Jeremiah 33:14-16 / 1 Thess 3:12 – 4:2 / Luke 21:25-28, 34-36
One of the easily available nutritious tropical fruit is the humble papaya.
The papaya has a sweet taste and a vibrant colour and the wide variety of health benefits make the papaya a popular fruit.
It is available at most times of the year and it is also not that expensive. In fact, it may be called a budget fruit.
And it can be eaten in many ways. It can be sliced up and refreshing to eat when it is chilled. It can be added to salads, or blended into smoothies, or for toppings on the ice cream, or even added into soup.
The nutrients found in the papaya are thought to have a range of health benefits, and may help to protect against a number of health conditions.
But of course, having said all that, as in everything that is good and beneficial, it has to be eaten in moderation.
What is usually done when we want to eat the papaya, is to cut it up and the roundish black seeds are removed and discarded.
But here is where we might just want to take a moment to do a reflection.
The seeds, unlike the skin of the papaya, is not useless just because we don't consume them.
In fact, each seed, if planted and nurtured, has the potential to germinate and grow into a tree and bear fruit.
So, each seed is a sign of life, and it is up to us whether we want to do something about it.
In the gospel, Jesus talked about signs when He said that there will be signs in the sun and the moon and the stars. He goes on to give a disturbing and terrifying picture of what might seem to be the end times.
But Jesus also added by saying that it is in those times that the Son of Man will come in a cloud with power and great glory.
With that, Jesus tells us what we should do for now, and that is to watch ourselves, or our hearts will be coarsened with the unimportant things of life.
Jesus ends off by urging us to stay awake, praying at all times and to stand in confidence.
Yes, we have to watch ourselves and stay awake and keep our hearts from being coarsened and hardened by the cares of this world, and ignoring the signs that God is showing us.
As we begin the season of Advent, we light the first candle of the Advent wreath. This first Sunday of Advent marks a new beginning in the liturgical life of the church.
The lighted candle is a sign for us to reflect deeper about life, so that we can see more signs that are pointing to life and love.
There is this story of a traveller who came upon an empty plot of land. He noticed an elderly man walking about in the barren land with a metal pipe in his hand.
As he walked around, he would stop now and then to poke the metal pipe into the ground and then he would drop a seed from the other end of the pipe.
The traveller was curious and asked the elderly man what he was doing. The man replied, “When I came into this world, there were fruit trees and I enjoyed the fruits that others before me had planted. I want to do the same, so that the next generation can have fruits to enjoy.”
So, the next time when we cut up a papaya, let us take a moment to look at the seeds.
We may know the number of seeds in a papaya, but only God knows the number of papayas there can be in a seed.
The signs that God wants us to look at are not in the sun or moon or stars.
God wants us to look at the signs in the people that we encounter.
God wants us to see that in each person, there is a potential to bear fruits of life and love.
When we can see that, then the season of Advent would prepare us for a joyful celebration of life and love.