Restore everything in Christ!

Saturday of the 2nd week of Advent

Matthew 17:10-13

Let us start the Simbang Gabi with the proper disposition.  The First Reading reflects the power of the Lord to bring famine on the people as well as to turn the hearts of fathers towards their children and restore the tribes of Jacob.

In today's Gospel Jesus talks about Elijah coming to see that everything is restored as it should be.

Simbang Gabi is about a direct encounter with the Lord through the different accounts leading to the Christmas night.  We need to restore some things in our lives so that we can authentically encounter the birth of Jesus, molding the way we view life itself.

We need to restore the grace lost by sin and sinful orientation.  It means rekindling paradise, the state of mankind's total unity with God.  It is also our state in the womb of our mothers, untainted and waiting to be born in the world.  We can restore it through the sacraments of forgiveness and the Eucharist.

Second, we need to restore God's vision for creating the world.  Why did God create the world in the first if we will just ruin it?  What is our notion of life, power, and love?  All these are meant not for ourselves but to serve God's purpose - to bring life to all his children in all generations.

Third, let's start restoring not through living comfortably, but partaking in the passion and death of Jesus.  Only then can we resurrect from the death of our lives to its newness in Jesus Christ.


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