Thursday of the Fifth Week of Lent
Thursday, April 7, 2022
Holy Ghost Church – 8:00 Mass
Genesis 17:3-9; Psalm 105:4-5, 6-7, 8-9; John 8:51-59
As we reflect on today’s gospel, we may wish to consider this question…who is Jesus and what does this mean for us?
The last straw for the Jews in this encounter with Jesus is that he not only claimed to know Abraham personally, but that he took for himself God’s sacred name: I AM. It was blasphemy and a capital crime to claim to be God, a crime which carried the penalty of death by stoning. Consequently, the Jews in today’s gospel picked up stones to throw at him; but Jesus hid and went out of the temple area.
Reflecting on these words, “I AM” can help us to explore more deeply the inexhaustible nature of God. To assist us with our reflection on who Jesus is, let’s consider 10 things about what the name I AM says about God.
1. God never had a beginning. Every child asks, “Who made God?” And every wise parent says, “Nobody made God. God simply is. And always was. No beginning.”
2. God will never end. If he did not come into being he cannot go out of being, because he is being.
3. God is absolute reality. There is no reality before him. There is no reality outside of him unless he wills it and makes it.
4. God is utterly independent. He depends on nothing to bring him into being or support him or counsel him or make him what he is.
5. Everything that is not God depends totally on God. The entire universe is utterly secondary. It came into being by God and stays in being moment by moment on God’s decision to keep it in being.
6. All the universe is by comparison to God as nothing. All that we are amazed by in the world and in the galaxies is, compared to God, as nothing.
7. God is constant. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He cannot be improved. He is not becoming anything. He is who he is.
8. God is the absolute standard of truth and goodness and beauty. He himself is the standard of what is right, what is true, what is beautiful.
9. God does whatever he pleases and it is always right and always beautiful and always in accord with truth.
10. God is the most important and most valuable reality and person in the universe. He is more worthy of interest and attention and admiration and enjoyment than all other realities, including the entire universe. Everything that exists pales in comparison to the infinite beauty and love of God.
Therefore, Jesus as the Son of God, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, The Word of God himself, is worthy of all praise and exultation. Jesus is Truth itself, nothing false can be present in him.
Today let us meditate on the nature of Jesus and what this means for each of us personally. Do we take him at his word? Do we trust that he wants only what is best for us and do we believe that he has the power to do whatever he wills?
If we do believe this, we are truly blessed and we should never fear anything that life throws at us, knowing that Jesus has the power to deliver us from all that we fear and from anything that may concern us.
Jesus I TRUST in you. God bless you