The Sánchez Archives FIFTH SUNDAY OF LENT Year B

By
Patricia Datchuck Sánchez

Struggles and Scars

JEREMIAH 31:31-34
HEBREWS 5:7-9
JOHN 12:20-33

When the American Baptist missionary Adoniram Judson (1788-1850 C.E.) went to Burma to preach the good news, he encountered untold hardships. During his seven-year mission, he suffered hunger and privation; for seventeen months he was held in Ava Prison and was subjected to incredible abuse and torture. As a result, his body was scarred for life from the beatings and by the iron shackles and chains he was forced to wear. Throughout many sufferings he remained undeterred in his resolve. When he was finally released from prison, he asked the civil authorities for permission to resume his work for the sake of the gospel. With indignation, the man in charge denied Judson’s request, saying, “My people are not foolish enough to listen to anything you say but I fear they may be impressed by your scars and thereby be convinced to turn to your religion!”

As the days of Lent ebb away, believers are led nearer and nearer to the culmination of this holy season. The church, through the liturgical readings, has kept us alert to what Jesus is saying to humankind. At this point, the gathered community is also invited to be once again impressed by the scars of Jesus and, thereby, to be more deeply convinced of the saving, merciful love of God for all people.

Both the second reading from Hebrews and the Johannine gospel focus attention on the suffering and death of Jesus on the cross as the means by which salvation has been effected. As is evident in today’s gospel, the fourth evangelist referred to the climax of Jesus’ life and his ultimate raison d’etre as his hour. Although it would probably not have been the means that you or I may have chosen, Jesus’ suffering was as necessary and central to his hour as was the resurrection.

In the sufferings of Christ are epitomized every human trial and hardship but suffering is not an end in itself; it served and continues to serve as the pathway to glory. It is through suffering that believers learn the true mettle of Jesus and the extent of God’s love. The Roman philosopher, Lucretius once wrote, “Look at a man in the midst of doubt and danger, and you will learn in his hour of adversity what he really is. It is then that true utterances are wrung from the recesses of the breast. The mask is torn off; the reality remains.”

If no other passages of the Christian scriptures survived except those which reference the last days of Jesus’ life or his hour, there would be sufficient evidence as to who he really was and sufficient substance on which to base our faith.

In his spiritual manifesto, Why I Am Still a Christian, Hans Küng suggests that the church is to emulate the “Spirit of the One crucified” by entering into those struggles which continue to scar humankind. He defines the church’s share of Jesus’ hour and its pathway to glory as “a struggle to ensure respect for human dignity against all animosity, even to the point of love for one’s enemies; a struggle for freedom against all oppression, even to the point of selfless service; a struggle for justice against all injustice, even to the point of voluntarily surrendering one’s rights; a struggle against all selfishness, even to the point of giving up the things we own; a struggle for peace against all strife, even to the point of infinite reconciliation.”

It would seem therefore that believers are charged to come away from today’s celebration with a renewed appreciation of Jesus’ saving scars as well as a deepened sense of dedication to the struggle of the human experience. The scars of human suffering are all around us; it is ours to soothe and offer assurance, that, just as the sufferings of Christ were the pathway to life, so shall every human struggle lay the groundwork for the glory of the resurrection.

JEREMIAH 31:31-34

Whereas the second reading and gospel focus on Jesus’ saving suffering, this short text from Jeremiah treats of the purpose of that singularly important struggle, viz., the forging of a new covenant between God and humankind. In its original historic context, Jeremiah’s promise of a new covenant was intended to encourage his contemporaries, exiled in Babylonia, with a prophecy of salvation. Jeremiah, who ministered to his people before and after Judah’s defeat and subsequent deportation, had interpreted their demise as just punishment for sins against the first, or Sinaitic covenant. With hearts hardened and unresponsive to God’s love, the people had failed repeatedly (Jeremiah 5:23; 13:10; 23:17). But what human sin had breached and destroyed, God had the power to heal and to make whole.

