The Sánchez Archives SEVENTH SUNDAY OF EASTER Year B

By
Patricia Datchuck Sánchez

Help Wanted

ACTS 1:15-17, 20-26
1 JOHN 4:1-16
JOHN 17:11-19

In the interim period between Easter and Pentecost, the lectionary reacquaints the gathered assembly with those processes by which the earliest followers of Jesus developed a network of vital communities which became known as church. Accepting Jesus’ mandate to go into the whole world and preach the good news required that a variety of missions be organized. These missions necessitated the appointment, consecration and commissioning of church leaders or missionaries. In today’s readings, contemporary believers are reminded of the criteria for leadership which were operable in the early church.

First, however, it may prove beneficial to engage in some personal speculation. Imagine that you have been appointed to an ad hoc Search Committee whose task it is to find a replacement for Judas (see first reading). How would you go about the task of assembling a group of possible candidates? What would be the criteria guiding your selection? What qualities would you be looking for? How would the final decision be made? Who would make it?

Perhaps you would post a “Help Wanted” notice in the market place; this would of course presume that interested applicants were literate. Your ad might include other requirements as well, such as: (1) demonstrate administrative abilities; (2) higher education at a reputable academy; (3) willingness to travel; (4) good people skills; (5) fluency in other languages; (6) letters of recommendation. Although these criteria may well serve the process of choosing contemporary leaders, they do not appear to have been uppermost in the minds of the early Christians. On the contrary, potential leaders were evaluated solely on the basis of their relationship with Jesus. Those whom the community nominated had to have been witnesses of Jesus’ saving words and works during his ministry and to have had an experience of the risen Christ. That was it; the rest was of little consequence. What was essential was to have known Jesus Christ in faith and to have been so transformed by that relationship as to be compelled to reach out in service so that others might come to similar knowledge, faith and service.

Both today’s second reading and gospel (selections from the Johannine corpus of literature) underscore the importance of the disciple’s ongoing relationship with Jesus. To acknowledge Jesus in both word and work is to become the very dwelling place of God (1 John).

Those who remain one with Jesus, and one with one another in his name, will be consecrated in truth; sent into the world by Jesus, those who are ministers of his word will know God’s protection from evil (John).

Also worth noting is the method followed by the early Christians in choosing their leaders. There were no ad hoc committees or autonomous decisions. All of the believers were involved in a collaborative process. This broader participation in selecting prospective leaders, opens the field for a greater range of candidates and, as Roland C. Faley (Footprints on the Mountain, Paulist Press, New York: 1994) has noted, manifests confidence in the Holy Spirit by showing greater sensitivity to the belief that God is truly present among us.

Once gathered, the community prayed together, seeking guidance from the Holy Spirit and from Scripture. Keeping uppermost in their minds the example of ministry Jesus had set while he was with them, the assembly suggested names of potential leaders. Without campaigning or debate, the decision was then left in God’s hands (lots were cast, Acts 1:26).

The fact that these criteria for leadership and this method of selecting leaders enabled the nascent church to grow and to develop, while facing and surviving both persecution and schism would appear to warrant the admiration and serious consideration of contemporary believers. Who are the leaders among us? How have they been chosen? Is there room for improvement?

ACTS 1:15-17, 20-26

Why was it so important that Judas be replaced? Granted, he had botched his ministry, but as Luke indicates in this excerpted passage from Acts, the early church had already begun to understand that Judas’ betrayal of Jesus and the subsequent chain of events that climaxed in Jesus’ death on the cross were all part of the surprising and unexpected but salvific plan of God for humankind.

Peter’s statement about scripture being fulfilled in verse 16 referenced Psalm 40:10 which reads, “Even my friend who had my trust and partook of my bread has raised his heel against me.” Recall the morsel which Jesus gave to Judas just before he took his leave from the others at the last supper (John 13: 18, 26-27). Also referenced in Peter’s speech are Psalms 69:26 and 109:8 (Acts 1: 20). Passages like these, drawn from the Hebrew writings and prophets, enabled our ancestral brothers and sisters in Christ to perceive and appreciate the divine purpose.

But, why was Judas replaced? Readers of the Christian scriptures will not find any other such narrative, telling of the replacement of James or Peter, or of any other apostles when they died. That would lead us to conclude that Luke had another reason for including this particular event in Acts.

The first clue as to Luke’s intention will be found in his gospel. At the beginning of his passion narrative, Luke remarked, “Then Satan entered into Judas, the one surnamed Iscariot, who was counted among the Twelve. . .” (Luke 22:5). Because the integrity of the Twelve had been damaged and because of the importance Luke placed on the role and significance of the Twelve, it was expedient that Judas be replaced. The Twelve had each been called by Jesus and commissioned by him to preach and to heal (Luke 9:1). When Jesus forged the new covenant in his own blood, he told the Twelve that they would share in his kingdom as leaders and judges of the twelve tribes of the New Israel (Luke 22:20, 30). The Twelve who believed in Jesus as Lord and Messiah would replace those leaders who failed the people by refusing to accept him.

As Luke Timothy Johnson has explained, “The betrayal of Judas was therefore more than simply the failure of an individual. It splintered the numerical and symbolic integrity of that group which constituted the beginning and essential authority of the restored people of God” (The Acts of the Aposles, The Liturgical Press, Collegeville, MN: 1992).

Recall that it was Luke’s intention to offer his readers assurance (Luke 1:1-4) that they were being offered the authentic gospel of salvation and that this gospel would be preached authentically and with continuity by the church (Acts). Here at the outset of Acts, Luke portrays the reconstitution of the Twelve as a way of deepening that assurance and underscoring that continuity. Once the Spirit was bestowed at Pentecost, the new Israel would come into existence and God’s promise would be fulfilled.

