Word to the Wise
Saturday, May 20, 2023 - 6th Week of Easter - Sat
[Acts 18:23-28 and John 16:23b-28]"I came from the Father and have come into the world. Now I am leaving the world and going back to the Father." [John]
In the Gospel According to John, like a good drama, everything goes according to script. Jesus is not just the innocent victim of scheming religious authorities, although they play a role. He is in charge of his mission. He has been sent into the world and now, at the Last Supper, with his mission almost completed, he is preparing the disciples for the last and most dramatic moment in his mission. His "hour" of glory is about to take place.
Jesus' drama will be replaced by the disciples': "'As the Father has sent me, so I send you.' And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, 'Receive the holy Spirit. Whose sins you shall forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.'" [John 16:22-23]. He has already reminded them that the "world" will hate them for the message that they will preach. This not only reflects what was going on at the Last Supper but to all the disciples at the time this gospel was composed and is true to this day.
We live now, in our western individualized culture, in a time in which faith is relegated to the realm of personal opinion in which we can fashion a god of our own designs. Golden calves abound. Jesus becomes just one of many "sages through the ages." That is not what our faith proclaims. We proclaim Jesus Christ as THE one whom God has sent. He is the Word made Flesh who dwelt among us. The beauty and power of the Gospel According to John enable us to encounter Jesus personally through the dramatic encounters told and retold in this gospel portrait. He is "the way, the truth and the life." AMEN