Needed Traits to Receive the Lord #1: EAGERNESS

THE WORD IN ADVENT: 21st December

Song of Songs 2:8-14; Luke 1:39-45

Starting today the Word shall point out to us three needed traits to receive the Lord... Is it not for that we have been preparing ourselves? 

Looking forward to meet the love of your life - that is the kind of disposition required if we really want to behold the coming of the Lord. The Song of Songs expresses the longing that one has for the beloved. It's like that innocent sweet child who asked her father at the end of her busy day of birthday celebrations, "Daddy, when will my birthday come again?" 

Imagine you are sitting with a gift box well wrapped... How eager you would feel to open and see what waits inside... How many ways you would try to guess what is there - checking the weight, seeing if it moves, listening to the noise when you shake... All these are ways of atuning yourself to the gift, isn't it? 

It is one thing to know that the Lord would come; it is entirely another thing to go out and meet the Lord. To receive the Lord would mean to be eager to observe every way that the Lord chooses to encounter us, not missing out even on the smallest of the signs.

That eagerness, that longing, that yearning like the parched land for water, like the deer for the running streams, like the drowning person for a breath above the waters... that is the requirement if we really want to encounter the Lord who visits us this Christmas!

It would be important to ask overselves today, how eager are we to encounter the Lord in our daily expediences? 

CHRISTMAS NOVENA - DAY 5: O Key of David!

20th December: O Key of David

O Key of David and sceptre of the House of Israel;

you open and no one can shut;

you shut and no one can open:

Come and lead the prisoners from the prison house,

those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death.

Based on  Isaiah 22:22, Isaiah 9:7 and Isaiah 42:7, the reference is to the sovereignty of God's Reign. That the throne shall have no end is a Messianic prophecy that, God will be established the Lord of history! Liberation of the oppressed and the fullness of life of all, is the sign of the Reign.

The symbol is the key to signify the authority that the Lord has, in creating, changing and structuring the whole history. It also signifies the perfect control that God has over time and space, life and being, but all these understood not in terms of domination but a love that creates and sustains.

Evil is real! Let us not deceive ourselves thinking it is imaginary, no it is real and the evil one is prowling round like a roaring lion, looking for someone to eat. This is not a matter to be worried about, as long as we commit ourselves to the One key, which alone can open or close time, space or history - the Lord! Liberation, we think has to come from afar. But it is already given to us by the Lord, we just need to choose it! When we choose the key to liberation, we choose liberation!

The prayer is for liberation... to be led towards fullness of life that is the experience of the Reign on earth. It is also a commitment to work towards, to contribute one's might and mite, to choose with all our heart and our strength, the Lord, the key to fullness, towards establishing the Reign here and now!