Liturgical Colour : White
Isaiah 62 : 11-12
For YHVH proclaims to the ends of the earth : Say to the daughter of Zion, here comes your salvation! YHVH brings the reward of His victory, His booty is carried before Him.
They shall be called the holy people, the redeemed of YHVH; and you shall be called The Sought After, a city no longer abandoned.
Liturgical Colour : White
Luke 2 : 1-14
At that time the Emperor issued a decree for a census of the whole Empire to be taken. This first census was taken when Quirinus was governor of Syria. Everyone had to be registered in his own town, so everyone set out for his own city. Joseph too set out from Nazareth of Galilee. As he belonged to the family of David, being a descendant of his, he went to Judea, to David’s town of Bethlehem, to be registered with Mary, his wife, who was with Child.
They were in Bethlehem when the time came for her to have her Child, and she gave birth to a Son, her Firstborn. She wrapped Him in swaddling clothes, and laid Him in the manger, because there was no place for them in the inn. There were shepherds camping in the countryside, taking turns to watch over their flocks by night.
Suddenly an Angel of the Lord appeared to them, with the Glory of the Lord shining around them. As the were terrified, the Angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; I am here to give you Good News, great joy for all the people. Today a Saviour has been born to you in David’s town; He is the Messiah and the Lord. Let this be a sign to you : you will find a Baby wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.”
Suddenly the Angel was surrounded by many more heavenly spirits, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and Peace, on earth, to those whom God loves.”
Liturgical Colour : White
Titus 2 : 11-14
For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all, teaching us to reject an irreligious way of life and worldly greed, and to live in this world as responsible persons, upright and serving God, while we await our blessed Hope – the glorious manifestation of our great God and Saviour Christ Jesus.
He gave Himself for us, to redeem us from every evil and to purify a people He wanted to be His own and dedicated to what is good.
Liturgical Colour : White
Psalm 95 : 1-2a, 2b-3, 11-12, 13
Sing to the Lord a new song, sing to the Lord, all the earth! Sing to the Lord, bless His Name.
Proclaim His salvation day after day. Recall His glory among the nations, tell all the peoples His wonderful deeds.
Let the heavens be glad, the earth rejoice; let the sea and all that fills it resound; let the fields exult and everything in them; let the forest, all the trees, sing for joy.
Let them sing before the Lord Who comes to judge the earth. He will rule the world with justice and the peoples with fairness.
Liturgical Colour : White
Isaiah 9 : 1-7
The people who walk in darkness have seen a great light. A light has dawned on those who live in the land of the shadow of death. You have enlarged the nation; You have increased their joy. They rejoice before You, as people rejoice at harvest time as they rejoice in dividing the spoil.
For the yoke of their burden, the bar across their shoulders, the rod of their oppressors, You have broken it as on the day of Midian. Every warrior’s boot that tramped in war, every cloak rolled in blood, will be thrown out for burning, will serve as fuel for the fire.
For a Child is born to us, a Son is given us; the royal ornament is laid upon His shoulder, and His Name is proclaimed : “Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”
To the increase of His powerful rule in peace, there will be no end. Vast will be His dominion, He will reign on David’s throne and over all his kingdom, to establish and uphold it with justice and righteousness from this time onward and forever. The zealous love of YHVH Sabaoth will do this.
Liturgical Colour : White
Matthew 1 : 1-25
This is the account of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, Son of David, Son of Abraham. Abraham was the father of Isaac, Isaac the father of Jacob, Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers. Judah was the father of Perez and Zerah (their mother was Tamar), Perez was the father of Hezron, and Hezron of Aram. Aram was the father of Aminadab, Aminadab of Nahshon, Nahshon of Salmon.
Salmon was the father of Boaz. His mother was Rahab. Boaz was the father of Obed. His mother was Ruth. Obed was the father of Jesse. Jesse was the father of David, the king. David was the father of Solomon. His mother had been Uriah’s wife. Solomon was the father of Rehoboam. Then came the kings : Abijah, Asaph, Jehoshaphat, Joram, Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah, Manasseh, Amon, Josiah.
Josiah was the father of Jechoniah and his brothers at the time of the deportation to Babylon. After the deportation to Babylon, Jechoniah was the father of Salathiel and Salathiel of Zerubbabel. Zerubbabel was the father of Abiud, Abiud of Eliakim, and Eliakim of Azor. Azor was the father of Zadok, Zadok the father of Akim, and Akim the father of Eliud. Eliud was the father of Eleazar, Eleazar of Matthan, and Matthan of Jacob.
Jacob was the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, and from her came Jesus Who is called the Christ – the Messiah. There were fourteen generations in all from Abraham to David, and fourteen generations from David to the deportation to Babylon, and fourteen generations from the deportation to Babylon to the birth of Christ.
This is how Jesus Christ was born : Mary His mother had been given to Joseph in marriage, but before they lived together, she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit. Then Joseph, her husband, made plans to divorce her in all secrecy. He was an upright man, and in no way did he want to discredit her.
