First Sunday of Advent (B)

December 3, 2017

Readings:

First Reading – Isaiah 63: 16b-17, 19b; 64: 2-7

Psalm 80

Second Reading – 1 Corinthians 1: 3-9

Gospel reading according to Mark 13; 33-37

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Homily: Prepare and be ready.  Watch!

Jesus said to his disciples, “Be watchful! Be alert!” (Mk. 13: 33). 

Like the preparation we do to our expected guest or friend coming to visit us in our homes, so also the preparation we have to do when our Savior Jesus Christ comes to our lives.  Before the coming of our special guest or best friend, we prepare the physical appearance of our home, we clean and arrange our home, we put curtain in the sala, and we make sure every corner of our home is in order and in place well.  If we think that our guest/friend will stay in our home, we also prepare the bedroom for our guest/friend.  We replace mattresses, the pillow cases and the blanket, and put some toiletries.   The next preparation we do is to get ready the food, especially the favorite food of our guest/friend we cook.  And the last thing we prepare is ourselves.  We take a bath, put perfume in our body and dress up beautifully. 

How much more preparation we do when our Lord Jesus Christ is coming to visit us?  Despite that we do not know the time and day of his coming, we have to prepare always at his coming.  We must always ready to welcome him every second, every minute, every hour, every day and every year throughout of our lives.  For he said, “You do not know when the time will come” (Mk. 13: 33).  He just gives us an indication.  “It is like a man traveling aboard.  He leaves home and places his servants in charge, each with his work and orders the gatekeeper to be on the watch” (Mk. 13: 34).  As good servants and followers, we too must do what our Lord Jesus Christ has charged us to do, each work assigned to us until such time he arrives.

Again, he said, “Watch, therefore; you do not know when the lord of the house is coming, whether in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or in the morning” (Mk. 13: 35).   The thing we have to do is to prepare ourselves always for the coming of the Lord.  We must clean our body and soul through confession and penance, asking forgiveness for the sins we did and still doing, give alms and love to the least brothers and sisters of our Lord Jesus Christ. (See the gospel on the Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe, November 26, 2017).  “May he not come suddenly and find you sleeping” (Mk. 13:36).

So also we have to constantly remind ourselves, as what Jesus Christ who is visiting us, “What I say to you, I say to all: ‘Watch!”” (Mk. 13:37).