According to Jeremiah’s promise, the new covenant would be forever unbreakable (vv. 31-32). Unlike the stone tablets of the covenant mediated by Moses which were shattered as testimony of the people’s sins, the terms of the new covenant would be written in the heart, i.e. integrated within the seat of human intellect and will. Therefore the terms of the new covenant would not be shouldered as a heavy burden or freedom-stifling yoke but as a commitment, knowingly and deliberately embraced (vv. 33-34). “Here, Yahweh will inscribe and store the Torah within one’s governing center, one’s decision making mechanism, one’s value judgment center, one’s emotional thermostat, and one’s consciousness controller -- all of which constitute the heart (Proclamation, Lent, James H. Harris, Jerome C. Ross, Miles J., Jones, Fortress Press, Minneapolis: 1996). Furthermore the new covenant would be characterized by mercy, because sins will be forgiven, and by knowledge of God. Knowing in the scriptural sense implies a relationship of personal intimacy and profound communion. Forgiveness meant total amnesty from sin and its consequences.

Early Christian believers, reading their Hebrew scriptures by the light of Easter faith, recognized that Jeremiah’s promised covenant had finally come to pass through the person and mission of Jesus. James Gaffney has called Jeremiah 31:31-34, “a conceptual bridge” which links both testaments or covenants in its promise (Biblical Note For the Sunday Lectionary, Paulist Press, New York: 1978).

Recall the fact that the covenants of the Hebrew testament were established to solidify an agreement, a pact between two parties. Participants in the covenant pledged their loyalties and/or allegiance to one another. As a sign that the covenant was considered inviolable, it was sealed with a sacrifice; the blood of the offering was sprinkled on both parties. At Sinai, the blood of bulls ratified the covenant between God and Israel (Exodus 24:8); in the Christian scriptures, Jesus’ own blood forged a forever covenant between God and all peoples.

Paul was the first to point out the correlation between the covenant of Sinai and that of Jesus (2 Corinthians 3:6-18; 1 Corinthians 11:25). The evangelists also recognized that the sacrificial offering of Jesus’ body and blood on the cross had cut and sealed a new covenant with God (Mark 14:24; Matthew 26:27-28; Luke 22:20). At every Eucharistic sharing, the community remembers and experiences, once again, the knowledge of God and the merciful forgiveness of sin achieved by Jesus, emissary and architect of the everlasting covenant promised over twenty-five centuries ago by Jeremiah.

While contemporary believers should live in the confidence that this covenant will never be nullified, this does not preclude the fact of human sin. During Lent, believers have sufficient time for reflecting on the quality of their covenantal loyalties and for cooperating with the constant gift of grace which can daily restore spiritual holiness and integrity to their eternal relationship with God in Christ.

HEBREWS 5:7-9

For centuries, this particular document has been referred to as the Letter of Paul to the Hebrews. But, it is not a letter; Paul did not write it, nor was it originally addressed to the Hebrews! Nevertheless, Hebrews is an eloquent theological exposition or lengthy sermon which portrays Jesus as high priest par excellence of the new and everlasting covenant, formulated at the Passover-Eucharistic supper and sealed on the cross. One of the best written pieces of early Christian literature, Hebrews is probably the work of a Greek speaking, Jewish Christian, writing near the end of the first century C.E. (ca 80-96 C.E.). George W. MacRae (“Hebrews”, The Collegeville Bible Commentary, The Liturgical Press, Collegeville, MN: 1989) has suggested that the theology of Hebrews can be summed up in a threefold statement of the function of Christ, corresponding to the document’s three main divisions. First, Christ is presented as the new word of God to humanity, communicated in a new and personal idiom (1:1-4:13). Second, Christ is featured as the unique and eternal priest whose sacrificial death atones for sin, inaugurates a new covenant and provides open access to God (4:14-10:31). Third, Christ’s own insight into the heavenly world of God is offered as a model of faith and a source of hope for Christians (10:32-12:29).

Today’s second reading is an excerpt from the body of Hebrews in which the qualities of Christ’s priesthood are enunciated. Priests of the Sinai covenant were charged with: (1) interpreting the will of God for the people; (2) giving guidance as regards the law; (3) offering sacrifice on behalf of the community. Clearly, Jesus during his earthly ministry was devoted to helping his contemporaries to know God’s will and to live according to the fullness of the law as he understood it. In his own death, he functioned as both priest and victim to offer the one perfect sacrifice to God for the deliverance of sinful humankind. Therefore as high priest of the new covenant, his role surpasses and obviates both the Sinai covenant and those who were its mediators.