While he was pondering over this, an Angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, descendant of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife. She has conceived by the Holy Spirit, and now she will bear a Son. You shall call Him ‘Jesus’ for He will save His people from their sins.”
All this happened in order to fulfil what the Lord had said through the prophet : The Virgin will conceive and bear a Son, and He will be called Emmanuel, which means God-with-us. When Joseph woke up, he did what the Angel of the Lord had told him to do, and he took his wife to his home.
So she gave birth to a Son and he had not had marital relations with her. Joseph gave Him the Name Jesus.
Alternative reading (shorter version)
Matthew 1 : 18-25
This is how Jesus Christ was born : Mary His mother had been given to Joseph in marriage, but before they lived together, she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit. Then Joseph, her husband, made plans to divorce her in all secrecy. He was an upright man, and in no way did he want to discredit her.
While he was pondering over this, an Angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, descendant of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife. She has conceived by the Holy Spirit, and now she will bear a Son. You shall call Him ‘Jesus’ for He will save His people from their sins.”
All this happened in order to fulfil what the Lord had said through the prophet : The Virgin will conceive and bear a Son, and He will be called Emmanuel, which means God-with-us. When Joseph woke up, he did what the Angel of the Lord had told him to do, and he took his wife to his home.
So she gave birth to a Son and he had not had marital relations with her. Joseph gave Him the Name Jesus.
Liturgical Colour : White
Acts 13 : 16-17, 22-25
So Paul arose, motioned to them for silence and began, “Fellow Israelites and also all you who fear God, listen. The God of our people Israel chose our ancestors, and after He had made them increase during their stay in Egypt, He led them out by powerful deeds.
After that time, God removed Saul and raised up David as king, to whom He bore witness saying : I have found David, the son of Jesse, a man after My own heart, who will do all I want him to do.
It is from the descendants of David that God has now raised up the promised Saviour of Israel, Jesus. Before He appeared, John proclaimed a baptism of repentance for all the people of Israel. As John was ending his life’s work, he said : ‘I am not what you think I am, for after me another One is coming Whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.'”
Liturgical Colour : White
Psalm 88 : 4-5, 16-17, 27 and 29
You said, “I have made a covenant with David, My chosen one; I have made a pledge to My servant. I establish his descendants forever; I build his throne for all generations.”
Blessed is the people who know Your praise. They walk in the light of Your face. They celebrate all day Your Name and Your protection lifts them up.
He will call on Me, “You are my Father, my God, my Rock, my Saviour.” I will keep My covenant firm forever, and My love for him will endure.
Liturgical Colour : White
Isaiah 62 : 1-5
For Zion’s sake I will not hold My peace, for Jerusalem I will not keep silent, until her holiness shines like the dawn and her salvation flames like a burning torch. The nations will see your holiness and all the kings your glory. You will be called by a new name which the mouth of YHVH will reveal.
You will be a crown of glory in the hand of YHVH, a royal diadem in the hand of your God. No longer will you be named Forsaken; no longer will your land be called Abandoned; but you will be called My Delight and your land Espoused. For YHVH delights in you and will make your land His spouse.
As a young man marries a virgin, so will your Builder marry you; and as a bridegroom rejoices in his bride, so will your God rejoice in you.
Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this fourth and last Sunday of the season of Advent, we focus on the last of the four themes that we are focusing on this Advent, namely hope, peace, joy and love. And this Sunday therefore, we focus on the theme of love in preparation of Christmas. As we all know, love is the most important of all Christian virtues, and is in fact the very reason why we have Christmas in the first place.
For without love, there would not have been Christmas and all of its celebrations and joy. In turn, there would not have been peace on earth, or a new hope for all of us mankind, and joy would have been dimmed and out of reach for us, because God’s love has not manifested among us. But thanks to God’s enduring love for each and every one of us, the love of God has been manifested in none other than His Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ.
This has been clearly stated to us, in what the Lord Jesus told Nicodemus the Pharisee in one of the most well-known phrase in the entire Scriptures, from the Gospel of St. John, chapter 3, ‘For God so loved the world, that He gave us His only beloved Son, so that all who believe in Him may not perish, but have eternal life.’ And this is in essence, what Christmas and all of its joy is all about, a celebration of God’s ultimate love for us.
That is why, after reflecting in the past three Sundays on the aspects of hope, peace and joy that Christmas has brought us and which we will celebrate again very soon, it is timely that on this last Sunday of Advent before the time of Christmas that we look into the very core of the Christmas celebration itself, the love of God made Man, the love of God coming to dwell among us in Christ.
And this is what the Scripture passages today have delivered to us, in the fulfilment of God’s long promised salvation, beginning from the encounter between the prophet Isaiah and king Ahaz of Judah, in which the prophet Isaiah prophesied of the coming of the Messiah, clearly speaking of how the Messiah would come, through the sign of the Virgin bearing a Child, the One through Whom God would dwell among His people, ‘Emmanuel’, meaning ‘God is with us’.
