"I am not the one. Jesus is the One!"

Gaudete Sunday. Third Sunday in Advent. December 11th, 2011

We rejoice and are glad as we await the coming of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. This is what we proclaim today as we celebrate this Third Sunday of Advent. The rose colored vestment symbolizes this great joy-Gaudete! We await Jesus coming just like His herald, John the Baptist. John shows us the way to Christ and how to wait with patient, but joyful hope.

In order to really understand today’s Gospel, we have to remember that during the first century in Israel, the Romans controlled the entire political and religious life of the people. And so, many people at the time of John were looking for political answers to this great oppression by the Romans. Now we have never had to live under foreign occupation in this country so it’s hard to image how terrible it must have been for the Israelites. In light of their great hardships, they asked; “Who would ever come to free them, who could possibly grant them liberty? They were a people whose hope was almost gone; the only hope they had left was in the prophecy of the coming of the Messiah.

These were the people who went out to see John the Baptist and so, “They asked John, “Are you the one, like Moses or David or Elijah that will lead a glorious and powerful army to victory over the Romans? Unfortunately, in their questions we see all too clearly that what little hope they had left, was placed solely in human power and solutions, such as politics and war. In other words, they trusted in man alone to save man; their hope was in a human Messiah, not a divine one. No wonder their hope was so weak.

John knew all too well the state of affairs in the country of Israel. Yet he saw hope not in human solutions, like politics and war, but in divine solutions. John saw the greatest enemy was not Roman’s, but was the people’s own infidelity to the Lord. He preached boldly about the need for repentance, about turning from the real oppressor-sin. He knew that the real problem of the day was the hardness of people hearts, their refusal to give their total yes to God as shown by their refusal to following God’s commandments and teachings and so offer true worship to the Lord. And so, John called them all to task, no exceptions; he called everyone, even Kings, to repentance-to turn away from the real cause of all the unhappiness, suffering, and even war in the world, which is sin, and to turn back in fidelity to the true and living God, the worship of Who, alone could give them true happiness and peace.

But John not only preached repentance, he lived it. John saw who he was in relation to God; he saw that he, himself was totally dependant on God for everything. “I am not the one, Jesus is the one.” John knew the truth, he knew he needed a savior, he knew he could not fix his own problems, he knew man could not and can never save man; and so he hoped in God alone--God alone can save.

And so, John pointed the world to the One who would come and who alone could fix the world—Jesus is the One. He is the one who will bring Glad tidings to the lowly, healing to the sick & liberty to the captives,. What glad tidings these are, and they make up the Good News of Jesus, the Gospel. This Gospel is not just a message, not just a holy book, the Gospel is a Person, a Divine Person, Jesus Christ—He is the Message! He is THE friend to the lowly, the poor in spirit, the sick and the oppressed, especially those who are sick, oppressed and in slavery to sin. Jesus will bring a victory, a victory much greater than any military victory over any enemy of this world.

Jesus shows us His definitive victory. One of the greatest military powers the world has ever seen threw everything that it had at him, even their greatest torture--crucifixion. The power of hell itself, threw everything it had at Him, even its greatest torture, the very power of death itself. And Jesus in return showed them and us an even greater power, the very power of God Himself. And because Jesus was God, it was His own power; and He used it to defeat the power of hell itself by His glorious resurrection. The Resurrection show us definitively that God’s power can swallow up anything the power of this world has to offer, anything the power of hell as to offer…especially the power of sin and death. This is indeed THE GOOD NEWS for us, for you and for me.

Jesus side is the winning side, the battle as already been won. But now the battle needs to be fought in each soul, inside each of us. If we are on His side, we will be victorious as well. But, we have to always keep in mind that the victory Jesus will lead us to will be primarily to a spiritual victory, like His. Jesus will not necessarily take all our troubles away, we still have to, like Him, suffer and die, but He will give us His own Divine Power in order to, not only to prevail and to persevere over our self will, over sin, but to do so with Joy and peace even amidst great sufferings. If we are with Jesus, no power in this world can defeat us; not even the devil himself; not even one of our greatest enemy, which is ourselves, can take away our hope in finally being victorious over our sins. With Jesus, and only with Jesus, we will reach the reward for all the victorious, union with God Himself and life forever with Him in heaven.

We live in a broken hearted world, one that is marked with conflict- wars, divisions, and a general disregard for God and the things of God. We want to see the solutions to all of our problems apart from God. It’s too easy fall into the trap of thinking that we can save ourselves; that we can solve all of our problems without conforming our lives to God’s truth and will in order to do it. Yet, this is so far from the truth. We are helpless and cannot save ourselves nor solve all of our problems apart from God and His truth. Politics can’t save us; only God can save; and He does so in the Person of Jesus Christ the Son of God who has become one of us in order to save us.

Jesus alone is the Answer…and Jesus comes to us through the Sacraments. It is only through the Sacraments, that the power of Jesus’ victory flows in order to brings liberty to the captives, captive to sin, which is all of us. The Sacraments alone have to power to set us free, to heals us, to save us. The Sacraments have the power to restore our fallen world; for the Sacraments have the power of God Himself…in fact one of the Sacraments is called the Most Blessed of all Sacraments because It is God Himself, in the flesh, in Person with all of His divine power and glory. And so this Sacrament of all Sacraments, the Holy Eucharist is alone the Answer because it is Jesus, and as I said, Jesus Alone is the Answer.

But we can only, access this Power of all powers through faith, by believing, adoring, trusting and loving, and begging pardon for those, including our own lack of faith, who do not believe, adore, hope and love. We will never, never, overcome our current woes, not to mention prevent our world from sliding more into chaos, into hell, until more Catholics come with strong and living faith, before the Holy Eucharist, having first been purified by worthy Sacramental confessions, and there in front of the very Person of God’s Divine Mercy, Jesus, present in the fullness of His Humanity and the fullness of His divinity, beg the Eternal Father for mercy on us and upon our whole world.

Gaudete! Let us rejoice, we have a God who has come, and who comes again in through the Sacraments in order to offer us His saving and healing power, the power of His Humanity and Divine Love. Let us have hope…for Hope has a name, and that name is Jesus, and through faith, we process this Hope in the Holy Eucharist, the Most Blessed Sacrament of the Altar, the God who heals, frees and saves those who come to Worship Him and adore Him.

Let us pray. St. John the Baptist, through your intercession, help us to have your same attitude, help us to have a humble submission to God and to live for Him alone. Help us to see that the cause of all, all, unhappiness, suffering and unrest in the world, even war, the cause of all man’s problems, is not great opposing military, or great power in the world, but the cause is our own infidelity to the Lord, that is doing our own thing, in other words, sin. John show us that the Holy Eucharist is Jesus--the Lamb of God, the One alone who has the power to free, to heal, and to save. Help us to be like you, faithful to the Lord even to our last breath, so that by our lives and even by our death, we too may point out to others, the true Lamb of God which takes away the sin of the world-Jesus truly Present in the Holy Eucharist, the Most Blessed Sacrament of the Altar.

Our Lady of the New Advent, through your intercession obtain for us the grace of the Holy Spirit to help us to open the gates of hearts fully at this Holy Mass in order that the Heart of Christ truly present in the Holy Eucharist, may come fully in, and make us one with Him and through Him, one with the Father in the unity of the Holy Spirit. Amen.