THE WORD
Is 49,8-15 / Jn 5,17-30 MAR
Jesus said to the Jews, “My Father is at work until now, so I am at work.” For this reason the Jews tried all the more to kill him, because he not only broke the sabbath but he also called God his own father, making himself equal to God.
Jesus answered and said to them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, a son cannot do anything on his own, but only what he sees his father doing; for what he does, his son will do also. For the Father loves his Son and shows him everything that he himself does, and he will show him greater works than these, so that you may be amazed. For just as the Father raises the dead and gives life, so also does the Son give life to whomever he wishes. Nor does the Father judge anyone, but he has given all judgment to his Son, so that all may honor the Son just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him.
“Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes in the one who sent me has eternal life and will not come to condemnation, but has passed from death to life. Amen, amen, I say to you, the hour is coming and is now here when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. For just as the Father has life in himself, so also he gave to his Son the possession of life in himself. And he gave him power to exercise judgment, because he is the Son of Man...”
IN OTHER WORDS
In November 2014, the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) advertised 16 key positions for its project among the Congolese refugees in Burundi. Out of more than 600 applicants, we shortlisted 64 candidates for the first round of interviews. One of them was a woman in her early 40s. She applied for the position of Assistant Coordinator for Urban Refugees. When I asked her about her motivation in applying for this job, she said that she had been involved in refugee work for more than 10 years then. Hence working with refugees was already part of her life and had somehow become her “identity.”
Jesus’ identity cannot be separated from his work of salvation. In fact that is exactly what his name means: God saves. Importantly, his identity and that of his Father are intrinsically one and the same. For this reason, he said to the Jews, “My Father is at work until now, so I am at work.”
Furthermore he said, “Amen, amen, I say to you, a son cannot do anything on his own but only what he sees his father doing, for what he does, his son will do also.”
Jesus, in healing sick people on the Sabbath day, did not rescind the importance of the Sabbath.
The Synoptics present the Sabbath as a time “to do good” (Mt 12:12), “to save” (Mk 3:4), “to loose” human beings from physical and spiritual bonds (Lk13:16-17), and to show “mercy” rather than religiosity (Mt 12:7). Unfortunately, instead of seeing the redemptive work that Jesus was doing, the Pharisees chose only to see the man carrying his mat on a Sabbath day.
Sabbath (Sunday) is a day for us to experience God’s redemptive work by ministering to the needs of others. Hopefully, those who hear the words of Jesus and believe in the one who sent him may have eternal life.
- Fr. Romeo Cagatin, SVD | Burundi, Republique du Togo
The Word in other words 2016
An annual project of Logos Publications, The WORD in Other Words Bible Diary contains daily scripture readings and reflections written by priest, brothers, and sisters of the three congregations founded by St. Arnold Janssen (the SVD, SSpS, and SSpSAP). It hopes to serve as a daily companion to readers who continually seek the correlation of the Word of God and human experience.
