Friday, Second Week of Advent

Jesus was a keen observer of life around him. All of life spoke to him of God and of our relationship with God and God’s relationship with us. He sees children playing in the marketplace and they remind him of how some people have been responding to the presence of God in the ministry of John the Baptist and in his own ministry. We have to imagine two groups of children. One group is keen to play at ‘make believe’ and they do their best to engage another group, but without success. This first group initially imagine themselves to be a music group playing the pipes at a wedding, but the other group are unmoved; they wouldn’t dance. They this first group imagine themselves to be the mourners at a funeral, singing dirges, but the other group are equally unmoved; they wouldn’t mourn. They just won’t play along to anything. In a similar way, Jesus observes that many of his contemporaries are equally unmoved by the rather mournful ministry of John the Baptist and his own much more festive ministry. Jesus once spoke of himself as the bridegroom at a wedding feast and of his disciples as the friends of the bridegroom. There was a real celebratory element to the ministry of Jesus because he came among us to proclaim the good news of the presence of God’s compassionate and merciful love, bringing healing to the broken in body and spirit. He played a joyful tune, the tune of the Spirit of God’s love and he invited all to dance to this tune. I am reminded of a popular religious song, ‘Lord of the dance’. The Spirit of God’s love has been poured into our hearts and the fruit of the Spirit is joy, a joy that is rooted in knowing ourselves to be loved unconditionally by God who revealed his love fully by giving us the gift of his beloved Son.