At the time of the prophet Isaiah and afterwards, as the people awaited for the coming of the Messiah, the true meaning of those words in the prophecy of Isaiah was not fully understood, and it was only then, when the Archangel Gabriel came to Nazareth, upon a young woman and virgin betrothed to the local carpenter, Mary, the one who was destined to be the Mother of God and Saviour, that the fullness of God’s intentions was made bare to all.
The Archangel Gabriel was very clear, and he said that through the will of God and by the power of the Holy Spirit, Mary herself would bear the Son of God in her, God Himself incarnate in the flesh, just as St. Paul mentioned in the very beginning of his Epistle to the Romans, as a core tenet and belief of our Christian faith, that God became flesh, assuming the full nature of our humanity and become both Son of Man, as well as Son of God.
This was what the Angel of God reiterated to St. Joseph in our Gospel passage today, when he hesitated to take Mary as his wife because she bad become pregnant before their marriage and before it was to be consummated. The Angel also made a link and reference to what the prophet Isaiah had prophesied earlier, a prophecy clearly well known to St. Joseph and all the Israelites, which right there and then was coming to its fulfilment.
And it was God’s love that made all these possible, as all of us must remember that even though we are looking forward to the coming of Christmas, but we must also not forget why Christmas exists in the first place. Christmas exists because of Easter, and all that is related to the Easter celebrations, namely the Lord’s Passion, His suffering, death on the Cross and finally, His glorious Resurrection.
It was Easter that made Christmas fully meaningful and it is by understanding fully the grand scheme of God’s plan of our salvation that we can better appreciate why Christmas is so important to all of us. It is not just merely another holiday or moment to celebrate, to exchange gifts or to expect good things from one another. It is not just a time for us to have parties or good food and drink, or to shop and buy the latest apparels and paraphernalia.
Sadly, this is what many of us believe, and what many of us embrace as we think of Christmas as merely just another good time and time to relax and enjoy ourselves, forgetting the very reason why Christmas exists and why we even should be joyful in the first place. We have relegated the Lord to the least important place in our preparations and celebrations, and we have overlooked Him in Christmas.
Remember, brothers and sisters in Christ, that Christ has given everything to all of us, as He did not even hold back giving us the ultimate gift of all, that is the gift of His very own life, when He suffered and died on the Cross, willingly enduring all those pains and sufferings, bearing our sins and the consequences for our sins, so that all of us may live and not perish, as He Himself said to Nicodemus.
And it was because of all these that we can truly rejoice in Christmas! Indeed, if not for all that Christ has gone through for our sake, there would indeed be no reason to celebrate, because by our sins and wickedness, we would have been condemned to utter annihilation and destruction, eternal suffering and pain. Instead, Christ took all the pain and suffering to Himself, and through Himself, He offered us all the Way to eternal joy and life.
If the world had forgotten the reason for Christmas and the true joy and meaning, then should it not then be a challenge for us all as Christians to remind the world? What do I mean by this, brothers and sisters in Christ? I mean that we should show it in how we ourselves celebrate Christmas and prepare ourselves for the Christmas joy to come. It is how we then remind everyone Who it is we are truly celebrating about.
It does not mean that we should then reject everything that the world has celebrated about Christmas, but rather, we should celebrate in that manner in moderation, not to give in to excesses in all the consumeristic attitudes that are always prevalent during this season and time of the year. We should instead focus our celebrations on Christ, and the best way for us to do that, is to follow the example of Our Lord.
If God has loved us with so much love, and therefore brought us new hope, peace and joy through Christmas, then should we not then show the same love to one another? This is what in essence we need to do in our Christmas celebrations, brothers and sisters in Christ. We must celebrate the love, not the gifts; rejoice with our brothers and sisters, and not with all the glamour and bling of the occasion; love and forgive one another for anything that we have caused hurt to each other instead of being jealous or trying to outmatch each other in how we celebrate; reach out and share our joy and love rather than selfishly keeping all the joy to ourselves.
This is easier said than done, brothers and sisters in Christ, but we must not then make it as an excuse then to be idle and to continue our lukewarm attitude towards Christmas. Let us all instead be beacons of light showing the path to one another, guiding each other and inspiring our fellow brethren to celebrate Christmas more meaningfully by turning ourselves once again to God’s love in Christ as the one and true focus of our Christmas festivities and celebrations.
May God continue to love us all as He has always done, and bless us all in our good endeavours, and may He help us all to prepare ourselves heart, mind and soul for the coming joy of Christmas that we may celebrate it well, and not to forget to share the love and joy we have with one another, especially with those who had no chance to celebrate. May God bless our Advent preparations for Christmas. Amen.
petercanisiusmichaeldavidkang 