Staying alert for God's surprises
In the Gospel for the First Sunday of Advent, Jesus tells his disciples to “Be watchful! Stay Alert!” because they don’t know when God is coming. In the parable Jesus exalts the image of the gatekeeper, the one who’s ready when the master returns. The truth is that we are all “gatekeepers.” The mystery of God’s advent is that he comes into the world through human beings, first because of Mary’s courageous and generous “yes,” but also in all places and times through people like us.
Twenty years ago, I became a gatekeeper in a surprising and life-changing way. It began with the gift of a sabbatical from my work as a parish priest in Brooklyn, NY. I had long had an attraction to the life of a missionary and so reached out to a colleague working in Turkana in the remote north of Kenya.
For much of my time there I was the only “mzungu” (white person) in the village. The total immersion into a new culture and language with no one to rely on stretched me to grow in ways I would not have chosen on my own. It forced me to see and feel the lives of the local people with none of the usual ways to distance myself from their suffering and poverty.
My heart had been moved to help, and when I got back to New York I was determined to do something. But how could I help the people I had just left from the other side of the world? One thing I did now appears entirely providential.
Flipping through a magazine, I saw an ad for Unbound (then called CFCA). In my memory its message read, “You may not be able to change world poverty, but you do have the power to change one person’s life.” I sent in the form and became number 5,528 in a family of sponsors that has now grown to a quarter million.
Today I sponsor three people and have preached on behalf of Unbound all over the country. I love to present the message of Unbound because it gives people what I so wanted to be able to offer, a concrete and positive way to make a difference. It has allowed me to realize my role as a gatekeeper, ready when the Lord comes, as he so often does, in the most unlikely ways and through surprising people. It has been one of the most satisfying and rewarding gifts of my nearly 40 years as a priest.
When we say “yes” to God, God comes into the world again. So “Be watchful! Stay Alert!”