First reading Isaiah 48:17-19
If you had been alert to my commandments, your happiness would have been like a river
Thus says the Lord, your redeemer, the Holy One of Israel:
I, the Lord, your God, teach you what is good for you,
I lead you in the way that you must go.
If only you had been alert to my commandments,
your happiness would have been like a river,
your integrity like the waves of the sea.
Your children would have been numbered like the sand,
your descendants as many as its grains.
Never would your name have been cut off or blotted out before me.
Responsorial Psalm 1:1-4,6
Anyone who follows you, O Lord, will have the light of life.
Happy indeed is the man
who follows not the counsel of the wicked;
nor lingers in the way of sinners
nor sits in the company of scorners,
but whose delight is the law of the Lord
and who ponders his law day and night.
He is like a tree that is planted
beside the flowing waters,
that yields its fruit in due season
and whose leaves shall never fade;
and all that he does shall prosper.
Not so are the wicked, not so!
For they like winnowed chaff
shall be driven away by the wind:
for the Lord guards the way of the just
but the way of the wicked leads to doom.
Gospel Matthew 11:16-19
They heed neither John nor the Son of Man
Jesus spoke to the crowds: ‘What description can I find for this generation? It is like children shouting to each other as they sit in the market place:
“We played the pipes for you,
and you wouldn’t dance;
we sang dirges,
and you wouldn’t be mourners.”
‘For John came, neither eating nor drinking, and they say, “He is possessed.” The Son of Man came, eating and drinking, and they say, “Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.” Yet wisdom has been proved right by her actions.’
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Move to God’s tune
In today’s gospel, Jesus spoke about the responses of the people towards His ministry and that of John the Baptist. They were indifferent, like the children playing in the marketplace who would neither dance to joyful songs nor mourn to sad hymns. The people of Jesus’ generation rejected and chose to be deaf to Jesus and John the Baptist. For them, John the Baptist was “possessed” and Jesus was “a glutton and a drunkard” and “a friend of tax collectors and sinners”.
We can be like the people who rejected John the Baptist and Jesus. We are deaf to the life-giving message of Jesus and unmoved by the different ways God comes into our lives. “I, the Lord, your God. Teach you what is good for you, I lead you in the way you must go. If only you had been alert to my commandments, your happiness would have been like a river…” (First reading). May this Advent be a time when we grow to become more attentive to God’s presence and move to His rhythm.
Reflective question:
How can I be more open to God’s ways and walk to where He wants to lead me?
How can I be more open to God’s ways and walk to where He wants to lead me?
Acknowledgment: Reflections are based on “Prayer for Living: The Word of God for Daily Prayer Year B” by Sr Sandra Seow FMVD.
