3rd Sunday in Advent C  

We continue, in a sense, where we left off last week with John the Baptist’s preaching. There have been a few verses missed out where John really sets into the crowd and calls them, among other things, a brood of vipers! He has challenged them, if they are serious, to repent and to prove they have changed. Here in this Gospel they ask how – even in the past people, like today, wanted the answers fed to them. (If we consider the whole world of self-help books, gurus etc. etc. not much has changed!) 

 

John lays down a challenge to them but also to us. Yes we can get rid extra clothes and I’m sure we all do have a good clear out for charity shops on a regular basis and a good declutter often during the year. We’re also very good at supporting many charities but John is surely talking about more than that. It’s a bit like the widow’s mite that we read about a few weeks ago – we need to give what hurts us and not just from our surplus! 

 

Each one of us, just as the tax collectors and soldiers did, has to find what is right for us. We are the only ones, in a sense, who know how much/ how little we can give, how much/ how little we can change. We each have to look at our own lives, examine our own conscience. 

 

We know the feeling of expectancy – we have it every year around this time as we prepare for Christmas. What John was saying to the crowd was ‘You have never met anyone like Him – if you think I’m good, wait till you see Him!’ He talks to them about baptising with the Holy Spirit and fire – a far cry from the water John himself is using. Why the Holy Spirit? – because they, and us, all needed help especially in difficult times and circumstances. 

 

In the first reading the prophet Zephaniah tells us that ‘the King of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst’. In the second reading to the Philippians Paul tells us ‘the Lord is at hand.’ John the Baptist tells us that ‘He who is mightier than I is coming’. Jesus, with the help of the Holy Spirit, carries us through the difficult times of our lives – not just outward ones but inward ones as well. To know and believe that God is so close to us gives us a deep sense of joy, peace and contentment that we won’t find anywhere else. 

 

So as we continue with our Advent preparations on this Gaudete Sunday let us promise ourselves that we will declutter ourselves of our spare tunics – whatever that might mean for each one of us. 

 

www.dupuiscentre.co.uk