Collect:

Pour forth, we beseech you, O Lord,
your grace into our hearts,
that we, to whom the Incarnation of Christ your Son
was made known by the message of an Angel,
may by his Passion and Cross
be brought to the glory of his Resurrection.
Who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.

Reflection:

Today is the 4th Sunday of  Advent and we are faced about the images of the paschal mytery of Christ. The Church is reminding us that the birth of Jesus is “concretization” and part of God’s plan of salvation.  This collect is familiar to us, because it is the prayer we used in the Angelus.

This prayer asks that God would pour out his aboundant grace into our hearts and because of that grace we may know the message of the Angel. In addition, that Angel announcing the birth of Christ would signify to us that we are brought to and sharers of glorious Resurrection of Jesus Christ through his passion and death on the cross. We want to see the child in the manager. However, this prayer reminds us that the manager is always connected to the Cross, which means, God  shows to us the plan of redemption trough the incarnation. According St. Irenaeus, “For this reason the lord himself gave us the sign of our salvation, the one who was born of the Virgin, Emmanuel.it was the Lord who saved us.” Our God is the God of life, as he pour out his loving grace into my heart, let us open  our whole being to receive Chhrist in our life.

In our first reading according to Isaiah narrates how king Ahaz trusted himself and his own plan in disregarding God by not listening or considering the divine plan. That is why the Lord gave the sign which is a child to whom the king’s opposite attitude. In the letter of Paul to the people of Rome reminds us that we belong to Jesus Christ: the fulfillment of the promised by the prophets. So our hope is not in vain because it is fulfilled already and God continues to fulfill it by his second coming. In the Gospel according to Matthew, narrates how Joseph abides in the plan of God.

Most of us today are thinking that God is far from us. And sometimes, we are not thinking that God in our very life. We disregard Him in our plans. We want to eliminate Him in our life because we believe so much into our own selves. In a Filipino way, sobrang bilib sa sarili. We do not want to listen to His guidance through the Church. We want to follow only our desires even and by ‘unnoticeable’ way the immoral acts that can destroy our very person: our dignity and our spiritual life.

We must know how to listen to God through the teachings of the Church, as St. Paul said, “You should know how to behave in the household of God, which is the Church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of truth.” (cf. 1 Timothy 3:15) It is in the Church that we can know the ways of God. We must imitate st. Joseph and not king Ahaz by  following attitude: first,listening; second, acceptance; and lastly, obedient. These three characters of st. Joseph by allowing the plan of God be his priority plan.

We are challenge by our collect and by our readings to prepare ourselves in the incarnation of Jesus in the attitude of st. Joseph.