6th Easter
John 14: 1-31
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| Good Shepherd |
“Let
not your hearts be troubled. Trust in the power that leads you to the Fatherly
Ground of the World and to me. In my Father’s house there are many rooms. If it
were not so, how could I have said to you, ‘I go there to prepare a place for
you’? And when I have gone and prepared
a place for you, I will come again and take you up into the realm of my being
and working, so that where I work, you also may work. And you know the way
where I am going.”
Then Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How
can we know the way?”
Jesus answered, “I myself am the Way—the Truth— and the Life. No one
finds his way to the Father but through me. If you had really known my Being,
you would have recognized my Father as well. From now on you do know him and
have seen Him.”
Then Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father; that would satisfy
our deepest yearning.”
Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long and yet you do not know
me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us
the Father’? Does your heart’s voice not tell you that I am in the Father and
the Father is in me? The words I say to you are not just my own. But the
Father, who lives eternally in me, continues to do his works in them. Build
your faith on the power of my Being that lets you know: I in the Father, the
Father in me. Or at least learn to trust through looking at the works
themselves that have arisen.
Truly, truly I say to you, whoever trusts in my Being will also do the
works that I do --and greater deeds will he do, because I go to the Father. Whatever you ask for in unity with
me, I will do it, so that the deeds of the Father may be revealed in the
working of the Son. When you turn to me in prayer in the power of my name, I
will be the Creating One in all your works. If you truly love me, you will
share in my spiritual goals. And I will ask the Father and He will send to you
another Counselor, who will stand by you for ever, even the Spirit of Truth.
The earthly world cannot receive this Counselor, for it cannot perceive his
working and does not recognize him. But you know him, for he will live with you
and will work in you.
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| Ascension, Ninetta Sombart |
Whoever bears my spiritual goals within himself, and brings them to
revelation in his working, is one who truly loves me. And whoever truly loves
me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and will reveal myself to
him.”
Then Judas, (not the Iscariot) said, “But Lord, how is it that you will
reveal yourself to us and not to the people who are in the world?
Jesus
replied, “Whoever truly loves me reveals my Spirit, and my Father will love him
and we will come to him and prepare with him a dwelling in the everlasting [an
eternal dwelling]. Whoever does not love me cannot reveal my Spirit. And the
spirit power of the word that you hear is not from me; it is the speaking of
the Father who sent me.
These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. But the
health-bringing Spirit, the Counselor whom the Father will send in my name, he
will teach you everything and will bring to your remembrance all that I have
said to you.
Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. Not as the world gives do I
give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled nor let them be afraid.
You heard me say to you, ‘I am going away, and yet I am coming to you’.
If you loved me you would have rejoiced, because I am going to the Father, for
the Father is greater than I am.
I have told you now, before it happens, so that when it happens you may
find trust. I no longer have much to say to you, for soon the ruler of this
world is coming. He has no power over me.
But I act in accordance with the Father’s purpose, as it was entrusted
to me, so that the world may know that I love the Father. Do the same. Arise,
let us be on our way.
This was indeed a valid fear in the time before Christ’s
coming. For it was a true threat—humankind was losing its share in ongoing
life. But since Christ’s death and resurrection, we need not fear being
extinguished by death. For He has already died our death for us, and has
prepared a place for each of us to be in the afterworld. “Because I live, you
will live also,’ He says. John
14:19
6th Easter
May 13, 2012
John 14: 1-31
There can be many things in life that trouble us—people who
are annoying, economic insecurity, illness. All of these things are minor key
versions of the one big trouble, our deepest and most innate worry—the fear of
death. For what we really fear is loss of our own self, loss of others.
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| Fra Angelico |
We need only follow Him there. He gives us the pathway on earth by which to
follow Him: our love for Him will guide us. ‘Whoever bears my spiritual goals
within himself and brings them to revelation in his working is the one who
truly loves me.’ John
14:21
What are His goals?—that we come to trust in his power in
our hearts; that we come to live our lives as an expression of our love for
Him; that in loving trust we come to live in Him, the giver of Peace. In loving
trust our hearts are peace-filled, even in the face of loss, of illness, even
of death. As Wendell Berry who lives close to the heart of nature says:
When despair grows in me
and I wake in the middle of the
night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my
children's lives may be,
….I come into the peace of wild
things
who do not tax their lives with
forethought
of grief. I come into the presence
of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind
stars
waiting for their light. For a time
