\u201cRejoice in the Lord\nalways; again I say, rejoice\u201d. These are the very first words that we hear on\nthe Third Sunday of Advent, also known as \u201cGaudete Sunday\u201d. As we near the\nbirth of our Lord, we, like Our Lady, start to shake with anticipated joy. We\ncan\u2019t wait to see him, to hold him, to hear his cries and coos in the manger at\nBethlehem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Which is why we might be puzzled by our Gospel today. We might ask ourselves, \u201chow is John saying he is not the Christ or Elijah or a prophet cause for joy?\u201d Why should we rejoice at this testimony?\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We\u2019re told at the start that John the Baptist is not the light but \u201ccame to testify to the light\u201d. We can imagine John the Baptist as the twilight for the sunrise. The twilight announces the sun\u2019s imminent arrival, it\u2019s imminent rising of when it takes its place in the sky, shining over everything on the face of the earth. But the twilight, itself, is not the day or the sun. It runs ahead but ultimately points behind it \u2013 towards the sun.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u00a0When John says \u201cI am not\u201d, he points to the One who says and is \u201cI am\u201d: Jesus Christ. John knows he is not the Messiah. John is not the savior of the world. Jesus is. And we, too, should rejoice, because the one who saves us is God himself. Most religions teach about us binding ourselves to a deity or God; but only Christianity dares to profess that God first binds himself to us to the point of becoming one of us. And yet, for all of the similarities between us and God, the differences and distinctions are greater. God is God \u2013 we are not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The more we see how distinct we are from Christ, the more we rely on his love, on his grace, on his strength, to make us \u201cperfectly holy\u201d in spirit, soul, and body. Only when we rely on his love rather than our competencies alone do we find the strength God gives us daily to rejoice always, pray without ceasing, and refrain from every kind of evil.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
May we be like John the Baptist, whose \u201cI am not the Christ\u201d reminds us and everything that our existence is to be a testimony to the Light of the World, Jesus Christ, \u201cI AM\u201d in the flesh. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Joseph Yuson <\/strong>\u2013 St. Joseph Seminary, Edmonton, Alberta<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fot. Timotheus Wolf\/Unsplash.com<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 3rd Sunday of Advent <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":2355,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,17,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2354","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","category-strona-glowna-najnowsze","category-strona-glowna-slider"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n