A homily for the Third Sunday of Advent (Gaudete), December 15, 2024
Zep 3:14-18a, Phil 4:4-7, Lk 3:10-18
One winter holiday evening about 30 years ago, our extended family decided to go out light-peeping. As my sister-in-law suggested a few nearby places to check out, her son asked, “Can we go see The Hinges?”
The Hinges?
Kathy laughed and explained that, when she first saw how one house was decorated, she said it was lit up like the Hinges of Hell.
The nickname stuck. Ever since then, several generations of my family have awarded the moniker to over-the-top displays.
And why shouldn’t we go over the top, especially on this day when we light the rose candle on the Advent wreath and proclaim Gaudete! Rejoice!
The violet and deep blue colors of most of Advent’s days and nights symbolically nudge us into reflecting on our lives and our relationships with God. Our faith, hope and charity. Our following of the Law of Love. Spiritual housecleaning. A personal audit of how well we’re using the skills and talents and intellect and emotional depth our abundantly generous Creator gave each of us.
But today, on the day before the last day to mail anything in time for Christmas (I’m just guessing about that part), we are invited to whoop it up a little. To pause. To relax our preparations. To rejoice. Be silly, even.
To look for The Hinges, or definitely for a computer genius’s display coordinated with music from Trans-Siberian Orchestra blasting through our car’s FM radio.
To rejoice in energy-efficient color-changing LED lights.
To rejoice in being led by those lights to see other people’s displays of joy.
To rejoice in being led to the joy of knowing — and being led by — the Light of Christ.
To rejoice in having the Light of Christ, given to us at Baptism, burn in our hearts and minds and souls eternally. Our never-ending guide, should we wisely choose to follow it always.
The shepherds keeping watch in the fields were led. And they rejoiced.
The Magi from distant lands were led. And they rejoiced.
Years later, the Apostles were led, as were the tens of thousands of other disciples whom Jesus fed with five barley loaves and two scrawny fish donated by a young boy. They all rejoiced that day and every day thereafter.
All over the Holy Land in those early years, people were led, and they rejoiced. For two millennia since then, humankind has been led by the Light of Christ, and despite our many failings, we have forged a civil society based on the Law of Love as taught and lived by Jesus, heir to the throne of David.
Yes, we are led.
Even after we return to the violet and blue motif next weekend one last time before Christmas, our wreath’s rose candle will shine brightly among the three purples. Our light of joy will glow amid our burning ponderings about hope, peace and love.
As disciples, as (we hope) the sheep Christ will place at his right side on Judgment Day because we cared for the least among us, we are challenged to remember that doing good for one another isn’t a burden. It’s a joy. Even a heavy lift done often enough makes us stronger; just ask any Schwarzenegger or MMA competitor.
I recall a fund-raiser’s plea from more than a half-century ago: “Don’t give ’til it hurts. Give ’til it feels good.”
She was asking for a few dollars from cash-strapped college kids. We couldn’t — and didn’t — say no.
Jesus is asking — daily, hourly, constantly — for gifts from our hearts, any ol’ way that each of us can craft them, wrap them and decorate them. To give ’til it feels incredibly good. Divinely good, even.
Let’s give those gifts joyfully, without the tiniest bit of, “Aw, do I hafta?”
Because, yeah, we hafta, but we also oughta wanna.
