“Why Did Abraham Rejoice?”

Fifth Sunday in Lent (Passion Sunday)

March 29, AD 2009

St. John VIII: 46-59

As I was meditating over our gospel lesson in preparing this sermon, a quote that I had recently seen echoed in my mind. It’s a quote written in 1939 by the famous author, George Orwell, who said, “We have now sunk to a depth at which restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men." It seems to me as if Jesus would have taken some comfort from George Orwell if he had been present and uttered those words after hearing the contentious exchange between Jesus and the Pharisees. Our gospel lesson is actually the conclusion of an argument that begins earlier in Chapter 8 of St. John’s Gospel after Jesus has saved the women taken in adultery from stoning. And remember what our Lord tells the woman? It wasn’t some psycho-babble about how important it was for her repressed feelings to find free expression, or “I’m okay, you’re okay” but instead it was a firm “go, and sin no more.”

This freeing from the bondage of sin through God’s saving Grace through belief in Jesus Christ as Lord is a key theme in the interchange that follows throughout Chapter 8. In order to get the full context of our lesson, we need to review briefly how the conversation evolves, and we see it becomes rather heated at times. Jesus begins by asserting “I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.”  That sets off the Pharisees who quarrel with Jesus over His self-revelatory claims, including His statement that they will die in their sins without belief in Him. In the midst of this extended argument, Jesus does say a word to some Jewish followers who do believe in Him: “If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed: And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” The enemies of Jesus retort that as Abraham’s descendents, they could never be in bondage to anyone. But Jesus answers, in effect, that it is the spiritual, not hereditary, life that really matters. Anyone committing sin is the servant or slave of sin. No making excuses here for a bad childhood or less than stellar genetic makeup. He also asserts that He speaks “that which I have seen with my Father: and ye do that which ye have seen with your father,” and that by seeking to kill Him, they are doing the deeds of their earthly fathers, not Abraham. Surely the commandment to not murder is operative here. The Jews then stoop to implying Jesus was born illegitimately by saying, “We be not born of fornication; we have one Father, God.” Jesus counters that “if God were your Father, ye would love me: for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of myself, but he sent me.” He then tells them that their father is really of the devil and is a liar, but He is telling them the truth. Don’t cast aspersions on the Holy Virgin Mary, Mother of God, in front of Jesus. I wonder if the author of the DaVinci Code really understood or cares what hubris he exhibits in his writing.

Here we pick up with our gospel lesson as Jesus challenges them to prove that he is guilty of sin, “Which of you convinceth me of sin? And if I say the truth, why do ye not believe me? He that is of God heareth God’s words: ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God.” The Pharisees then accuse Jesus of being a Samaritan and having a devil. This was an obvious insult to Jesus because Samaritans were hated by the Jews for the foreignness of their beliefs and practices. They did not believe in survival of the soul after death, for example. The accusation that Jesus is a Samaritan is obviously a deliberate distortion of Jesus’ words for He spoke often of the after-life. But Jesus chooses not to respond directly to the bait about the Samaritan, perhaps thinking of the parable He has taught in which Samaritans are shown to be more compassionate and merciful than self-righteous Jews. He does counter simply, truthfully, and humbly that He doesn’t have a devil and says, “but I honor my Father, and ye do dishonor me. And I seek not mine own glory: there is one that seeketh and judgeth.” Here Jesus, as He so often does, deflects attention from Himself to point to His Father in Heaven. He is the One who will seek Christ’s glory through His passion and resurrection, and also judge those who scorn Christ.

Next, Jesus states what, for the Jewish leaders, is a seemingly outrageous claim: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.” This is Jesus’ rebuttal to the insult of being called a Samaritan. It is also our Lord’s call for obedience to the Word of God, through belief in who He reveals Himself to be - Jesus the Christ. It is a call for a faithful and pure life worthy of Christ that leads to eternal life, both physically and spiritually, instead of spiritual death and eternal separation from God. Of course, the Pharisees and other Jewish leaders in their blind anger choose to take Jesus literally as if He were only speaking of physical death. So they make the false comparison between Abraham and the prophets, who are physically dead, and the claim by Jesus that keeping His word won’t lead to death. They challenge Jesus by asking him, “Art thou greater than our father Abraham, which is dead? And the prophets are dead: whom makest thou thyself?” Or as a modern translation states it: “Who do you think you are?” That is the ultimate question, isn’t it? Who do we think Jesus is?  That’s the same question posed by our Lord to St. Peter, remember. Our lives depend on how we answer that question. How did Jesus answer that question? By once again first directing attention to his Father. Jesus says the honor He might give himself is nothing, but rather, “It is my Father that honoureth me; of whom ye say, that he is your God.” The implication is that if the Jews believe in God, then they should also give honor to the One who is honored by their God. But Jesus seems to know the Jewish leaders are not really interested in knowing God the way He knows God, for He tells them “Yet ye have not known him; but I know him: and if I should say, I know him not, I shall be a liar like unto you: but I know him, and keep his saying.”

Then Jesus turns the words of the Jews about “father Abraham” back on them by saying, “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it and was glad.”  Here Jesus is claiming fulfillment of the promises of God made to Abraham in Genesis chapter 12, 1-7, where God told Abraham that through him a great nation would be formed and through him “shall all families of the earth be blessed.” Predictably, the Jews react badly to this claim and snidely remark, “Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham?” This gives Jesus the opportunity to provide the ultimate response to this question, as well as the earlier taunting question: “Art thou greater than our father Abraham, which is dead?” Jesus answers, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am.” Here Jesus is unequivocally claiming Oneness with God Himself by using the Hebrew “code words” for God – I AM, and by stating His pre-existence before Abraham. This was more than the Pharisees and other Jewish leaders could stand. They seek to stone Jesus right there for blasphemy, but our Lord manages to slip out of the temple unharmed.

And so this long and multi-faceted argument between Jesus and the Jewish leaders ends, for now. We know from the frequent words about “death” that we’ve just heard provide a subliminal drumbeat of what will happen in a few short days as our Lenten discipline comes to a close and we move with our Lord to His arrest and crucifixion. But the message from our lesson today gives us pause to consider not only the cost of discipleship but the ultimate victory in Christ, if we believe in Him. Despite all the point-counter point of the extended argument we’ve heard, it all comes down to one obvious point, doesn’t it? The divinity and saving Grace of Jesus. Either He is the Christ, the Messiah, the fulfillment of Abraham’s joy in his covenant with God, a blessing to all peoples, and our Lord and Savior, or He isn’t. Unfortunately, it seems that being witness to a life of purest holiness and perfect communion with God the Father and God the Holy Ghost wasn’t enough to lift the blinders of pride, power, and hatred from the eyes of the Jewish leaders and their sympathizers. Hopefully, our reaction is different. We have in the Gospels the Church’s record of God’s self-revelation to us through the Incarnation and the power of Jesus Christ over sin and death. That means our sin and our death, each one of us. There are principalities and powers of darkness at work in our society, and within our own selves, that actively work to pull us in the opposite direction from what we profess to believe. The path is indeed narrow, so we need to come to Jesus at every opportunity. To state the obvious, he gives an opportunity to be in communion with Him whenever the Holy Eucharist is celebrated. My prayer is that we all seek to feed on Him with thanksgiving, and live in His presence, now and forever.

And now unto God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, be ascribed all might, majesty, honor, and dominion, as is most justly due this day, both now and forever, Amen.