Luke 12

Several verses from this week's chapter jumped out at me as appropriate to today, on the eve of a new year. 

4 And I say to you, my friends: Be not afraid of them who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do.

5 But I will shew you whom you shall fear: fear ye him, who after he hath killed, hath power to cast into hell. Yea, I say to you, fear him.

8 And I say to you, Whosoever shall confess me before men, him shall the Son of man also confess before the angels of God.

9 But he that shall deny me before men, shall be denied before the angels of God.

15 And he said to them: Take heed and beware of all covetousness; for a man's life doth not consist in the abundance of things which he possesseth.

34 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

It's certainly easy, too easy, to find things to be fearful about in the world today. But Christ here provides a perspective-check: preserving our physical wellbeing, even our very lives, is not as important as defending our spiritual wellbeing. Not to say that we can't or shouldn't take care of our and our dependants' physical needs, but if we believe that our spiritual wellbeing is as important as Christ says it is, that belief will be reflected in our priorities. I don't know about you, but my day-to-day priorities could stand a little reorganizing here...

Verses 8 and 9 sort of tie into that, but specifically regarding how our spiritual health is manifested in our words and actions. 

"...for a man's life doth not consist in the abundance of things he possesseth." The gentleness of this reminder is actually what stopped me. It's not so much a 'woe to you wicked covetous people' as it is nudge to remember that we're all inclined to this in one way or another, so we need to be on guard for it because allowing ourselves to dwell on or act on covetous thoughts will not benefit us. 

"For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." Pretty much sums it all up, right? Our "treasure" is whatever we safeguard, build up, single out as our priority, "set our hearts on." 

I'm not the biggest fan of New Years resolutions, certainly in part because I'd be lucky to remember any of them by the second week in January. But as we begin a new year, I'm hoping to come back to these verses a couple of times as reminders of what Christ is looking for from me.

O Emmanuel

O Emmanuel, God with us, our King and lawgiver, the expected of the nations and their savior; come to save us, O Lord our God!

The last O Antiphon; tomorrow night, we celebrate the long-awaited Savior's birth. We proclaim Him our Lord, our God, our king, our savior. Emmanuel, God with us. Though we have one more day before Christmas, this last antiphon carries a uniquely excited, eager note: we expect Him. We know that he is coming, and we hover tonight on the cusp of that joyous proclamation the shepherds will hear tomorrow night: a child born, a savior, Christ the Lord!

O come, O come Emmanuel,

And ransom captive Israel

That mourns in lonely exile here

Until the Son of God appear.

Rejoice, rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel!

O Rex Gentium

O King of the nations, desire of every human heart; O Keystone of the mighty arch of man, come save the creature you fashioned from the dust.

King and Keystone, two images of the key piece without which everything below them falls apart. The king holds together his kingdom as surely as a keystone holds up an arch. Without Him, we are jumbled, fallen pieces; with Him, parts of a cohesive, functioning whole. 

In the context of King and Keystone, today's antiphon's description of Christ as the "desire of every human heart" becomes self-evident: everyone desires wholeness, even if they don't realize that the wholeness they seek is only found in connection with Christ.

O come, desire of nations, bind

In one the hearts of all mankind.

Bid Thou our sad divisions cease

And fill the world with heaven's peace.

Rejoice, rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.

O Oriens

O rising dawn, brightness of light eternal, and sun of justice: come, and enlighten those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.

Say, there're those folks sitting "in darkness and in the shadow of death" again, still referring to us, of course. This antiphon reiterates that we aren't merely "looking forward" to Christ's coming—we are desperately longing for Him. Longing for His enlightenment, and particularly so on this dark Solstice night.

We know a little bit about darkness, here in Alaska.

And on this darkest day of the year, we boldly proclaim Christ to be our light. Not just a light, but the "rising dawn": the light whose arrival we so eagerly watch for on the horizon. The "brightness of light eternal," shining through the bleakest night. The "sun of justice," putting all things to rights.

O come Thou Dayspring from on high

And cheer us by Thy drawing nigh.

Dispell the gloomy clouds of night

And death's dark shadow put to flight.

Rejoice, rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.

Luke 11

5 And he said to them: Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go to him at midnight, and shall say to him: Friend, lend me three loaves,

6 Because a friend of mine is come off his journey to me, and I have not what to set before him.

7 And he from within should answer, and say: Trouble me not, the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee.

8 Yet if he shall continue knocking, I say to you, although he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend; yet, because of his importunity, he will rise, and give him as many as he needeth.

9 And I say to you, Ask, and it shall be given you: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you.

10 For every one that asketh, receiveth; and he that seeketh, findeth; and to him that knocketh, it shall be opened.

Encouragement to keep knocking, to keep asking. I've fallen into an overthinking pattern lately that's left me needing to hear this particular passage; I somehow reasoned myself to a place of thinking that it was "more right" to just pray for God's will to be done in whatever given situation instead of making specific intentions. That praying "May Your will be done in X's life" was what I ought to be saying, rather than "Please help X to get better." And because of this, praying for people was starting to be a source of stress and confusion and even guilt.

But right here we have Christ instructing us to bring those specific petitions to God: "Ask, and it shall be given you: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you." God does want me to bring my needs and particular prayers to Him, and even to continue doing so over and over again.

Understanding that prayers may not be answered the way I think they should be is still important, of course; God sees everything, and I see only a small part, so any time one of us is wrong about what the best course of action is, it's always going to be me. But even in spite of my shortsightedness, God invites me to ask, to seek, to knock. What a gift!

O Clavis David

O Key of David, and scepter of the house of Israel, who opens and no man shuts, who shuts and no man opens: come, and bring forth the captive from his prison, he who sits in darkness and in the shadow of death.

What "captive" are we speaking of here, asking Christ to come set free? Ourselves. Each one of us is that captive, trapped "in darkness and in the shadow of death" by our sins. Only Christ has the key, is the Key, to free us from our prisons.

Today's antiphon sounds reminiscent of Matthew 16:19, wherein Christ tells Peter that He gives him the "keys to the kingdom of heaven," and bestows upon him (and a few chapters later, the other apostles) the authority to bind and loose, open and shut. In today's verse, we proclaim belief that Christ comes bearing these powers, in order that He (and down through the ages, priests and bishops to whom the ability to cooperate with His authority has been passed down) may loose us from the sins that bind us.

O come Thou Key of David come

And open wide our heavenly home;

Make safe the way that leads on high,

And close the path to misery.

Rejoice, rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.

O Radix Jesse

O Root of Jesse, that stands for an ensign of the people, before whom the kings keep silence and unto whom the Gentiles shall make application: come to deliver us, and tarry not.

Getting impatient for our Advent waiting to end? "Tarry not," we pray today. Come as quickly as possible! 

"Root of Jesse," we call Him, proclaiming Him the successor and fulfillment of the Davidic line. This antiphon weaves together the old covenant and the new: He comes to the Israelites awaiting the Messiah, but also to the Gentiles to whom the promise of salvation had not originally been revealed. All of us, all the world, grow impatient for the deliverance that Christ brings.

O come, Thou root of Jesse's stem;

From all distress deliver them

That trust Thy mighty power to save,

And give them victory o'er the grave.

Rejoice, rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.