A LITTLE CHILD SHALL LEAD THEM

A SERMON FOR THE 2nd SUNDAY IN ADVENT

How has your Advent been up to now?  The first week of Advent is over, and there are only two weeks and two days left before Christmas is upon us.  Only a couple of weeks left to prepare.  When we think of these next weeks, what do we think of?  If we’re a child, we think of the good things that will happen on Christmas Day, the stockings filled with gifts, the kitchen table stocked high with good things.  But if we have left those happy days of childhood behind, the last weeks of Advent are less a feeling of expectation of the good things to come, than a feeling of apprehension at all the work that still has to be done:  first the Christmas cards, then browsing the online stores, threading the Christmas lights all over the house, decorating the Christmas tree, all the food preparation.  Then those forgotten last-minute gifts that force us out of our home, so that we can drive in bumper-to-bumper traffic to the mall, look desperately for a parking place within walking distance from the doors, fight the crowds in the stores, before joining the long lines at check-out, and heading back to the car, our fingers numb with cold as we clutch our packages.  What happened to that spirit of Christmas we used to love so much?

Christmas comes too fast, and then seems to disappear even faster.  We’re so exhausted by all those crazy preparations that as soon as Christmas Day is over we can’t wait to toss the Christmas tree to the kerb and get back to normal life.  But haven’t you noticed, that once we take down all the Christmas decorations, we are left with a sad feeling or emptiness?  Something has been left out.  Something extremely important.  What did we forget?  Think hard, and let’s admit it—we actually missed the whole point of Christmas!  We spent the four weeks of Advent not preparing for the coming of the Christ Child, but for the coming of Santa Claus!  The shepherds of Bethlehem are replaced by the elves of the North Pole, the ox and the ass by penguins and reindeer!  The central focus of Christmas has shifted away from God’s greatest gift to man, to the gifts we exchange with each other, plain ordinary trinkets that are supposed to be the mere representation of that ultimate gift that God gave us in the form of the Christ Child in the manger. We waste, in other words, these four most precious weeks of Advent, where we are invited by God to prepare our hearts for the great event.

As we attend our gloomy Advent Masses, with their purple vestments, stripped of their Gloria in Excelsis Deo, we must constantly remind ourselves that we are simply re-living those dark days of the Old Testament.  With the benefit of hindsight, we know what is in store for those people that dwelt in darkness.  They shall see a great light.   We know now what the prophet Isaiah meant by those words.  In fact, St. Paul reminds us again today of Isaiah’s ancient prophecy, that there shall be a root of Jesse, who shall rise to reign over the Gentiles, in him shall the Gentiles trust.  Not just the Jews, the chosen people, but the Gentiles too.  Even we would reap the infinite merits and graces that were to flow from Redeemer’s sacrifice on the cross.  For we are all the children of God.

And maybe that’s the reason why we find it so very hard to maintain the feeling of desolation that these ancient times represent.  Because we areall children at heart.  This is why we cannot help ourselves from anticipating the joys of Christmas by playing our Christmas carols and putting up our Christmas trees “too early”, this is why our Christmas parties and carol concerts are held before Christmas rather than after.  All this Advent joy is not really as inappropriate as some would have us believe, but is rather natural exuberance over the fact that something good is coming, and like little children, we just can’t wait.

So let’s not feel too guilty if we enjoy these happy feelings during this period of penance.  The good Lord is surely smiling down from heaven at the excitement of his children. The world of commerce may have cashed in on this anticipated joy, it’s true.  But we shouldn’t imagine that our joy is driven by this commerce.  At least, it shouldn’t be.  The joy of Advent existed long before Macy’s had their first Thanksgiving Day parade, with the triumphant arrival of Santa Claus.  

We really don’t have to wait until Christmas Day to wish people a Merry Christmas. Christmas creeps up on us very quickly, and before you know where you are, it is here and gone.  Let’s try and make this Christmas a real time of joy and thankfulness, so that we’re not left, as I said earlier, with that strange empty feeling, that maybe we’ve wasted a big opportunity.  In the spirit of hope that Advent represents, I hopethat this Advent will mean more to us this year than in years past.  I hopethat we will all prepare our hearts that the Christ Child may enter in.  

One of the great tragedies of our life is that the Christmas spirit is driven out of us as we leave childhood behind.  But one of the most important of Isaiah’s prophecies of the coming of a Messiah was read at Matins this past night.  It’s a strange prophecy that reminds us that Christ is all about childhood. It tells first of the rod coming forth from the Root of Jesse, clearly foretelling the coming of the Christ Child. And then, with these memorable words, it describes the following picture: “He shall smite the earth: with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked.  The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion … and a little child shall lead them.”  What an extraordinary picture Isaiah paints.  This dreadful second coming of Christ, who shall smite the earth and slay the wicked.  And yet, a little child shall lead them…  Who is this great King, this judge, who shall pronounce such terrible judgments, and yet have the innocency of a little child?  A king, mighty in battle, carrying rod and scepter, and yet with the innocence of an infant?  Prepare ye the way of the Lord, King and Child.  “The wolf shall dwell with the lamb.” — Fear the wolf, and place your hope in the Lamb of God.  “Justice shall lie down with mercy.”  Fear the justice of the King and place your hope in the mercy of the Child.  Let this little Child remind us of the days of joy that Christmas used to be.  And let us be as little children, in our hopes for something wonderful that’s coming, in our innocent belief in the true magic of that first Christmas night.