Some have suggested that there is another lesson to be learned from Judas’ botched ministry and subsequent demise. Beverly Roberts Gaventa thinks that “Judas stands as a type, anticipating all who will hear the gospel but never receive it, and especially those who would block its proclamation” (Proclamation, Easter, Fortress Press, Minneapolis MN: 1996).

With Judas’ experience to warn and instruct us, we look forward to the renewal of strength and grace that Pentecost will bring.

1 JOHN 4:1-16

Chicken Soup for the Soul (Jack Cornfield and Mark V. Hansen, Health Communications Inc., Deerfield Beach FL: 1993) is a delightful anthology of stories poems and anecdotes about the extraordinary moments of our ordinary lives. Included among its varied collection is a story about a little girl. She and her mother had just returned home from church and the child went immediately to her desk and began to draw. After watching her work intently for a while, the mother asked, “What are you drawing, dear?” “A picture of God,” came the reply. “But,” said

the mother, “no one has ever seen God. No one knows what God really looks like.” Undeterred and still at work, the girl answered, “They will when I’m finished!” The charming naiveté of this little girl provides believers with a key for understanding one of the most profound aspects of Johannine theology. Like the mother in this story, the Johannine author told his readers, No one has ever seen God. . . yet if we love one another as God has loved us, then God’s love is brought to perfection in us (v. 12). In all we say, and in all we do with the course of our life, we are, as it were, a living, breathing, drawing or illustration of who God is. Inasmuch as our life and love are an authentic facsimile of the life and love of God, then when our life’s portrait is given its final stroke, people will know what God looks like.

As Raymond E. Brown (The Epistles of John, Anchor Bible, Vol. 30, Doubleday and Co. Inc., New York: 1984) has explained, the reader of 1 John might have expected the author to say, “If God has loved us so (v. 11), we in turn ought to love God. But it is primarily in our loving one another that we imitate God and God, who is love, is revealed in us. In other words, the love of God, incarnate in Jesus, must become incarnate in the life of the believer.

The notion of God’s love being brought to perfection in us (v. 12) warrants some clarification. Here, as elsewhere in the Christian scriptures (1 Corinthians, 2:16; 14:20; Matthew 5:48, Hebrews 2:10, 5:9, 7:28), the term perfection, or teleioun in Greek, does not mean without fault or flaw; on the contrary, perfection implies maturity, wholeness and the realization of an intended goal. God’s love for humanity comes to perfection, i.e. to maturity and wholeness and is fully realized when it becomes a visible, tangible reality within the believing community. Until then, it is like a picture being drawn, a work in progress; until then, the gifts of the Spirit spur believers on to perfection.

As she adds what may be her final strokes and finishing touches to the picture of God which is her life, Mother Teresa of Calcutta reminds us, ”Spread love wherever you go: first of all in your own house. Give love to your children, to your wife or husband, to a next door neighbor. . . Let no one ever come to you without leaving better and happier. Be the living expression of God’s love, love in your face, love in your eyes, love in your smile, love in your warm greeting.”

JOHN 17:11-19

Usually, someone’s last will and testament is read by another, after the person has died. And usually, such a document is intended to parcel out the material possessions of the deceased in the manner they had predetermined. However, the Johannine Jesus delivered his last will and testament personally, and before his death, bequeathing not material things but the abiding gift of the word of God with his own. Similar last testaments can be found in Greek literature and Hebrew tradition (Deuteronomy 32-32) where Kevin Quast (Reading the Gospel of John, Paulist Press, New York: 1991) explains, “the farewell discourses of a dying leader characteristically ended in a prayer that expressed the author’s paramount hopes for both the leader and his audience.”

Jesus’ last testament represents the longest prayer in the Christian scriptures and revolves around the shared union between the Father and the Son, between the Son and his disciples and among future generations of believers. In the excerpt which comprises today’s gospel, the focus of Jesus’ prayer is on those whom he will soon leave behind. Because the mission of making known the Word was to continue after his death, and because he would no longer be present to guard and care for them, Jesus asked that the Father protect his disciples from the hatred of the world and from the evil one. He also prayed that God would consecrate, i.e. make holy, those who believe in him. Stanley B. Marrow (The Gospel of John, Paulist Press, New York: 1995) explains that being consecrated means that “believers no longer belong to themselves, but to God. Therefore their ‘sanctification’ (consecration), their status of holiness, is a status of appurtenance, of belonging to another, not of achievement.” They are holy because of what they are (viz., God’s very own loved children) not as a consequence of what they do.

In their consecrated status and by their belonging to God, believers in Jesus live in juxtaposition with the world. They (we) are light as opposed to darkness, love as opposed to hatred. As Marrow further points out, the hatred of the world is the criterion of the community’s existence. By the hatred of the world, the community is known for what it truly is. In more contemporary terms, Christians might think of themselves and their life-style as a sort of counter-culture which necessarily confronts the world with truth.

Unfortunately, today’s gospel falls short of its intended theological conclusion because verses 20-21 are omitted. Therein, the reason for Jesus’ entreaty is fully manifested; he has prayed for the unity, protection, joy and holiness of his own, for the purpose of bringing the world to faith. “I pray not only for them, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, so that they may all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, that the world may believe that you sent me.”

If Christian unity is to attain its intended goal, viz., a believing world, then the task of achieving such unity will require great effort. The occasional ecumenical prayer breakfast will not suffice; nor will the sharing of facilities and/or equipment simply because necessity demands it. Christian unity is a theological process of actualizing our oneness with one another through, and because of, our oneness with Christ. When the world begins to see that Christians are seriously willing to struggle with this process, then it will be compelled to believe, and Jesus’ prayer will finally be realized.

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