For Sunday
Lent 4A
Collect
Gracious Father, whose blessed Son Jesus Christ came down from heaven to be the true bread which gives life to the world: Evermore give us this bread, that he may live in us, and we in him; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.
Amen.
Reading
Reflection
Back at the beginning of John 7, the Judean leaders begin plotting to kill Jesus. They are out to stop his mission. And here, two chapters later, they are intent on destroying the good news of this miracle healing.
This incessant drive to destroy is the machine working behind this passage. It is also the disappointment to which Jesus responds.
This man can see! But rather than celebrate in that or give praise to God, they seek to prove someone a liar. First the young man. Then his parents. Then the young man a second time.
To call this a misunderstanding would be insulting to misunderstandings. And similarly, to give Jesus a hard time for giving them a hard time at the end, is similarly our choosing a way of obstinance.
While I am quite fond of the skeptics in Scripture, I am as impatient as Jesus is with impudence. This is a story that should be a celebration. But these cynical “protectors” of the faith offer an inquisition.
That it so resembles the way many leaders in our world choose the way of distrust, vengeance, and destruction is no coincidence. Especially when they do so in the name of God. Or to protect their faith or culture.
A faith born of self-sacrifice and being crucified, not freeing ourselves from having to endure it.