Advent trust

We continue today with our Reflections on the verses of the hymn, “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel.”

I encourage you to continue substituting your own name in place of the word “Israel” in order to make this wonderful hymn your own personal prayer.

Verse 4:

O Come, O Rod of Jesse’s stem.

From ev’ry foe deliver them

That trust your mighty power to save,

And give them victory o’er the grave.

Rejoice! Rejoice!

Emmanuel shall come to you,

O [Israel].

The key word in this verse is trust. Do you, can you, trust that God will indeed deliver you from the enemies of your soul and of your peace, serenity, security and well-being? Ask God continually to increase your capacity to trust him. Look back over the landscape of your life and recall those times when he has, indeed, delivered you from something or someone that threatened to wreck havoc in your life. Give thanks for his great mercy to you, and build your trust in the present time on the realities you discover in your own past. More simply put: he has delivered you, he is delivering you (even if you aren’t aware of it) and he will deliver you.

In his prayer for the Jubilee Year of Mercy, Pope Francis eloquently points out to us the kinds of deliverance that are described in the Gospels. Let the words of his prayer serve to increase our own faith and hope and trust:

Your loving gaze freed Zacchaeus and Matthew from being enslaved by money;

the adulteress and Magdalene from seeking happiness only in created things;

made Peter weep after his betrayal,

and assured Paradise to the repentant thief.

Let us hear, as if addressed to each one of us, the words that you spoke to the Samaritan woman: ‘If only you knew the gift of God.’

Trust that the gift be given to you as well during this Advent season, in whatever way you need it. And, above all, remember that the greatest gift is yet to come: Our Lord is going to give each of us victory over the grave! Our physical death will be a temporary state for us and not the end of existence.

Pray for that trust as well.

Blessed  Advent to you.