Gospel of John: John 12:20-33
Jesus answered them, "The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.
Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.
"Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say--' Father, save me from this hour'? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour.
Father, glorify your name." Then a voice came from heaven, "I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again." The crowd standing there heard it and said that it was thunder. Others said, "An angel has spoken to him." Jesus answered, "This voice has come for your sake, not for mine. Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out.
And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself."
He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die.
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Humanity has been craving for redemption for millennia or maybe for a couple of hundreds of thousands of years and since time immemorial, marked by the exile from the Garden of Eden, as an outset. The text we read in the Gospel of John tries to direct our thoughts toward Jesus as the Redeemer and toward the Redemption by faith in Him, that by his death on the cross he atones for the sins of humanity. The author of the Gospel is using biblical reasoning, prophesy, tradition, common sense and even heavenly voice to prove it.
The Redeemer, as a person, must be more just a fellow human, serving God, as God’s suffering servant described by Prophet Isaiah, as it is written in the famous chapter 53 that “Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the Lord makes his life an offering for sin, he will see his offspring and prolong his days, and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand. (…) For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.” The Redeemer must be more than a servant, exactly just as the Gospel of John testifies by saying in its very first chapter that “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
The Redeemer of humanity must be more just a mere human servant, because the Old Testament is adamant that the Redeemer is God himself, as prophet Isaiah states in its chapter 44 that “This is what the Lord says - Israel’s King and Redeemer, the Lord Almighty: I am the first and I am the last; apart from me there is no God.”
Just as the 19th Psalm reads that “May these words of my mouth and this meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer, and just as the 78 Psalm says that “They remembered that God was their Rock, that God Most High was their Redeemer.” The Psalm depicts the Redeemer as a Divine Rock, because the Redeemer is unmovable, never changes as it is written also in the letter of James, chapter one, that “ 17 Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.”
Once upon a time in a far far away land a man left India for China in the Fifth Century.
His name was Bodhidharma, the founder of the Zen or Chan Buddhism in China.
Among his other achievements he went to the famous Shaolin monastery, but his entry was denied. He had spent nine years in a nearby cave without saying a single word, gazing a rock for contemplation in order to reach enlightenment. After his admission into the monastery he taught the monks contemplation. When he saw how weak they were, he introduced them martial arts, the forerunner of the famous Chinese Kung Fu, and advised them to drink Tea.
Finally, seeing the benefits of his teachings, the monks apologized to him for making him wait nine years after the denial of entry. What a waist of time, they claimed. He answered them, that monks, you must be like a holy rock, solid and unmovable. Denial or approval from the external world must not affect you, but you have to keep focusing on Heaven.
A famous first century Jewish mystic, called Rabbi Shimon, was famous of his anti-Roman sentiments. In the era of Emperor Hadrian he had to flee for his life, escaping death sentence. He spent 13 years in a cave together with his son Rabbi Eleazar, gazing the rock wall, contemplating over the Bible. When the emperor died and their sentence was lifted, on the road to home they met relatives, who were very saddened to see their poor shape of health and condition. Rabbi Shimon said to them that either in good times or bad times you have to become unmovable as a rock.
Once upon an other time, in a story tale, an indigenous prophet fondled a holy rock on the summit of a hill. “I have come to you to say fare-well.” The rock remained silent. It was not really talkative that day. And not on other days too. It had no mouth and tongue. But the Huron prophet even so understood his friend. If you would like to say something, you do not need necessarily mouth and tongue . And you do not need words too. How could I be so wise as you, rock brother? ”, he asked. The rock quietly existed as an answer.
“You can not say, that it is nothing, because existing is everything” the prophet thought. “You are as old as this hill is here. And the hill is just as old as Mother Earth”, he added.
The rock had its life, despite it had no heart, no veins and circulating blood in them.
“To live, you do not need veins and blood, bones and flesh, biological organs. You need only a soul. And you have it, brother. ” The Prophet said it aloud. The rock still quietly existed rock solid as an answer. “Yeah, you're right: remaining silent, when talking is not necessary, is wiser than talking. I will never forget how much I learned from you.”
Jesus told his disciples to try hard to be perfect because their Father in Heaven is perfect.
Although it sounds impossible, but the one of the main Gospel messages of Jesus is that everything is possible to those who believe. One of the attributes of being perfect is to become unmovable as a Rock, just our God is like an unmovable Rock, which statement is of course a metaphor. In some hard times of exile or during seeking enlightenment or completing a discernment process, the people of God had often spent days, weeks, years, decades in the desert, in caves, in remote settings, isolated from the society.
Nowadays we had been forced to be disconnected from society, in general, for more than a year. Hopefully, we spent well this time with Bible Study, prayers, meditations, contemplation, focusing on Heaven, trying to become unmovable as a Rock, like our Master in the Garden of Gethsemane. Social times or unsocial times, we should stay connected to Heaven, as Heaven itself is connected to all, always. The Redeeming Servant of God, Jesus gave up everything for us, in order to repair the broken connection in all.
May the Lord’s name be blessed gratefully everyday, in proper or seemingly not so proper times, as we submit to the will of God, by the Holy Spirit, rock solidly, always. AMEN
