A Sermon for Gaudete Sunday, Dec. 11th

Gaudete in Domino semper: iterum dico, gaudete. “Rejoice in the Lord always. I say again, rejoice!” Modestia vestra nota sit omnibus hominibus. Dominus prope est. “Let your gentleness”—your forbearance, your modesty—“be noted by all people. The Lord is near!” These are the words that give today its name—Gaudete Sunday, "Joyful Sunday." Since at least 750 AD (and probably for centuries before that date) Benedictine monks have begun Mass on the third Sunday of Advent by chanting this marvelous command from the fourth chapter of St. Paul’s letter to the Philippians: Be joyful in the Lord! On “Joyful” Sunday Christians around the world light the pink Advent candle and preparations for the great Feast of our Lord’s Incarnation take on a more festive tone. Today we are on a mission from God to “party”! “I say again, rejoice!”

Yet Paul’s apostolic summons to joy is immediately followed by an exhortation to gentleness, meekness, humility. We find the same curious pairing in today’s Gospel lesson. John the Baptist tells his followers that the sound of the bridegroom’s voice—the revelation of God’s Messiah—fills his heart with joy. The Baptist has been looking forward to this for years—in the recent past he has been “crying out in the wilderness” about it. John’s charismatic preaching and outlandish mannerisms made him a sort of first-century “rock star.” Crowds flocked from all over Palestine to hear him denounce their sinfulness and proclaim “the One who is to come.” John’s success as a preacher is astonishing when you think about the content of his message. But even more amazingly, the Baptist was proven right! Behold the Lamb of God! Behold Him who takes away the sin of the world! It actually happened! The Christ really came! No doubt John’s heart was filled to bursting with joy. But there is no gloating on John’s part—no “I told you so.” Instead John the Baptist’s response to the vindication of his entire ministry is: “He must increase, and I must decrease.” A greater One than John has come and a new age has dawned. The Baptist wants only to slip quietly off the stage. Rejoicing over the Lord’s immanent victory and cultivating humility in His Church—these are two touchstones of Advent that John the Baptist models for us this morning.

The monks in the early Middle Ages who first gave us “Joyful” Sunday understood something important: Advent is about paradox. In two weeks we will celebrate the piercing of the veil between Heaven and earth, when the sovereign Lord of the cosmos became one of His own creatures, united with us in joy and suffering by His own human flesh. We shall hear the familiar story again, a story that never grows old with retelling. God’s mighty arms, accustomed to swirling galaxies, will be bound in swaddling clothes. God the Son, serenaded from the dawn of creation by choirs of angels, will doze to his mother’s lullaby. New Life entering our world so that Death may no longer abide here--how can we not weep for joy at the very thought of such divine Love? How fulfilling it is to contemplate such beauty, such awesome grace! That pink candle reminds us that it will come very soon.

But the joy of “Joyful Sunday” is much greater than simply knowing we are two weeks away from midnight Mass. Advent is about far more than that! Two thousand years ago John the Baptist reminded the people of Judea that God is faithful to His promises of redemption, and I shall do the same this morning. God’s Holy Word promises that a day will soon come when our Lord will once again make His home among mortals. Every knee in Heaven, and on earth, and under the earth will bow to Him and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. The glory of God will light up the world and the nations will walk by its light. And the God-who-is-with-us will wipe every tear from our eyes. “Death will be no more; mourning and crying will be no more.” The entire Universe will gaze in adoration upon Christ’s radiant scars and know that nothing will ever triumph over the boundless Love of God. Perfect joy. Perfect peace. Soon, my dear brothers and sisters, it will come very soon. Today’s pink candle reminds us of that, as well.

Unfortunately, the fallen world which you and I inhabit scoffs at such thoughts. The same voices that shouted down the prophets of ancient Israel and taunted our Lord Jesus on the cross still call out today—“realistic” voices, cynical voices, voices of despair and emptiness. “You don’t really believe all that baloney in the Bible, do you?” they ask. “If your Christ really is coming back why is He taking so long?” If only these sad people could know the joy that you and I feel at Christmas and Easter! If they could comprehend just a fraction of the eternal glory that lay in that manger at Bethlehem, if they could see the love of God pouring out of Christ’s wounds on Calvary, if they realized that the power of sin and death has been crushed by the stone rolled away on Easter morning, their doubts would be quieted and their hearts would be opened. You and I have to tell them. We must tell them that God is faithful and just, and His promises are true. But more than that: you and I must show them the Love of God made manifest two millennia ago in the Babe of Bethlehem.

Advent is not simply about preparing ourselves for the glories of the Christ Mass. It is also about preparing ourselves to be living, breathing icons of the divine love that shows forth from the Nativity, the Crucifixion, and the Resurrection. Christ, the perfect icon of God’s love, must increase within us, if we are to "bring the Lord near" an age that desperately needs Him. St. Paul pairs modesty--gentleness--forbearance--with rejoicing as a testimony to all men, a means of showing forth Christ in our fallen world. Our joy and the gentleness of Christ in which you and I partake--together they can draw the lost to Christ. And if the lost meet Christ in our gentleness, their darkness might finally lift. And what a great cause for rejoicing that would be! For them it would be dawn in the New Jerusalem. I say again, rejoice!

So the pink candle burns this Joyful Sunday, stoking our desire for that night two weeks from now when we will gather here to celebrate the coming of Christ’s light into the world so long ago at Bethlehem. The “joyful” candle also reflects our longing for that glorious day when all darkness will finally be put to flight, when “the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the archangel's call and the sound of the trumpet of God.” But the candle’s small, steady flame also reminds us that Advent is not simply about the distant past and the indeterminate future. We worship the Holy One “who was, and is, and is to come.” Between the wonders of the Incarnation and the Second Coming our God has not stopped coming to His people. We have not been left as orphans. God the Holy Spirit, the sacred fire at the heart of Christ’s Church, abides with us, giving us life and growth, indwelling us at our baptism, sanctifying us in our walk through this world, and empowering us for service to the Kingdom. And in a few moments God our Savior will make Himself present for us in the most tangible of ways as Christ’s sacrifice at Calvary is re-presented here on this holy altar and our Lord shares His precious Body and Blood with those He has redeemed. He comes now to offer His very own life to us. Now that is most certainly an Advent worth celebrating!

And so, my brothers and sisters rejoice. I say again, rejoice! “May the God of peace himself sanctify you wholly; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ. He who calls you is faithful, and he will do it.” In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.