1st Sunday of Advent Year B. By Tobe Eze

                                                                     ADVENT
Advent is a season observed in many Christian churches as a time of expectant waiting and preparation for the celebration of the Nativity of Jesus at Christmas. The term is a version of the Latin word meaning "coming". The term "Advent" is also used in Eastern Orthodoxy for the 40-day Nativity Fast, which has practices ...

1st Sunday of Advent Year B.

FIRST READING
Isaiah 63:16b—17, 19b; 64:2—7

SECOND READING
1 Corinthians 1:3—9

GOSPEL
Mark 13:33—37

THEME: THERE IS NO TIME TO WASTE.

One day after my preaching in a gathering, I emphasized much on end of time. One man stood up and asked me. Let me quote him, “Since my great grandfather, my grand father, my father and my own self were born, we have been hearing about end time, end of time, the coming of the son of man and many other ways people qualify it. My question is now, when is that end time coming?” I stood for sometimes and answered the man, Now! He asked, How? I told him. People die everyday, death meet people here and there and we are meant to know that there is no repentance or change of heart in the grave, and we do no when we will die. If that is so, then I asked him back, when are you going to die? He answered me that he does not know. From there i made him to understand that once you don’t know when, how and where you will die, it is good to make every minute or even second of your life your last opportunity. If we regard every minute or second of our lives as our last opportunity, we will do good, obey God's commandments and men’s positive laws. Continue Reading......................

We all have been exposed to knowing what is good and evil. Telling us that there is no time is not for us to develop a new way of escape but to come back from where we are and take up the good things we know and have been doing as the first reading says. Come back to him who made you in his own image and likeness. The second reading in the same view is telling us that in Christ Jesus we have everything we need. Which means, we should come back to him to get all that we need to be sustained till the day of the Lord and this day of the Lord, we do not know. The gospel is not moving away from the circle rather it is making it clearer to us. We do not know the hour the son of man will come back, so we should be ready all the time. The owner of the house or the master will come at the hour, place when we do not expect it. Like the motto of scout boys. BE READY. Let us be ready at all time.

Advent is a time of preparation of many things both spiritual and temporal. Many preparations have to be made. Advent means many things for many persons.

1.       It is a time Catholic Church starts a new liturgical year

2.       It is a time Catholic church wear's purple or violent vestments

3.       It is a reminder of Christmas.

4.       It is a time of reconstruction of spiritual life to welcome Christ.

It is not that we should not be ready other times but just a reminder.

1.       The Church starts a new liturgical year with the first Sunday of Advent and with alarm of coming back to our God both in body and spirit.

2.       The Church wear's purple which is a sign of repentance. We use that to show how ready we are to come back to our God and creator.

3.       For some it is just time to reminder them about Christmas so that they do all sort of things to get money that they will spend during Christmas and every other good and bad things they do in Christmas.

4.       It is this Advent that we should prepare all we have and are to welcome the coming Jesus in our lives. A time to repay all we have destroyed in our lives and we come Christ Jesus. We should also know that our tomorrow should be our Christmas and our today should be our Advent for there is no time to waste.

THANKS AND HAPPY SUNDAY WELCOME TO ADVENT. NEW LITURGICAL YEAR, YEAR B.