we didn’t have to be, we should become humbled creatures of creation giving thanks to God that we even exist. And more than that, through our Lord Jesus we, all humanity, are presented an invitation to pass from mortality to immortality through the same Jesus Christ by making straight our lives in order that that same Holy Spirit of God that passed over the waters in the beginning, might also be our bridge to eternal life. Most bridges (not all) are straight structures that connect two bodies of land. Even those that are curved do the same. The word for us today is to clear the path for God to act in our lives. We clear this path by prayer and repentance.
Today, this Third Sunday of Advent, is marked as a day of joyful thanksgiving for the opportunity accept the invitation from God to receive our Lord Jesus into our lives that we might repent and rebuild our lives as a welcome place to the coming of our Lord. Thank You Lord Jesus.
Please keep up your thoughts and prayers and hopes for Ukraine and Russia, Israel and Palestine, and our schools.
As we listen to what the Spirit of God is saying to us, let us live to love and serve, and to teach others to love and serve, while pondering anew what the Almighty can do. John
onewhoponders 