Sunday Reflection: 4th Sunday of Advent, Cycle C

1^st Reading      Micah 5:1-4a
2^nd Reading     Hebrews 10:5-10
Gospel             Luke 1:39-45

As we are about to end the Advent Season, we are reminded of the right attitude of the one who waits for the coming of the Lord. The Gospel gives us the image of the Blessed Virgin Mary as the best model of how a Christian ought to wait the person he or she serves. Knowing one’s own vocation and dignity makes one humble.

Mary’s attitude of humility in the face of a sublime dignity as Mother of God makes us reflect on our own attitude when we are in an exalted status. Does our position make us humble or proud? The example of the Blessed Mother is an invitation for us to always look up to the Lord who puts us in the position we are in. Humility is an expression of accepting the reality that what we have reached is not purely because of our personal strength and power. Rather it is God’s grace acting in our lives that makes us reach the fullness of our being.

The visitation of Mary is also an invitation to respond to God’s will with urgency. Mary’s response to the Angel’s revelation about Elizabeth’s condition was to visit her with haste. She visited her not as a curious outsider, but as a witness of the same graciousness of God. Her haste was of an interior disposition that makes her act with zeal and fervor.

We, on our part, have we been in such haste when the Lord calls us to a certain mission? What kind of attitude do we have after finding out God’s will for us? The Letter to the Hebrews reminds us of how Christ Himself, the One we are waiting to come again, obeyed the will of the Father. Jesus said, “Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me; in holocausts and sin offerings you took no delight. Then I said, ‘As is written of me in the scroll, behold, I come to do your will, O God.’” Christ’s coming to the world is to be a sin offering for us. His coming in the flesh is an invitation towards faithfulness to God’s will in whatever circumstance we are.

The difficulties of life that Mary, Elizabeth, and Jesus are as nothing. They have lived always for the Lord, and they are there to point to us the way towards living faithfully the Christian life. Mary responded with love and urgency to God’s revelation; Elizabeth was patiently waiting for God’s mercy and generosity to them; and Jesus took to Himself all the pains that we would have to bear to pay for our offenses to God.

The Prophet Micah prophesied of Jesus, as the Shepherd who will bring about peace to God’s people, as He is the power of God present in our midst, “He shall take his place as shepherd by the strength of the LORD, by the majestic name of the LORD, his God; And they shall dwell securely, for now his greatness shall reach to the ends of the earth: he shall be peace.”