GOOD OUT OF EVIL

 A SERMON FOR THE 4TH SUNDAY IN ADVENT

If there’s one lesson in life that it takes many years to appreciate, it’s that God always manages to pull something good out of every bad thing that happens.  So often, our gut reaction to something horrible befalling us is one of profound sorrow, frustration, sometimes anger, even anger at God for allowing it to happen.  Experience teaches us, however, that no matter how bad a situation might become, it is always and without exception, for the greater good.  Sometimes that greater good is meant for us personally; for example, ill health.  Often it takes a serious illness or accident to draw us closer to God as we’re reminded of the fragility of our human body and the true happiness that we can find only in the eternal afterlife.  Other times, the evil that takes place is for the good of society at large; we see this happening right now in politics, where the topsy-turvy thinking of the crazed far-left is finally provoking the long-awaited reaction, a return to common sense by the public at large.  We can only hope that this trend is able to continue, and that the good may eventually triumph.

Sometimes, though, we have a really hard time envisioning God’s plan.  Sometimes, he permits certain things too awful to contemplate.  At times like these, we must, we simply must rely on God’s providence, trying to remain peaceful in the thought that he knows what he is doing and that some good will eventually result, perhaps invisible and unknown to ourselves, that will balance out the awfulness of our own devastating experience.  It takes a lot to resign ourselves to God’s will at times like this, but it is an important aspect of our life, which is, after all, nothing but a test of our own free will and its submission to the will of God.  To fail this test can lead to a loss of hope in this life, even despair.  The consequences are even more dire for the life to come.

We are just six days away from Christmas, so you may wonder what all these somber reflections have to do with the festive season that is now almost upon us.  I mention it, because we have in the persons of our blessed Lady and St. Joseph a striking example of how we are to act when things don’t go the way we plan, and when God seems to take away any fleeting moments of happiness we might have, replacing them with fear, anxiety, discomfort and pain.  These are not things we like to mention when we’re thinking about the beautiful Christmas story and the peace and joy that go with that image of the Christ Child in his manger.  Yet it is precisely this happy Christmas scene that makes sense of the sufferings our Lady and St. Joseph had to endure.  So many sufferings, and yet, such a wonderful result.  The stable of Bethlehem is likewise our inspiration to pass those tests we endure and commit ourselves unreservedly to God’s will.

In the case of the Holy Family, let’s consider that our Lady was just about ready to deliver her Child, all is ready in the family home of Nazareth to welcome the Newborn Son.  Then suddenly, like a kick in the stomach, “there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed.”  That meant that every head of family, wherever he may be, had to travel back to his own city to pay the tax.  Now St. Joseph was “of the house and lineage of David” and so, at this critical time, not only in his family’s life, but indeed in the larger context of the Redemption, he was forced to take his spouse, in her ninth month, on the long journey from Nazareth in Galilee all the way to Bethlehem in Judea.  In those days, a trip of this length was nothing like what we have today.  There were no rest areas on the way, no motels, no supermarkets to buy provisions, no nice clean bathrooms like we have in the gas stations these days.  Back then it was a real test of endurance at the best of times, but when one of your passengers is all set to have a baby, it most have been the source of enormous anxiety for the good St. Joseph.

When they arrived in Bethlehem, it was only to find that the town was packed with other unhappy travelers, all there for the same reason, called by the Emperor to hand over their money and pay their taxes.  The inns were all full, and there was nowhere except a poor stable for St. Joseph to provide shelter for his family.  It was in the middle of winter, cold and nasty, but it was all he could find, in the straw amidst the farm animals, for the Son of God to be born into this world.  There followed some momentary joy as Mary successfully delivers this Son to a world that is almost completely ignorant of the great event.  But then, the arrival of the three Wise Men a few days later brings with it an angel’s warning that King Herod was seeking the newborn Christ Child to kill him, and so St. Joseph’s journeying resumes.  This time, he has to take his spouse west into Egypt, another long, hard journey, this time with an Infant, and in fear of his life.

There are many aspects of the Christmas story where we wonder how on earth the Holy Family managed to survive.  The physical aspects were bad enough, but the psychological implications of their duty to the Son of God himself must have outweighed everything else, and been a terrible burden on the Mother and Foster Father.  And yet, out of these anxious times came something far more wonderful than the sum of all their fears—the arrival in the world of a Saviour, the expectation of the nations, in whom would be the deliverance of all mankind from his iniquities.

Our Lady and St. Joseph were wise and holy enough to recognize that, out of their own sacrifices and tribulations, God would draw a Good that would be far beyond the evils they suffered.  This faith in God made their troubles bearable, as they put their trust in their Infant Son, upon him whose yoke is easy and his burden light.  They were able to endure these burdens in the knowledge of the great good that would come from them, and they are our role model in the times of trouble we now endure.  They would have gone through even more hardship if God had so permitted, and so must we if and when the time comes.  As we approach the great anniversary of these blessed events, we should set our minds to follow the Holy Family in their journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem, and beyond to Egypt—in other words, wherever Divine Providence takes us—ever conscious of what makes sense of it all, namely that “Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counseller, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.”