Have we really received Jesus?
My dear friends,
My dear brethren,
The Church, during the time of preparation for the feast of Christmas—in Advent—consid ers three different ways in which Our Lord comes to us.
The first coming is that which we celebrate especially today, on the feast of Christmas: Our Lord’s coming among men, through the intermediary of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary.
The second is found in the readings of the Church in Advent: the coming of Our Lord at the end of time to judge all men.
Lastly, the third coming of Jesus is unique to each one of us: the coming of Jesus into our souls.
And ultimately, if we meditate a little on the readings of the Church over these weeks, we realize that the most important of these comings is the one that concerns us individually. For if Our Lord chose to come to earth, it was for each one of us, for our salvation. And if Our Lord is to come in the clouds of heaven to judge us, He is coming to see what we have done with the means He gave us to attain salvation.
FIRST COMING: BETHLEHEM
The celebration of Christmas is the feast that dwells in a special way on the coming of Jesus to Bethlehem and imparts marvelous lessons. For when Our Lord comes in the clouds of heaven, He will ask: “What did you do with all the things I gave you? How did you receive Me
dur ing your earthly pilgrimage? How did you receive Me in the messages I sent? How did you receive My apostles? How did you receive My Sacrifice and My sacraments?”
And at that time, what will be our answer? Dear brethren, may our reply be that first given by the Most Blessed Virgin Mary. How did Mary receive Jesus? With thanksgiving. As I was telling you yesterday, she sang her Magnifi cat. She received Him with all of her soul when she pronounced her Fiat.
God knows that she had the necessary and proper dispositions to receive Jesus worthily.
Joseph too, after his hesitations about the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, was granted extraordinary graces to receive Jesus and Mary.
The story of Bethlehem is truly marvelous in this sense. When we meet the shepherds, to whom the angels announce the coming of Jesus, what do the shepherds do? They could have said, as perhaps many of us would have said, “But it’s dark, it’s cold… we don’t know the way… we won’t be able to find Him…”
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They might have found many reasons not to seek out Jesus.
But no. That is not what the shepherds did. The Gospel tells us they arose and “they came with haste” –festinantes—they has tened to find Jesus. They found Him and they sang His praises.
And we can imagine that they gave Jesus a gift, perhaps a lamb, a sign of what St. John the Baptist would say later on, “Behold the Lamb of God.” Perhaps they gave Him some of the things they had made from their flock’s wool or its milk, so that Mary and Joseph could see the love they had for Jesus.
And then, like true missionaries, the shepherds spoke. They spread the news, and those who heard them, the Gospel tells us, were filled with wonder. They too sang the praises of God.
Did not the angels encourage us to receive Jesus by singing their hymn, “Gloria in excelsis Deo:” Glory to God in the highest and peace to men of goodwill?
“And are we really living with Our Lord Jesus Christ throughout our days?”
And now we must ask ourselves, my dear brethren, what have we done up to now to receive Jesus?
Did you hear what we have just read in the Gospel: “Et sui eum receperunt” (John 1:11): “And His own received Him not.” He came unto His own—for everything belongs to Him, we ourselves belong to Him—in pro pria venit et eum non receperunt. They were like those at the inn of Bethlehem, who did not want to receive Our Lady and St. Joseph. They did not receive Jesus.
But those who receive Jesus, according to St. John in the Gospel, they are the sons of God. What have we done, my dear brethren? Have we truly received Jesus? Do we truly live with Jesus? Has the need for salvation truly penetrated our souls? For this is why Jesus came here below. When the Angel Gabriel came to the Blessed Virgin, he told her that the holy one to be born of her would be the Savior of the world. And he repeated the same thing to the shepherds: “This day is born to you a Saviour:” Salvator mundi. He is also Salvator mundi for each one of us.
It is necessary that we apply the power of the grace and resurrection of Our Lord to our souls. Let us not be indifferent to Jesus.
Like Mary, let us receive Jesus with the dispositions needed to welcome Him worthily.
THIRD COMING: INTO OUR VERY SOULS
Jesus has loved us so much. It is true, we were not granted the joy of being in Bethlehem—ah, how happy we would surely have been, had we been with the shepherds, able to accompany them to Mary and Joseph and to see the Child Jesus—we would have indeed been happy! But Our Lord does even more for us, even more than letting us hold Jesus in our arms. We can receive Him in ourselves through the Holy Eucharist.
Whenever we wish, every day, Jesus is available for us to receive Him in us; for us to become in a sense one with Him.
As St. Paul says, “I live, now not I; but Christ liveth in me.”
All throughout the day, do we truly live with Our Lord Jesus Christ? Do we live with His spirit, in His spirit? Do we keep His commandments? Do we recite the prayers of preparation for Communion in which we prom ise Our Lord never to separate ourselves from Him again, never more to separate ourselves from Him?
That is what is written in our prayers before Communion. Is it true that we will never separate ourselves from Jesus? That is what we must ask ourselves. And that is the great lesson of Christ mas today.
Let us ask the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, let us ask St. Joseph, let us ask the shepherds and the holy Angels who surrounded Jesus at His birth and who welcomed Him with their whole hearts, let us ask them to give us hearts like theirs so that we too can receive Jesus worthily in our souls and be true missionaries.
We must think of those who have not received the graces we have been given. Some do not know Our Lord Jesus Christ; some no longer receive Him. Today, especially, we are in a time when so much of the world has abandoned Jesus; those who knew Him, have abandoned Him.
So let us do everything in our power so that our families, our parents, our brothers, our sisters, all our friends, all may know Jesus once again and receive Him, as did the Blessed Virgin Mary and St. Joseph and the holy shepherds.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
by Father Michel Rion