THE BEAUTY OF KNOWING GOD. (Homily for Tuesday of the 1st Week in Advent, Year C.)


Bible Study: Isaiah 11, 1 to 10. And Luke 10, 21 to 24.


In today’s Gospel passage, we encounter a literally joyful Jesus so happy about the fact that his disciples were given the privilege of knowing him as God. First he prayed to God saying: “I thank thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to babes; yea, Father, for such was thy gracious will.” Luke 10, 21. Then he turned towards the people themselves and said: “Blessed are the eyes which see what you see! For I tell you that many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.” Luke 10, 23 to 24.

We should consider ourselves privileged to be Christians and followers of Jesus who is THE WAY, THE TRUTH AND THE LIFE. To be a Christian is to have the way, the truth and life right in your hands. Yes, Jesus is the way, only by following him closely are we going to get the best things life has to offer. Jesus is the truth, he is the answer to all of life’s challenging questions. Jesus is the Life, only in him do we find true life and by true life, I mean health for our souls.

Many are physically alive but because they lack Jesus, they are dead within them yet they do not even know it. But for us who know Jesus, we are truly lucky, because we are the ones who have come to touch true happiness, we are the ones who experience that mysterious peace which Jesus spoke about when he said: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you.” John 14, 27. We are the ones who know that peace does not depend on how much money we have, how much power we have in the world or how readily we can find bodily pleasure.

We are ones who know that these very things which the people of the world crave for with endless pursuit are the same things which bring them sadness, restlessness and totally unfulfilled. We are the ones who defy Adam’s Smith theory that man is an insatiable creature because by our closeness to Jesus Christ, we have come to find satisfaction in Life. By living out the beatitudes, we have come to quench our unruly appetites. By refusing to live by bread alone but by every word God has spoken, we have come to discover a spring of water welling up inside of us such that as Jesus told the Samaritan woman, we do not have to keep going again and again to the well of earthly life to draw water.

Yes, we must consider ourselves lucky to know Jesus. The world does not know Jesus and that is why they look at us as weird people, they do not know what we enjoy. Truly, Isaiah’s prophecy in today’s first reading give us a clue to this mysterious joy and peace that knowing Jesus personifies. As Isaiah says: “The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid, and the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall feed; their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The sucking child shall play over the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder's den. They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea.” Isaiah 11, 6 to 9.

Physically speaking, these things seem impossible yet they are real. The world cannot understand how the wolf can dwell with the lamb, how the leopard shall lie with the kid. In the same way, the world does not understand how we who say we have picked up our cross to follow Jesus are happy, contented and at peace. The world cannot and will never understand how we who have renounced the best it claims to offer are experiencing true peace and fulfilment in life. Aren’t we lucky?

Let us Pray:
Lord Jesus, you are my peace, may I never depart from you, the way, the truth and life. Amen.


Good morning. Be Happy. Live Positive. Have Faith. It is well with you. HAPPY NEW MONTH. Welcome to December

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