Expecting, waiting for the Savior

Fr. Leo Pabayo .

IT can be said that Christmas is the most joyous celebration in the Philippines. The experience of the Christmas celebration has done something to the soul of some Filipinos that they cannot wait to celebrate it. As early as September, we already occasionally hears Christmas carols.

It is still too early for carols. But some radio stations play it for the comforting feeling that it gives. That is not the time for it. But it is understandable. However, some business establishments play them as part of their come-on. This, however, is not understandable from a religious point of view because it already encroaches on the religious sensibility of some Christians who want their religious practices to be in the right place and at the right time.

“For everything there is a season,” says the Book of Ecclesiastes.

It is best to sway with the different liturgical or religious seasons of the year. They make one another’s celebration more meaningful. Christmas, ought to be preceded by the season of Advent which is but the beginning of of the Christmas celebration but not yet the celebration proper of Christmas. There are good reasons for saying this. It makes the Christmas celebration more meaningful and joyful.

There are elements in the celebration of Advent that gradually brings us to the fuller celebration of Christmas.

Advent is about expectations, waiting and preparation. We look back to the past and relive the prophets’ expectations of the coming of the Savior of the world. We let ourselves be inspired by their strong hope that the Savior is coming. We also relive their patient waiting.

At Christmas we remember that Jesus Christ the Savior has already come and has already wrought our salvation. But there are still so much of His presence that have to be revealed to the world through His Church working under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

The whole drama of his coming and acts of redemption has to be played in each and everyone of us his disciples in all aspects of our lives and in all parts of the world for mankind to fully benefit from the effects of His saving work. That requires that we relive much of the work and hardships that He underwent as well as the joy of His Resurrection in our lives now.

However we already have the assurance that what He has started in His Church will surely be fully accomplished in due time.

“As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it. You will go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and hills will burst into song before you, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands.” (Isaiah 55:10-12)

The Kingdom of God has come in Jesus Christ. There is cause for great celebrations. But in a sense also the Kingdom is still coming.

It has come already because the Savior was here in flesh and blood and He has shown the way of salvation and given His Holy Spirit to enable us to do what He asks us to do.

However, as sinners, we are slow learners when it comes to learning about God and about faith, hope and love, truthfulness and holiness, justice and mercy forgiveness and all the other saving graces that He has sowed in the world.

We are not ready enough for the fullness of His coming and so, in a sense He is still to come and we are still in the state of waiting and expectation.

The nature of that waiting and expectation is very much like that of the waiting of an expectant mother  as the Lord says. It is in a sense anxious waiting but at the same time it is also full of expectations, hope and joy of good things to come.

(Fr. Leo Pabayo is a priest from the Society of Jesus.)