The Prince Of Peace Comes In Glory And Majesty
A prophetic look at a time ahead
“They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks;
one nation shall not raise the sword against another, nor shall they train for war again.
O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord!” From Isaiah ch. 2
Therefore, stay awake! For you do not know on which day your Lord will come.
Be sure of this: if the master of the house had known the hour of night when the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and not let his house be broken into.
So too, you also must be prepared,for at an hour you do not expect, the Son of Man will come.” From Matthew ch. 24
Today is the first Sunday of Advent. We can concentrate on the word “Come” for this first of the four Advent big themes.
The liturgy starts today with those verses from Isaiah chapter 2, which are inscribed on the walls of the United Nations building in New York. Can we work for peace and plowing the land for food for all? Rather than be at war? Isaiah 2 also was inscribed in the heart of President Abe Lincoln. I often hear this passage with reference to Lincoln.
Naturally, we all desire peace because, it is really the destiny of our servants of God. We serve a God who will bring the Peace. He will bring a day of reckoning for everything, and a day of fulfillment for everything good. The weapons of fighting can be laid down and hands can be joined together by all peoples.
It is this peace that we pray for, and we expect that Jesus has already sown a spirit of prince within our hearts, that we would hope could go forth to reach the world through our combined witness of all the Church.
So we come to the season of that expectation. The term Advent comes from two Latin words Ad-ventus, which simply means “to arrive” or Ad-venire, meaning “to come.” For all Christians, and Catholics in particular, it means expecting the Lord’s coming. Advent marks the beginning of the Church’s new liturgical calendar. It is a four-week preparation period leading up to Christmas. So, on this first Sunday of Advent, the Church enjoins us to rejoice because that night of long pilgrimage to God’s eternal city of peace will soon be fruitful. The reign of peace is soon at hand.
Of course, the meaning of the phrase “soon at hand” means that it will eventually come, and the day draws ever nearer, but it has been much of a wait for it to occur. That wait likely is because of us, and our not being ready for reception of the Lord’s plan. It is not a delay because of any dilly-dallying of The Lord and His plans with us.
So—How do we hang up our swords of fighting and insistence and selfishness in this life?
Back when President Lincoln read those words, of plowshares now at work rather than guns ablazing, Abe just was hoping for an end to the Civil War of this nation. It eventually came. The fight of north vs. south was over. Yet he was a martyr in the cause to have it come about.
The Gospel today is about waking up. It’s not a wake from bed, but from a sleepy or lazy Christianity.
We have been accused by some Christian commenters as being a too comfortable Church of today. There are souls to be saved, and work to be done, but it doesn’t necessarily get done. Maybe we should hang up our lazy boys.
The Message of Advent shouts forth how we must wake up and receive all that Christ wants to pour into our lives, as that of being His witness to the world and as being a light to the dark world. While the world goes off in disharmony and more divisions, we the Church need to do the work of harmonizing and uniting.
Secularism and humanism is doing a lot of harm on our American nation. Decisions are being made or were made in some recent past times, that is far away from our practice of a Godly life
here in the USA. To usher in this reign of Christ’ Peace successfully, both the second reading and gospel call us to be ready and awake. Paul, announces clearly to us of the closeness of our Savior, the Prince of peace:“Our salvation is even nearer than He was when we were converted.” He also reminds us that:“The time has come.”
We have a moment in time here.
The time St. Paul means here is not the earthly time (“chronos”), but God’s time (“kairos”). It is the God’s appointed time to save his own people, and to restore peace to all troubled hearts, families, businesses, and nations. Hence, Paul advices us: “Let us live decently as people do in day time… no warring or jealous. Let your armor be the Lord Jesus Christ.”
Then, the gospel admonishes us to“Stay awake!” It is very important because, this is a season of great awakening, preparation, and of great expectation of the birth of the Messiah. It is a season that will definitely culminate in an outburst of great joy. It is, a season of prayer when all Christians should be turning to God in prayer.
We know that Jesus was the promised Messiah. He came to the people of Israel, as He said He would. As we remember that Advent time called the Old Testament, we know that it all ended when Jesus finally came on the world’s scene.
Now we live in the New Covenant or New Testament time. He promises to come to the world in Glory, so with Jesus’ expectation to gloriously appear one day, we try to stay awake to that possibility of it being in our day.
I recall a time when people in a parish of mine were caught off guard. It was in the first decade of the 2000’s. I think it was 2003 and I think it was from the storm Isabel. I was living in a parish with a south border that was the Potomac River. The waters rose up so high that it flooded homes to their second floor which were waterfront ones. Significant damage was done. The flood walls to prevent damage was not enough protection.
One of my parishioners had word of its coming on to hit his shoreline, but had nowhere to go, so he took food and his pet and valuables to his second story of the house. Through the storm he had no trouble staying awake, as he was quite scared of losing not only all of his hours, but also his life. He survived it.
It was something that he knew could happen, that with him living on the riverside. Yet it never seemed that such a storm effect could happen. Yet it did.
I think that he’ll never be unprepared again for such a surge to his property.
But that it just a local place in a riverspot, but the Word says that something will come upon the world to knock us silly. What will it be? It is already occurring a bit?
Will your faith survive it? A comfortable faith won’t survive a storm, bur a readied one will.