The Last Hour
“Children, it is the last hour;
and just as you heard that the antichrist was coming,
so now many antichrists have appeared.”1 John 2:18
St. John wrote in his letter that it is the last hour. With the coming of Christ and His Paschal Mystery, a new era has been ushered in and the Kingdom of God has come to man. Jesus Christ is the Kingdom. And so St. John speaks of this “last hour,” pointing to the eschaton or the end of time. How fitting it is that on New Year’s Eve we have this reading, the reading the speaks of the “last hour.”
If today was the culmination of the “last hour” and Christ was to come again, will we be ready? Have we prepared our hearts well during this past Advent to welcome Christ into our lives and our hearts on Christmas day and every day since? As we come to the end of this calendar year, how have we journeyed? Have we journeyed with God or have we journeyed ahead or even away from Him?
St. John speaks of these antichrists who are false prophets and those who really tempt us and draw us away from the Light, from God Himself. We can see this happening in our world today, and so the last hour is indeed among us. Have we mistaken darkness for Light or worldly pleasures for grace? Have we sought to conform God to us rather than conforming our hearts to His? In the prologue of his Gospel, John speaks of the Word becoming flesh and how this Word was Life and the Light of the world that dispels the darkness of evil. He also describes two groups of people: one who accepted Jesus and thereby becoming children of God and the other group who rejected Him. Which group do we belong to?
As this year comes to an end and a new year is ushered in, whose will we be? Will we choose God or will we choose the world? Will we choose life or will we choose death? Will we choose hope or will choose despair? It is easy to say that we will choose God, life, and hope because it is obvious, but when we reflect on this past year, how often have we chosen the opposite? This new year, in this last hour, may we come to not simply choose God by our words but truly do so by our lives. And this can only be possible by staying beside our Lord, talking with Him and listening to Him. May our prayer life be ever strengthened this new year.
