Advent III –C- Zeph. 3:14-18a; Phil. 4:4-7; Lk 3:10-18  

Two men, Charlie and Roger, got together and opened a butcher shop. The business did quite well and they prospered. One day a preacher came to town, and Charlie gave his life to Christ. He tried to persuade Roger to accept Christ also, but to no avail. "Why won't you, Roger?" asked the newly baptized Charlie. "Listen, Charlie," Roger said. "If I get religion too, who's going to weigh the meat?"

Roger has this going for him, that he understands that believing in Christ implies a radical change in personal and professional behavior. Many people who identify themselves as Christians do not seem to get it. According to a Gallup poll conducted in 1987 in the USA, there is little difference in moral behavior between people who go to church and people who don't. There is as much pilfering and dishonesty among church members as among non-members. There seems to be a widespread misconception among Christians that we can add Christ to our lives without subtracting sin. Accepting Jesus as one's personal Lord and Savior is seen as a matter of changing one's belief and not much to do with changing one's behavior. Many street preachers preach, "Only believe, and you will be saved?" Most non Catholics say of themselves as “saved” people. Because they think only by believing they are saved.

They don’t care about how one lives after one comes to faith.

Faith in Jesus Christ saves us. But that faith has to be proven to be genuine by the way one lives. St.James tells us to prove our faith by our actions. Yes, you will be saved by just believing, if you die soon after your coming to faith and you get no time to prove your faith. But if you continue to live on this earth you have to show your faith that it is genuine by your every day actions.

The gospel is a leaven that affects every aspect of our personal, business and social life. To repent is to turn from evil and do good. "Only believe, and you will be saved" is at best a half-truth. Someone explained it this way.
Repentance means to "return from going down the wrong road." Rebirth means to "start anew on
the right road." Faith in Jesus involves not only repentance, but rebirth as well.

William Willimon, Chaplain at Duke University, says that John the Baptist reminds us of boundaries we must respect and gates we must pass through. At Duke, Willimon reminds the students, "If you are going to graduate, you must first get past the English Department. If you are going to practice law, you must pass the bar. If you want to get to medical school you must survive Organic Chemistry." Likewise, "If you want to get to the joy of Bethlehem in the presence of Jesus, you must get past John the Baptist in the desert." The word from John is "repent," which means "about-face" or turning 180 degrees.

Just think for a moment how different the world would be if everyone followed these simple directives of John. John is announcing the coming of the Savior, the Messiah, the Lord of life and history. And he is telling the people how they can enter into a personal relationship with that Savior, how they can come to experience what St Paul calls in today’s Second Reading “the peace of God that surpasses all understanding.”

Christianity is not about doing the right thing. It is not all about morality.  It is about being the right person. It is about faith in Jesus Christ leading to a converted life and right relationship with God. Good works alone do not give us justification. It is the faith that gives Justification. The basic problem with Christian faith today is that we profess to believe but do not match it with practical behavior.

Advent and lent provide us with settings and circumstances hospitable for religious experience. The people who listened to John the baptizer were eager to make changes in their life and they asked him what shall we do ? His answer to them was “Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you.. Be content with your pay..

 If we, like those people, are eager to bring changes in our life, let’s ask the same question: Lord, what shall I do today to experience and live the life of the Word Incarnate in my life ?