5th
Sunday of Lent
Cycle
B
March
18, 2018
Saint
Mary Parish, Pylesville 8:00 am
Saint Matthew Parish, Baltimore 11:00am
Two Struggles
I struggle with two things in today’s gospel. Actually, it
is two words.
1st Struggle:
“Hate”
My
first struggle is with the word “hate.”
Jesus
says, “Whoever hates their life in
this world will preserve it for eternal life.” Well, I don’t hate my
life; in fact, I like it.
I
really enjoy good food, things like pasta and crab cakes. I enjoy reading
mystery novels and theology books and I like to watch movies.
I enjoy
spending time with my family and friends. And they are just some of the things
that I really like about my life.
1st Resolution:
Priority
So, what
does Jesus mean when he talks about “hating
our life in this world”?
Scripture
scholars tell us that he is talking about our priorities and choices. Jesus wants
us to make him and his values a priority.
This
means that we choose to follow the way of the gospel instead of other ways. For
example, a child would take up for a classmate who is being bullied.
A
teenager or young adult would refuse to experiment with drugs and might even
choose other friends to hang out with. We adults would be faithful to our life
commitments – to marriage and family, or for me, to priesthood.
So “hating our life in this world”
means that we make Jesus and his values our priority. It means that we do this even when it is
difficult and even when it goes against what others are doing.
2nd Struggle:
“World”
Now I
also struggle with the word “world.”
Jesus
seems to speak negatively about the “world.” He talks about “the judgment of the world” and “the ruler of the world” being driven out.”
I
struggle with this because God made the world. The Book of Genesis says that God looked at
what he had made and saw that it was very good.
I find
so much of creation beautiful and I find a lot of goodness in the world.
And yet, this gospel seems to see the world as bad.
2nd Resolution:
The Way
So
again, what does Jesus really mean here?
Scripture
scholars interpret this in context – and that’s really important for
understanding the Scripture correctly – the context. The idea is that Jesus is
not saying that the world itself is evil.
Instead,
the word world, as Jesus uses it, means life not lived according to the
way of the gospel – life not lived according to the way of the gospel. In other
words, not “hating” our lives.
So this
would mean the child at school goes along with bullying a classmate or a teen
tries drugs or we adults waver on our commitments when the grass looks greener
on the other side or when the going gets tough. The word world means
choosing something other than the way of the gospel.
Jesus
wants us to realize that the world, again, as he uses the word, that the
world can be in all of us. And it is from this that we need fuller
conversion.
Conclusion
This
takes me to one final thought that kind of wraps all of this together.
Jesus
says today: “When I am lifted up, I will
draw everyone to myself.” Here “lifted
up” means Jesus being “lifted up”
on the cross.
He says
that this will draw “everyone” to
himself. This will happen because his being “lifted
up” shows us God’s unlimited love for us.
This is
also what the word “glorified” means.
Jesus says: “The hour has come for the
Son of Man to be glorified.”
Being “glorified” means making God present. And
this happens in the great demonstration of God’s love when Jesus is “lifted up” on the cross.
This love
is so powerful that it moves us to repent of the elements of the world
that are within us. It moves us to hate our lives, in the Scriptural
understanding of that word, and to make Jesus and his way our priority.
