CALLING THE DEAD TO LIFE

WEDNESDAY, FOURTH WEEK OF LENT   

Isa 49:8-15; Ps 145:8-9,13-14,17-18; Jn 5:17-30

The Son of Man raises the Dead

The joy of salvation is exceedingly great in those who have received the word of God truly as the word of God, and not some human thinking or fabrication. What the word of God announces to us is beyond this world; only the believers can comprehend the meaning of the word they receive because the Holy Spirit has given them a new capacity to receive and comprehend spiritual things. By sending His Son in human nature, God has given us a new spiritual birth in the Son. The new birth is the spiritual life we have in common with the Son of Man. So, we are one with the Son of Man spiritually, but many by our material bodies. Thus, what is said of the Son of Man applies to all who constitute his body by their share in His Spirit. Our share in the Spirit of the Son increases as we reorient our minds and hearts to become like His. Since the Spirit defines a desire and orientation to God within us, the more we make the desire of the Spirit ours, the more we identify with the Son of Man, who by his desires and orientation identifies with God the Father. The word of God has the power to continuously bring about this transformation if we maintain our focus and attention on the Lord. The compassion with which the Father carries out this transformation in us is praised by the psalmist. “The Lord is kind and full of compassion, slow to anger, abounding in love. How good is the Lord to all, compassionate to all his creatures.”

The Father Himself plans all things and orders their execution in an orderly manner for our salvation. There is nothing which will benefit our salvation that He has excluded in the events of our lives, and nothing nonbeneficial that he has included. He reveals this through the prophet Isaiah. “Thus says the Lord: ‘At the favourable time I will answer you, on the day of salvation I will help you. I have formed you and have appointed you as a covenant of the people. I will restore the land and assign you the estates that lie waste.” The prophecy primarily applies to the Son of Man, but mystically applies to his members, who share the same Spirit and life with him. The human nature, which is the estate or house constructed by God for himself, lies in waste because of human sinfulness, which admits demons to inhabit it, and prevents God from taking possession of these estates. God sent His Son into the world to reclaim and inhabit what is rightfully his. The estate will be eternally inhabited by the Son of Man and all who believe in him, who form his mystical body. Of them, the prophecy continues in the following words: “On every roadway they will graze, and each bare height shall be their pasture. They will never hunger or thirst, scorching wind and sun shall never plague them; for he who pities them will lead them and guide them to springs of water.” The idea of roadway or journey signifies the gradual and continuous transformation we are undergoing into the Son of Man.

The prophecy by Isaiah reveals the mind of the Father to us. But the Word Himself brings it about in us who believe Him. Jesus made this known in the Gospel when he said to the Jews: “My Father goes on working, and so do I.” The Jews could not understand him because they did not believe in him, and as long as they lacked faith in him, all the words and works of the Son of Man would remain a mystery and something hidden from them. Only faith admits the word of God into us for the commencement of the work of our transformation. “I tell you most solemnly, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees the Father doing: and whatever the Father does the Son does too. For the Father loves the Son and shows him everything he does himself, and he will show him even greater things than these, works that will astonish you.” Since we become part of the Son by faith, our profession of faith brings us to know the mind of the Father and the work the Father is doing. By faith, the Son works in us according to the will of the Father and makes us the means through which the Father brings back the strayed sheep and calls the dead souls back to life. “Thus, as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so the Son gives life to anyone he chooses.” Our proclamation of the Gospel calls the spiritually dead back to life.

Let us pray: O God, who reward the merits of the just and offer pardon to sinners who do penance, have mercy, we pray, on those who call upon you, that the admission of our guilt may serve to obtain your pardon for our sins. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever.