“Be prepared, for at an hour you do not expect, the Son of Man will come” (Mt 24:44).
With these words, our Lord helps to prepare us for his coming. As we begin a new liturgical year today, the First Sunday of Advent, allow me to reflect on the season of Advent and the Gospel of Matthew (from which we will hear extensively during this liturgical year).
We human beings cannot live without hope. Unlike the rest of the animals in this world, we are blessed with the ability to recognize the future and to realize that our actions have some effect in shaping it. This is such an essential element of humanity that we cannot live without it. We must have something to live for, something to which we look forward. Once there is nothing to live for, we give up and die. But, we can find all sorts of things to live for and we can hope for so many different things that will give us reason to live. Whether it be as close to us as living for our children and grandchildren or as global as trying to make the world a little better or as simple as eagerly anticipating our next vacation, these all give us a reason to live, something for which we can hope.
One of the reasons we Christians read the Old Testament during the Advent season is to learn where we should place our hope as followers of Christ. The people of the Old Testament times had great hopes. As we hear in today’s first reading from the Book of the Prophet Isaiah, they believed that “in the days to come” the Lord would fulfill the promise he had made to the house of Israel, when “the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established as the highest mountain and raised above the hills. All nations shall stream toward it” (Is 2:1-2). They were looking for that day when God would establish Israel as the greatest of all nations and lead all people toward his kingdom here on earth.
Our hope is a little different than the hope of the people of the Old Testament since we live in the age of fulfillment. The coming of Jesus in history has brought about the beginning of the Kingdom of God. So, our hope is for its complete fulfillment as Jesus prepares to come again. As we celebrate the Season of Advent, let us turn our hope to the fulfillment of God’s plan, which will bring lasting peace and joy to our lives!
Beginning this Sunday, we will begin to hear from the Gospel of Matthew throughout the Sundays of this liturgical year. Each of the years in the Church’s three-year Sunday cycle features one of the three Synoptic Gospels. Year A, which begins today, features the Gospel of Matthew, year B features the Gospel of Mark, and year C – which ended last Sunday – features the Gospel of Luke. This cycle allows us to hear each gospel, which presents our Lord’s teachings in slightly different ways since each gospel was written to different audiences at different times under different circumstances and for different reasons. The Gospel of John is also featured on certain Sundays throughout the year as well as on the first Sundays of Lent and during the Easter season.
The Gospel of Matthew is generally thought to be written at least after 70AD and probably after 80AD (40 to 50 years after our Lord’s death and Resurrection) in Antioch, Syria. Like the gospels of Mark and Luke, it was written as the eye-witnesses of our Lord were dying and they wanted to preserve the important message of salvation they had received from him while he was in their midst. Like the other gospels, the text of the Gospel of Matthew does not identify the author. Although it was traditionally thought to be Matthew, also known as Levi, the tax collector-turned-apostle, modern scripture scholars identify him as either a Jewish Christian or a Gentile Christian, not an eye-witness to Jesus’ ministry. Intended for Jewish converts to Christianity who were being persecuted by both Jews and Romans, it seeks to encourage them to be confident that Jesus is, indeed, the Messiah, the fulfillment of the Hebrew Scriptures prophecies.
As we begin this new liturgical year, let us listen carefully to all the readings – and especially the Gospel of Matthew – which are proclaimed to prepare us for the Kingdom of God! May they encourage us in our doubt and strengthen us in our faith in the Lord.