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Friday, March 13
John 5:30-47
'I can do nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge; and my judgment is just, because I seek to do not my own will but the will of him who sent me.
'If I testify about myself, my testimony is not true. There is another who testifies on my behalf, and I know that his testimony to me is true. You sent messengers to John, and he testified to the truth. Not that I accept such human testimony, but I say these things so that you may be saved. He was a burning and shining lamp, and you were willing to rejoice for a while in his light. But I have a testimony greater than John's. The works that the Father has given me to complete, the very works that I am doing, testify on my behalf that the Father has sent me. And the Father who sent me has himself testified on my behalf. You have never heard his voice or seen his form, and you do not have his word abiding in you, because you do not believe him whom he has sent.
'You search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that testify on my behalf. Yet you refuse to come to me to have life. I do not accept glory from human beings. But I know that you do not have the love of God in you. I have come in my Father's name, and you do not accept me; if another comes in his own name, you will accept him. How can you believe when you accept glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the one who alone is God? Do not think that I will accuse you before the Father; your accuser is Moses, on whom you have set your hope. If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. But if you do not believe what he wrote, how will you believe what I say?'
This passage immediately follows verses effectively placing Jesus on trial in which the charges of the Jews and their resolve to kill Jesus are expressed. In today's reading, Jesus turns the tables on the Pharisees. In yesterday's reading, Jesus spoke on his own behalf; but Jewish law does not allow a person to be his own witness at his own trial. Therefore, Jesus acts as his own defense attorney presenting other witnesses who speak on his behalf. Jesus calls on the witness of John the Baptist, the witness of his own ministry, the witness of God and the witness of the Scriptures in his defense. In making his defense, Jesus becomes the prosecutor and reverses the charges, placing upon the Jewish leaders the responsibility for refusing to see and hear the truth. Jesus describes his interrelationship with and dependence upon God for his own work, his virtual inseparability from his parent because his own will is identical with God's. How can Jesus hope that they will believe anything he has to say? The condemnation of his righteous judgment of them strongly implies that he knows they not only do not but will not see. In spite of having witnesses that his accusers claim to honor, they still do not believe him.
Jesus' message for his accusers is a difficult one. He is asking them to change their lives. In her book, The Change Cycle, the Reverend Elder Lillie Brock explains the stages that people go through when confronted with change. This helps us understand the Pharisees reaction. Stage One in the Change Cycle - what these men were confronted with when Jesus appeared in their world, asking them to change - is loss. What is the first feeling a person experiences when they are confronted with either the possibility of or the reality of loss? Fear. The primary feeling encountered during change is fear of loss. This was as true for the Pharisees two thousand years ago as it is for us today.
The difficulty in Jesus' message for his accusers is that if they choose to accept it, their lives will immediately turn upside down, from perceived social power to perceived powerlessness, Not only would they lose the authority to make decisions for the collective well being of their subjects, they would then have to trust others to make good decisions on their own. One can almost see and hear them looking at each other and saying, "Oh No! We can't live with that!" They cannot get beyond their fear of what this change will mean to their lives.
The good news for us, the same good news which Jesus tried to tell the Pharisees, is that we do not have to face change - or our fear of it - alone. The Reverend Elder Lillie Brock says that in the face of change we will nearly always experience fear. But, in spite of that fear, we have a hope in something far bigger than any change that might come our way, a hope so big that it will always conquer our fear - if we will allow that. The Apostle Paul tells us that in our relationship with God, in our acceptance of the parent-child relationship which God offers us, we like Paul, can know the secret of being content in all circumstances. That is: that we can do everything through Jesus who gives us strength. cw
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