“I AM, For You”
Saint John 8: 46-59
Judica: 29 March Anno Domini 2020
Father Jay Watson SSP
Those who either don’t believe in God, or do…but hate Him, resort to the ancient lie (Satan’s original lie) “then why do bad things happen to good people?” Job asked that question. C.S. Lewis wrote his famous book ‘The Problem of Pain’ to address it. Mark Twain blasphemously opined: “If God is omnipotent but shows no mercy then He’s a thug; if He’s merciful but can’t help, then He’s no God.”
Christ asks “Which of you convinceth Me of sin?”
“Can any of you prove me guilty of sin?”
Eve, Adam, you, we all try and put the blame on God, other people, bad luck, or fate. We do not “fear, love, and trust in God above all things.” We are ungrateful and, like Adam, like Eve, we point the finger at the “other” rather than ‘man up’ and admit our sin, our guilt, our total responsibility for badness. “Mea culpa, Mea culpa, Mea Maxima Culpa.” Jesus is Good. He is goodness, righteousness incarnate.
He shares this truth with all by His revealed words in Scripture. The Bible, this Gospel text, the truth on paper, in voice, in ears, that He IS in His very Body and Blood and presence in The Sacrament.
We by the power of The Holy Ghost, in repentance, will turn from our natural and fallen inclination to blame God, and we will simply repent as He comes to us in Mercy and Love. We will not be angry with Him for corona virus or cancer or other hideously monstrous physical diseases. We will not point the finger of blame at our Lord for mis-carriages, still born death, auto accidents taking children, fires, floods, plagues or pestilences. We will not try and convict The Christ of “holding back” from us…even when we crave His precious Body and Blood in The Lord’s Supper, and can’t have it because of this pandemic. All pandemics our temporary. Eternity with God as we feast at the Wedding Banquet of The Lamb, with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, lasts forever. The Psalmist speaks Jesus to you: “Sing unto The Lord, O ye saints of His, and give thanks at the remembrance of His holiness. For His anger endureth but for a moment; in His favour is Life: weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning” [Ps. 30. 4-6].
Only you the faithful, the sheep, can hear this truth, this voice, this Word of your Good Shepherd—The Word made flesh. This is a gift of faith. Grace! The Jews disbelieved and rejected The Word and His Words. They convicted Him and called him an impure half-breed non-human—a “Samaritan.” They called Him demonic “Thou hast a devil.” They like all non-believers today dishonored Him, dishonored The God they thought they worshipped. They worshipped only themselves. They did not realize that the wages of sin is death. They did not know that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. They had no life and thus the saw death.
Christ speaks good news to you: “If a man keep my saying, He shall never see death.” We know that all men do die—physically—for a while. We know that all men will be raised, with their bodies, at The Lord’s return. This speak to you in all your fears of pain, sickness, loss, separation, and yes, physical death. Jesus is not the God of the dead but The God of the living. All those “in Christ” by faith will be with Him forever in the joys of the new heaven and the new earth, enjoying Him in the beatific vision of Glory and Peace.
Not just Enoch and Elias. All in Christ will never taste the eternal death of suffering in hell…in not just three or four weeks of shut-down, stay away from community, quarantine isolation; but in eternal loneliness. No! Abraham is not dead. The Prophets are not dead. You are not dead but alive because after Jesus suffered and died for you on the Cross, He rose again from the dead, forever shattering coronavirus, death, Satan, and hell.
The Lord was not “yet fifty years old” when he was blasphemed by the Jews. He was around 30 to 33 years of age…real flesh, real blood, real body from the Virgin. He may well appear to your resurrected eyes when you see Him at the end, but it won’t be the end. In the “forever” you will see the ancient of days, the timeless and infinite One looking like what He truly is: Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the completion…Life in all abundance forever and ever. Amen.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of The Holy Ghost
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