By Such Stripes Are We Healed
by Jack Shaver
©The United Church of Canada, 1985
All Rights Reserved
ISBN 0-88622-196-X
7M/12/85/APL
Used with Permission
The Fourth Sunday of Lent
Look what's called glorification
John 12: 20-33
I picked this passage for our reflection because it is one of several in his Gospel where John discloses a special understanding of what it is to be "glorified". We could also have read chapter 17, which is Jesus' long prayer during the last supper.
Both passages refer to the culmination of Jesus' life and ministry, as his glorification and this glorification of the Son of Man amounts to the glorification of God's name.
- In chapter 12, there is an inescapable connection between the glorification of the Son of Man and his death on a cross. John does not suggest it is an easy connection to make for he has Jesus debate with himself whether to go through with it.
- "Now is my soul troubled, and what shall I say? 'Father, save me from this hour'?"
But it is a reassuring connection.
"No, for this purpose I have come to this hour. Father, glorify thy name."
The connection between Christ's glorification and his crucifixion is affirmed in the metaphor of the seed that remains alone unless it falls into the ground and dies, but bears much fruit if it does so.
Following the mixed reaction of the crowd to the voice from heaven, Jesus announces the judgement of this world and the casting out of the evil ruler of this world and says,
"When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all people to myself."
The kind of death Jesus died, Christ lifted up, Christ glorified, the breaking of evil's hold on the earth - all these are seen as the same event. And God's name is glorified in that event.
In the 17th chapter the glorification that is Jesus' death is given a firm connection with his whole faithful life. Accomplishing God's work on earth was a glorification of God and it included, or was even characterized by, the death he should die.
Further, there is a connection made between Christ's followers and his glorification. Jesus says of those who received God's Word through him, however brokenly.
" All mine are thine and thine are mine and I am glorified in them."
I must confess I find the style of writing in much of John's Gospel repetitive and tiresome. But he gets worked up by notions that captivate me.
What a thing to call the life and teaching and death of Jesus and the broken faithfulness of his disciples all the glorification of God's name.
How is the death of Christ the glory of God? I think Christ's death is the glory of God when it becomes a window into the heart of God. If by Christ's death we come to see love of enemies at the heart of God, it is good and right to call that death a glorification.
Benediction
O Almighty and Eternal One- with whom we wrestle through the night of our existence,
depart not from us until you have blessed us. - We dread so much of life. We wrestle with the fear of failure,
- the fear of losing what is precious,
the fear of offending,
the fear of rejection, the fear of destroying and being destroyed, - Depart not from us until you have blessed us.
Our burden of guilt darkens our thoughts and distorts our behaviour.- As we wrestle with the truth and lies of our bad consciences,
- depart not from us until you have blessed us.
We continually wrestle with our call.- What are we meant to be?
- What's our part in the scheme of things?
- What's worth spending our life on?
- What's the name of the one with whom all life has to do?
- O Holy one, you are the one we contend with.
Don't leave until you have blessed us.
O Righteous One, we make efforts to leave the world a better place.- But that's no simple matter. The more committed we become, the more alive to the world's ills and needs, the more we are of two minds and simple solutions escape us.
- As we wrestle with these ambiguities we draw close to you;
- don't leave us until you have blessed us.
Dear God, even in our deepest depression, we are working at something.
Depart not from us until you have blessed us.
Through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen