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Terrance Callan
December 17, 2000
Third Sunday of Advent (C)
Zeph 3:14-18a; Phil 4:4-7; Luke 3:10-18
The readings for the third Sunday of Advent continue to focus our
attention on the past, present and future coming of Jesus as the
fulfillment
of God's promise of salvation. This Sunday the readings especially call us
to rejoice at the coming of Jesus.
The reading from the book of the prophet Zephaniah is another statement
of God's promise to save Israel. The reading begins with a summons to
rejoice because God has saved Israel, because God is in their midst. The
remainder of the reading describes the time of salvation as lying in the
future. On that day, God will be in their midst; God "will rejoice
over you
with gladness, and renew you in his love." We Christians believe that
the
coming of Jesus fulfilled this promise.
The reading from the gospel according to Luke describes the preaching of
John the Baptist. He prepared the way for Jesus by calling on people to
repent. John said, "Whoever has two cloaks should share with the
person who
has none. And whoever has food should do likewise." He told tax
collectors
to stop collecting more than is prescribed. He told soldiers not to use
their power to take money from people unjustly.
John's preaching made people wonder if he might be the promised savior.
John distinguished himself from the savior partly by saying about him,
"His
winnowing fan is in his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather
the
wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable
fire."
This makes it clear that at his first coming Jesus did not do all he was
expected to do; he will come again to complete the salvation he has begun.
We can prepare for the second coming of Jesus by acting the way John the
Baptist told people to act to prepare for Jesus' first coming.
The reading from the letter of St. Paul to the Philippians gives other
advice about how to prepare for the second coming of Jesus, echoing the
theme
of rejoicing in salvation found in the reading from Zephaniah. Paul says,
"Rejoice in the Lord always. I shall say it again: rejoice." We
should rejoice because "The Lord is near." The Lord is near both
in the
sense that Jesus could come again at any moment, and in the sense that
Jesus
is with us now as we wait for his second coming.
Because of this we should have no anxiety about the second coming of
Jesus, or about anything else. Instead we should ask God for whatever we
want, so sure that God will give it to us that we thank God for giving it
even as we ask for it. The basis for this assurance is that God has
already
sent Jesus to live, die and rise again for us. As Paul asks elsewhere,
"He
who did not spare his own Son but handed him over for us all, how will he
not
also give us everything else along with him?" (Romans 8:32).
If we do this, the peace of God that is far beyond anything we can
understand will guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. In this way,
we
can truly rejoice always.
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