2 Sam 7:1-5, 8-11, 16 / Romans 16:25-27 / Luke 1:26-38
One of our desires in life, besides wanting to be happy, is that everything would be peaceful and smooth sailing.
We don’t like it when life becomes bumpy and rocky and stony. In other words, we don’t like to be disturbed in life, whether by situations or by people.
When we are disturbed, we will get irritated and frustrated, and we will grumble and complain.
What we have undergone, and are still undergoing, is a great disturbance. We can call it the disturbance of our generation.
The only consolation is that everyone, in fact the whole world, is affected by it. We have not heard anyone say “I love this pandemic” or that “I was looking forward to this”. For anyone to say that, they must be crazy.
Oh yes, this time has been a time of great disturbance.
But when we think about it, since when life is without disturbance.
From the moment we came into this world, it is one disturbance after another. Life is like a series of disturbances.
Today’s gospel passage is commonly known as the Annunciation. It is a message of the good news of salvation.
But when we read it again, we will notice that when the angel Gabriel greeted Mary, she was disturbed, and deeply disturbed.
And maybe even before that, and if we do some imagining, we may picture the angel Gabriel being rather disturbed when God told him to go and announce that message to Mary.
We can imagine that as Gabriel came to Nazareth, he was a bit anxious and a bit nervous.
Would Mary accept what he was going to tell her? It sounded so out of this world, so impossible.
And true enough, Mary was disturbed, deeply disturbed. And Gabriel had a lot of explaining to do.
But in the end, Mary accepted. But that doesn’t mean that the disturbance has ended. In fact, more was to come.
As we hear this passage on the last Sunday of Advent, we would not think of it as a disturbing message.
After all, Christmas is just a few days away, and we want to be happy and forget about the disturbances of life.
But actually, disturbances are a source of growth and we can draw strength and experience from it.
We see in nature. When the winds blow, the trees are disturbed, but they grow stronger from it and they hold on firmer to the ground.
This time of great disturbance has affected all of us, and especially the seniors.
Today is the day that Fr Paul Tong celebrates the 67th anniversary of his priestly ordination.
We would want to celebrate for him and he would have loved to see us without wearing masks and without having to observe safe- distance. He would have loved to see us celebrate without any restrictions.
At 93 years old, this situation has affected and maybe even disturbed him.
But 67 years ago, when he said “Yes” to the Lord, the Lord gave him the strength to face the challenges of the ministry and the disturbances of life.
Oh yes, Fr Tong has had his share of challenges and disturbances: he couldn’t go back to his family and his country when there were persecutions against the Church; he had to adapt quickly to different life-styles and learn different languages; he had to keep believing when the going was rough.
Fr Tong has shown us what perseverance and resilience is about when we say “Yes” to the Lord.
So like Mary our Mother, and like Fr. Paul Tong, let us also say “Yes” to the Lord.
We will face challenges and disturbances, but we will overcome and we will grow stronger and be happy in life.