Posts Tagged ‘Hebrews 5:5–10’

Jeremiah 31:31-34
Hebrews 5:5-10
John 12:20-33
Psalm 51:1-13
or Psalm 119:9-16

We are in the deep end of Lent now, the far side of the wilderness.  The forty-day path of prayer, fasting, and acts of mercy, is drawing ever closer to the cross.  It’s like the last few miles of a marathon; the last set of finals before the end of term; the last month of a pregnancy; all yearning and aching to end well but not quite there yet.  Too far to go back, and so we continue to strain forward.  There are so many ways that life in the world in general these days has been like a long journey.  You would be forgiven for feeling a little or even very weary.  But, take heart, because there is hope on the horizon although, it may not be readily apparent.

The Jesus whom we encounter in this 12^th Chapter of John has also set his face toward Jerusalem and the completion of the race marked out for him.  In fact, Jesus is more aware of this unravelling than most.  When Philip and Andrew go to tell Jesus about a whole new group of people that want to see him you can feel a sense of eagerness and enthusiasm at beginning to know Jesus.  His fame is spreading.  “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified!”

Oh, but glory looks different than fame and notoriety, which is why Jesus immediately begins to explain what it means for him to be glorified.  It’s like a grain of wheat that falls to the earth and dies so that it may bear much fruit.  Without descent and death, there can be no new life.  Without transformation and conversion, it’s just a lone grain of wheat, small and ineffectual.  Without being broken open, it remains closed and unto itself.

Cognitively we know that seeds produce plants.  But, it’s a hidden process that takes place in the darkness of soil and isn’t immediately apparent to the eye.  Planting a seed in the hope of new growth takes trust and patience.  Experienced gardeners and farmers grow in that trust but planting is never without risk.  What if the seed doesn’t grow?  What if something goes wrong and it’s all for naught?  That waiting in the dark can be terrifying when a crop is badly needed.

These days of sowing the seeds of renunciation and penitence can feel exhausting when spiritual fruit is hard to see and only the darkness, fear, and pain of death are near.  Our rule of life describes the nature of this kind dying, “Hardships, renunciations, losses, bereavements, frustrations, and risks are all ways in which death is at work in advance preparing us for the self-surrender of bodily death.  Through them we practice the final letting go of dying, so that it will be less strange and terrifying to us.” (Ch. 48, Holy Death)

At this point in our Lenten journey, Christ points to a glimpse of the glory we await because seeing is part and parcel of God’s glory.  The root words in Greek and Hebrew that are ascribed to God both take on the meaning of visible splendor, power on display.  Glory is outward.  Jesus is the visible image of the invisible God and displays God’s power in his life.  The death he was willing to die, like a grain of wheat falling to the earth, has produced great fruit for us to see.

I can still recall the wonder of the childhood experiments where we would place little beans against the side of a clear plastic cup lined with just some wet paper towel.  It seemed like overnight we would come back to find that the outer casing had cracked open and little shoots were coming out, top and bottom.  Before long, that original little bean was hardly recognizable as the plant grew right before our eyes.  It was quick and gratifying to young attention spans and it gave me the visual confirmation of the process that typically goes on in secret in the soil.  I could see with my own eyes how the death of that seed produced new life.

But the stakes are higher with a human life.  The fear and uncertainty of death are magnified.  And they get personal when Jesus tells us to follow him into a death like his.  Thanks be to God, Jesus was willing to feel this, and to make it evident.  “Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say—‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour.”

Faced with death, and the ignominious death of the cross, Jesus goes to great lengths to encourage us along.  “Father, glorify your name.”  Show them what I have seen!  And like, thunder the voice replies, I have glorified it and I will glorify it again.  The signs and wonders of Jesus were all God’s visible splendor.  The work of the cross is God’s power on display.  “When I am lifted up, I will draw all people to myself.”

Christ was lifted up in his obedience to the Father as the letter to the Hebrews says.  His obedience and submission to the Father has become the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him.  As Jesus calls us to follow him, to serve him, to lose our life like him, we are inexorably drawn to him like a strong magnet.  Pulled inwardly to remain with him.

And we have seen this glory.
Who in your life has drawn you to Jesus?
Can you see them?  Name them?
Do they know what fruit has been born of their dying to self?
They may not know it just as we may not know who is being drawn to Christ because of us.
The good news is that is has happened, it is happening, and it shall happen.

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God.  Consider him who endured such hostility against himself from sinners, so that you may not grow weary or lose heart. In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.”  (Hebrews 12:1-3)

Take heart, dearly beloved of God.  The path we walk with Christ will lead us all the way to through death until our baptism is complete.  “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain”  Unless we lose our life in this world we cannot keep it to everlasting life.  Unless the bread is broken it cannot be given.  Bind yourself to Christ in his passion.  Pray for the consolations of Christ in this home stretch of our pilgrimage.  Be nourished by the prayer, Anima Christi, in poetic translation by John Henry Newman:

Soul of Christ, be my sanctification;
Body of Christ, be my salvation;
Blood of Christ, fill all my veins;
Water of Christ’s side, wash out my stains;
Passion of Christ, my comfort be;
O good Jesus, listen to me;
In Thy wounds I fain would hide;
Ne’er to be parted from Thy side;
Guard me, should the foe assail me;
Call me when my life shall fail me;
Bid me come to Thee above,
With Thy saints to sing Thy love,
World without end.

Amen.