HOMILY LENT SUNDAY 05 – B
The Hour Has Come
(Jeremiah 31:31-34; Ps 51; Hebrew 5:7-9; John 12:20-23)
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What is your finest hour; your best moment, the highlight of your life?
The way to glory is through the acceptance of our “hour” like Jesus – a trusting relationship with Jesus that leads to the Cross.
Cindy Klassen wanted to be the best athlete that she could be. Her way to achieve that goal was through determination, dedication, strenuous training and personal sacrifice. Along the way she had the support of many others, especially her coaches, family and friends. Her finest hour was reaching the height of her career – Olympic goal. What is our finest hour? What could and should it be?
In today’s Gospel, Greeks come to the first disciples, wanting to meet Jesus, to perhaps become disciples as well. The reaction of Jesus is very interesting. Instead of focusing on these pagans who want to relate to him, he seems to go off on a tangent about his “hour.” What is that about, and what is that “hour”?
That “hour” is very significant. There are two previous times in the scriptures that this “hour” is mentioned. We first hear about this hour at the end of the temptations that Jesus faced in the desert at the beginning of the gospels, when Satan left him to return “at an opportune time” or “his hour.” The next time we hear about this “hour” is at the wedding feast at Cana, when Jesus responds to his mother Mary’s request to help the young couple that “it was not his hour.”
The hour refers to Jesus’ suffering, his passion, death and resurrection. It is also significant that three times in the scriptures God the Father blesses Jesus: first at his baptism in the Jordan when he took on our sinful humanity; second at the transfiguration, when Moses and Elijah appeared to him and discussed with him his passing in Jerusalem, or his “hour,” and here when Jesus speaks of his hour finally arriving.
The Father’s voice is heard for the third time, telling Jesus that the Father has glorified his name and would glorify it again. Those three love-filled blessings from the Father were meant to empower Jesus to accept death on the cross as the ultimate sign of the depth of God’s love for the world.
Jeremiah, in the first reading, gives us a glimpse into that deep love of God for the world, when he tells us that the Lord will forgive our iniquity and not even remember our sin. It is as if God the Father has divine amnesia – we can’t forget our sins but God can. When they are forgiven, it is like they do not even exist.
One of the inmates at the Remand Centre in Edmonton went to confession with a me. He had prepared well, and read his sins that he had itemized on three sheets of paper. When I told him that God had not only forgiven him these sins, but also forgotten them, that they no longer existed, he was filled with joy. When I suggested that he burn the list, he said he could not do that there, but asked if I would, which I agreed to do, saying I would include a prayer for him as I did that. The inmate was truly filled with hope and new energy, feeling ready to celebrate Easter now no matter what happened to him in his impending court date.
What is the implication of this “hour” for us? Suffering will come to us sooner or later in life. What is important is how we go through that suffering. It can make us bitter, or better. Suffering is intended to make us better. That is what St Paul is alluding to in the second reading: “Jesus learned obedience through suffering, and having been made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who believe in him.”
To accept some suffering, and to go through that suffering as Jesus did, without resentment or bitterness, is to understand the secret of the cross. It is to understand the secret of the Kingdom that Jesus sometimes mentioned, which is the brokenness of Jesus on the cross. It is said that therapy can alleviate some of our suffering; spirituality gives us the strength to go through that suffering.
The choice is ours – we can complain, become resentful and be bitter when suffering comes our way, or we can in faith connect our suffering to that of Jesus, accept it with patience, and let it be redemptive. What is remarkable is that when we accept the cross like Jesus, when we go through our suffering as he did, without bitterness or resentment, when we act like Jesus, we get to feel like him – free, at peace and even full of joy. Jesus, on the cross, was at peace, and so can we be at peace when we enter into our “hours,” our times of suffering, our crosses.
Our faith relationship with the Father, Son and Holy Spirit enables us to deal with our demons, character defects, addictions; go on healing journeys, learn to forgive others and ourselves, ask for forgiveness, deal with the messiness of life, and give our lives away in selfless sacrificial service and work for justice – all done with the peace and joy of the Spirit of Jesus.
The Eucharist that we celebrate now makes present that tremendous unconditional love of God for humanity that Jesus lived out during his hour, on the cross.
It also empowers us to go out, loved, forgiven and healed, to live out our own suffering as he did, and teach others to do the same, as the best way of building up the Kingdom of God here in this world, right here and now.
So remember, the way to glory is through the acceptance of our “hour” like Jesus – a trusting relationship with Jesus that leads to the Cross.
