Homily for Third Sunday of Advent

Tell John what you see and hear was what Jesus said to the disciples of John when they asked Jesus if he was the ONE - the Christ, the Messiah.  I began to think about that statement as a question: What do you see and hear happening?  What do YOU see and hear happening here in the parish, in the Church? Jesus sends them back to John with that response, there is healing, restoration, proclamation of the Good News. He then tells them:  "Blessed is the one who takes no offense in me.” Obviously there will be many who will take offense in Jesus. I suspect that some that will take offense in me! I am sure that there are those who have been offended by some of the things that I have said over the years.  Maybe some are even offended because they might think I have a hidden agenda. 

The truth is, I do have an agenda.  It is only the agenda of the Gospel. That is simply to bring people, to bring you, into a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, to share with you the healing, restoration, and Good News that I have experienced.  I have been reading a new book, entitled Forming Intentional Disciples. The author of the book writes on the meaning of discipleship, not simply for priests and religious, rather for all people serious about their faith. In the first chapter the author offers some startling statistics. One of those is the huge percentage of people have left the Catholic Church, not because of scandal, not because of money, RATHER, because they seek and cannot (or do not) find in the Catholic Church an  understanding, an experience of a personal God. There is no sense of, no possibility for personal relationship with God.  “We are here, and God is there and there is a sort of wall between the two that can never be crossed.”  There is nothing further from the truth of Gospel.  In fact the whole reason that Jesus came to earth was so that we COULD know God in a very personal, intimate way!

So after sending the disciples of John away, Jesus turns and asks the gathered CROWD, “why did you go out to desert to see John?” (Who would want to even go out into that desert - it is desolate, very desolate!).  I thing they recognized that John gave them something that no one else was giving them, a personal encounter with God.  Think about John’s message of repentance.  A message not of (beating my chest) “Oh, woe is me a sinner!” rather a message that is of one who will come to restore a broken relationship. By sending disciples back to John, "tell them what you see and hear," Jesus is SAYING, “John is point you to the ONE who wants to bring healing and reiteration in to your lives so that you can have a personal relationship with God. I am that One.”

NOW, in and through the person of Jesus Christ you can have a personal relationship with God, because he wants to have a personal relationship with each of us.  It is a relationship that is rooted in healing and hope. THIS IS THE GOOD NEWS that Jesus proclaims! 

How do enter into this personal relationship?  All you have to do is ask!  Ask HIM to come in and be a part of your life.