Advent Week III – Expectation

You Are The One To Come

Expectation & Hope

  

The Desert and the 

Parched Land will Exult;

The Steppe will

Rejoice and Bloom.

They will Bloom with 

Abundant Flowers, and 

Rejoice with Joyful Song.

Isaiah 35: 1-6a, 10

Rejoice Again I Say Rejoice

God Comes To Save Us

Advent is a time of yearning and waiting for the Promised Messiah.  A time of hope and expectation that the long-desired one will come to save us. We have just celebrated the feast of Mary’s Immaculate Conception, the one who is sinless and chosen to bring Life and Salvation into our world.  And John the Baptist appears in the readings as the Messenger of God, proclaiming that Jesus is the One, so be strong and do not fear, He is the One who is to come and will set us free. 

The third candle of the  Advent  Wreathe is Rose, a color of JOY.  Darkness increases in the world and in our lives at this time, so the message this week is to Rejoice! Jesus is near and this ‘Good News is JOY for all the world.  Jesus is the One, the Long-Desired One who is faithful, who gives sight to the blind, who loves the just and protects strangers, who sustains the fatherless and the widow, who reigns forever.

During this third week of Advent we light three candles, two purple and one rose/pink candle. We pray that the growing light of the One to Come will appear at Christmas and become Manifested to all nations during the celebration of Epiphany.

How will we Prepare and Celebrate? 

Read the Word of God, especially the Prophet Isaiah and the Gospel Passages of the Birth of Christ.

Foster relationships of joy, hopefulness.

Practice being hopeful and joyful. Give a surprise of ‘good news’ to others.

Expect God’s Mercy and Salvation and live this sharing it with others.

Do one thing each day this week that fills you with joy.

Recite many times a day the mantra, Come, O Long-Desired One, Come!

Come,  O Long Desired One,  Come