In contrast to the priests of the Sinai Covenant who remained in a class apart from the mainstream of society in order to maintain their ritual purity, Jesus was thoroughly immersed (v. 7) in the maelstrom of sinful humanity; his saving words and works enabled sinners to avail themselves of the authentic purity that only God could bestow.

But Jesus’ ministry was not exercised without great personal suffering. The author of Hebrews description of Jesus as offering prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears to God (v. 7) may be a reference to his night of agony in Gethsemane’s garden. According to the rabbis, “there are three kinds of prayers, each loftier than the preceding one, e.g., prayer, crying and tears. Prayer is made in silence; crying with raised voice; but tears overcome all things.” So united with those for whom he ministered, Jesus could empathize even with the plight of the tearful and desperate.

Through it all, Jesus was reverent and obedient to God; willing to learn the savage lessons that only suffering can teach, Jesus was made perfect (v. 9). To be perfected (from the Greek verb teleioun) means to achieve the purpose or goal for which something or someone is intended. Having done this, Jesus is the source of salvation and the model for all who still struggle against sin and evil.

JOHN 12:20-33

During the plundering of Europe by the Third Reich, Winston Churchill encouraged the citizens of Great Britain with these words, “Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duty, and so bear ourselves that, if the British Empire and its Commonwealth lasts for a thousand years, men will still say, ‘This was their finest hour’.” (Speech, Hansard 18 June 1940, col. 60). Students of world history are, of course, aware of the fact that Europe was to suffer the bitterness and pain of war for the next several years but Churchill’s words concerning the “finest hour” were less about chronological time than they were about a significant moment in life, or purpose for which someone or something has been created. Churchill believed that in the midst of its most tortuous testing, England would prove itself and thereby enjoy its finest hour.

At this juncture in the fourth gospel, Jesus is about to embark on his finest hour, a moment in which he would be tortuously tested, and during which, he would prove himself, his purpose and God’s saving plan to the fullest extent. Up to this point, the Johannine Jesus had frequently stated that his hour, or the hour had not yet come (2:4; 7:30; 8:20) and that the hour was indeed coming (4:21, 23; 5:25, 28-29). At this point in his ministry and on the occasion of his final Passover in Jerusalem, Jesus makes the dramatic declaration that “the hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified” (v. 23). From this moment on, things will escalate because the reason for Jesus’ appearance in human flesh (Hebrews 5:7) is about to be fully realized. Glory will indeed be one aspect of Jesus’ hour but it shall be accompanied and preceded by the scars of suffering, rejection, abandonment, death and burial.

Prompted by the Greeks who requested to see Jesus (to see in Greek, eidon, also means to believe), the subsequent discourse on Jesus’ hour could also be understood as a universal invitation to discipleship; “if anyone would serve me, let him follow me.” Not only Jews but Gentiles are challenged to participate in Jesus’ hour, sharing in his suffering and death as well as in the glory of his resurrection and exaltation.

As the discourse unfolds, Jesus’ hour is described in three ways: (1) as a death that gives life; the proverb about the grain of what was borrowed from the every day experience of Jesus’ contemporaries. Planted seeds, buried in the earth, seem for all practical purposes to be dead. Yet they begin to grow and rise out of the furrows of their grave to live and to nourish. So also with Jesus; his death will yield to a life which nourishes and sustains others. (2) Jesus’ hour will afford believers a crisis situation (v. 31); those who accept Jesus in faith will be free of the ruler of this world (Satan, power of evil). (3) Jesus’ hour provides access to eternal life to all. Lifted up in his finest hour, Jesus will draw everyone to himself (v. 32).

In the next two weeks, the gathered community will experience every aspect of Jesus’ hour. Each of us is invited to unite our personal struggles and scars with those of Jesus and to follow him confidently to the glory that awaits.

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