The testimony of John the Baptist

It is the third Sunday of Advent and it is also known in our Liturgical Calendar as "Gaudete Sunday" which is a Latin word, which means "Rejoice." Of course all Christians believe that we must all rejoice when we learn that the Messiah will be coming on Christmas Day, which is just a week from now. For us Catholics, Christmas time is a season for joyous celebration of that Divine event that happened two thousand years ago, when God fulfilled his promise to send a Messiah to redeem us from our sinful ways.

It is also significant to read in today's second reading, which comes from 1 Thessalonians 5: 16-24. "Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. Do not quench the Spirit. Do not despise the words of prophets, but test everything; hold fast to what is good; abstain from every form of evil. May the God of peace himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do this."

This reading tells us to stay firm in our prayers and not to stop praying. Above all, never to despise what the prophets have said for the God of peace will sanctify us. This is why Christmas time is not just a time for shopping and giving or getting of gifts but a time to commune with God in prayer for God himself allowed his only begotten son to shed his divinity and become human just like all of us except in matters of sin.

The coming of our Lord Jesus Christ to this world is a momentous event in human history for before the coming of the Messiah, for a long time now, man and woman were banished from Paradise because of the disobedience of Adam and Eve. It was only through the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ on the cross that we have all been restored to the friendship of God and regained our paradise lost.

Today's gospel reading comes from John 1: 6-8, 19-28. It is about the Testimony of John the Baptist, whose main role is to announce to the world the coming of the Messiah, which was written by the Prophet Isaiah and handed down to generation after generation.

"6 There was a man sent from God whose name was John.7 He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe.

8 He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light

19 And this is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, "Who are you?" 20 He confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, "I'm not the Christ," 21 And they asked him, "What then? Are you Elijah?" He said, "I am not." "Are you the Prophet?" and he answered, "No." 22 So they said to him, "Who are you? We need to answer to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?"

23 He said, "I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, "Make straight the way of the Lord,' as the prophet Isaiah said." 24 Some Pharisees were also sent and they asked him, "Then why are you baptizing, if you are neither the Christ or Elijah, nor the prophet?" John answered them, "I baptize you with water, but among you stands one you do not know, 27 the one who is coming after me, the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie. 28 This happened in Bethany across the Jordan where John was Baptizing."

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When the Jews sent priests and Levites to John who was baptizing in the Jordan River to ask him who he was, it would have been easy for John to say that he was either Elijah or the Messiah because he already gained a huge following from Jews all over Judea, including Jerusalem. But John's humility only gave them truthful answers that he was merely the precursor of the one who was coming who was greater than him.

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