The Beloved of the Father is coming to share His joy with you, a fullness of life that not even death can contain. Enslaved by the banality of the work-a-day world, our Deliverer did not create us to be in bondage to material pursuits. Calling us out of the exile of sin, He offers freedom from ignoble relationships or selfish insobriety. Oppressed, we have been weighed down by sorrows that no one was ever meant to carry. Now, He runs to us to make our burden light. He advances to bring us home, sons and daughters of His Father, by the very glory of Heaven.

The Mighty God draws near and it is no time to be timid but to lay hold of the promises made to us. The Sun of Righteous rises up in splendor, it is time to open the windows of our hearts to the radiance that justifies us. Our Champion will be delayed no longer: now is the time to rid ourselves of anything that stands in the way of God. Myriads of messengers go before Him to stir us out of our sluggishness and to encourage us on our way. If we once fed on fleshpots that cannot nourish freedom, now He is ready to feed us with Manna from Heaven.

The Word of the Father beckons us in the innermost sanctuary of our very being.  The anxieties of the moment do not deserve our allegiance. The concerns of the day are not worthy of our worship. Let our ears be attentive to His Wisdom. Let us make straight the pathway by reconciling with those whom you have offended. Let us knock down all prideful thoughts and fill in every bitter valley with forgiveness. The One who comes for us declares, “Do not fear to confess your sins and to do penance out of love for what I have done for you. Dark voids and difficult inadequacies do not have the last word. For Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness cannot overcome it.”

When I am too tired to collect my thoughts, when there are too many failures to confess, a simple movement of heart becomes my prayer. I ponder, or try to remember, the closeness of His promised Presence though I feel far from Him and feel Him not at all. Having fallen short of the mark yet again and weighed down by the day’s anxieties, holy fear forbids me to presume but commands me to rely on Divine Mercy. A wave of compunction wants to surface, but my mind is too sluggish to bear more than a feeble sigh. Even as I suffer this void of devotion unaware, a more simple movement takes hold. Familiar with my weakness, the Lamb who has come into the world tenderly sighs in my sigh and patiently joins my pathetic offering to His magnificent sacrifice of praise. Without my knowing how, the Good Shepherd is leading me out of self-occupation and into great silence – all He needs is a humble act of trust. In the shadow of so great and so undeserved a gift, I struggle to lower my head and bend my knees, but not in vain: His prayer gently moves my prayer when I can pray no more.

The hour is upon us to make straight the pathway of the Lord. It is time to straighten the crookedness of an indifferent life, to level pride’s mountains, and to carefully fill in the absences of love that ought to be there. We must wait no longer for broken friendships to be reconciled, for the bonds of married love to be renewed, for parents to take up again their dedication to their children, and for children to honor their parents anew. Tomorrow is too late. The time is here, now, for us to forgive our enemies and seek forgiveness from those we have offended.

Have we been impatient? Now is the time to take hold of ourselves and to choose to live for the joy of the Lord. Have we been harsh? Now is the time to submit our anger to the gentleness of God. Have we failed to speak for those who have no one to take their side? Now is the time to surrender our timidity to the Mighty Lord. Have we stewed over injury? It is not too late to plead mercy from the One who bore injury and bitterness for our sake. Have we sat in judgment over those who offended us? Now is the time to loosen the chains by which we have bound them, for the Vindicator draws near.

The Glory of God comes for us! Let us abandon anything that is not for the glory of God. Let us renounce what is merely convenient or comfortable – for what does love know of these? Let us leave behind discouragement and second thoughts – for what hope is found in what lies behind? Let us set aside our lack of faith – for how can doubt help us find the Face of God? Let us never settle for the conventional or sit on our laurels, for cowardliness never wins the day. Let us disavow what is not worthy of the high calling that we have received and dare embrace the new beginning that has been prepared for us.

Disguised in the lonely and lost, in the homeless and hungry, in the diseased and dying: the Judge of the Living and the Dead comes to us in the darkness of this Advent hour. It is not time to avoid His judgment. Let us go seek Him out so that His loneliness for human love might be relieved. Let us not fail to welcome the homeless One who knocks on the doors of hearts looking for a place to rest His head. He hungers and thirsts for justice, let us make no provision for sin in our lives or for indifference to our neighbor’s plight. The Mighty King identifies with the rejected and abandoned. He abides with the lowly, the vulnerable and the afflicted as their very possession- woe unto us if we will not relieve their plight when only they can give us the Heart of God. He cannot bear the thought of those who suffer alone, so He suffers with them hoping for our help.

Keeping watch and waiting for the Lord is part of the mystery of Advent Prayer.
If we keep faithful to the discipline of this Advent,
a grace that we do not expect will seize us
and we will find ourselves plunged into the most beautiful paradoxes:

With Divine Power, the Word is coming in a new way, and
we cannot presume we will recognize Him.

Just as fasting from physical food
  keeps us spiritually hungry for the Bread of Life, and

Interrupting our sleep for prayer
  helps our hearts find rest in the Prince of Peace, and

Pondering His teaching with our hearts
  humbles our intellect and baptizes our imagination in glory:

So too setting aside our daily routine for the sake of our neighbor
  aids us in our quest
For the One who has set aside everything for us. 

In the Season of Advent, we should allow ourselves to experience the mystery of John the Baptist. His voice rings in our conscience and when we hear it, God is able to make space in our hearts for the joy of Christmas. The Baptist’s voice sets a limit on the power and authority of the world in our lives. His voice reminds us of the truth about marriage and family, about faithfulness and sin, about God and our neighbor.

If we are comfortable, the Baptist makes us uneasy.  If we are arrogant, His voice humbles us. If we are confused, he is there to clarify. If we are discouraged, he helps us find the heart we need. This inner voice prepares for the Coming of Word of the Father. It is a voice that helps us recognize the truth that we need. If we do not hear this voice, it is easy to forget what it means to be, not only a Christian. but even decent human being. Such is the mission of the Baptist in the life of the Church and the plan of God.

We need to listen to the voice of John the Baptist anew. In our great wealth and power, we have become spiritually dull. In our self-conceit and self-interest, we live imprisoned in our egos – and remain powerless to help others find freedom.  In our fear of discomfort and inconvenience, we have robbed ourselves of the greatness of God’s love. The witness of the Baptist cuts through fear, self, wealth and power – and makes us vulnerable to the truth once again.

To listen to the voice of the Baptist requires us to withdraw into our hearts and be still.  It requires the confession of sin and the readiness to commit ourselves to reparation for what we have done and not done for others. It requires us to listen to the suffering of those often alienated and sometimes tormented souls that God has entrusted to us. The voice of the Baptist can be in the distressing outburst of an autistic child, or in the quiet sobs of a grieving widow. His voice whispers among the brokenhearted who have lost it all and it calls out among the cynical who risk being lost forever. This call to love requires patient vigilance.  To make space for this voice in our lives, we must welcome the inconvenience and discomfort it causes – this suffering is salvific.

None of this is comfortable, but it makes all the difference in life. If we let what this prophet says change our judgments about ourselves, the world, and God, a pathway to reconciliation, integrity and fulfillment is opened before us. Listening to the Baptist and heeding his call to repentance fills in valleys of indifference and levels mountains of sin. Our whole being and existence is made ready for the coming of Word of the Father into the reality of our lives – a suffering joy that not only makes life meaningful, but lifts up everyone around us.