Thursday of 4th Week in Lent
Gen 17:3-9; John 8: 51-59
Deacon Larry Brockman
When will we learn! When will we learn what it means to keep God’s covenant.
There is one thing for sure. There is no question but that God has promised us everlasting life and happiness. He has done it in the Multiple Covenants he has made with his people over the millennia. First Adam and Eve, then Noah, then Abraham, and then Moses. The message was simple each time: “I will be your God and take care of you forever. In fact, I will do one better than make a contract with you. I will make a Covenant with you.”
You see, a Covenant is an everlasting agreement as opposed to a contract which has escape clauses and finite lengths. There is always just one thing about God’s covenants. It is very accurately summed up in our first reading as: “On your part, you and your descendants after you must keep my covenant throughout the ages.” That means keeping God’s word. And yet, despite those four covenants between God and His people; the people broke the covenants by straying from God’s word.
And so, God sent His only son, Jesus, to us. He sent him in the form of a man, that’s what we call the Incarnation. “The Word became flesh” as St. John put it. We didn’t have to listen to third party prophets; rather, we had only to listen directly to the Word of God speaking to us in the flesh. His Gospels, the Good News, recorded all that he did and said.
That brings us to today’s Gospel. The Jewish leaders hung up on Jesus assertion that: “Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever keeps my word will never die.” They still didn’t understand the covenant being offered by God: everlasting life for those who believe in God, His Son, and His Word. Because people of this world focus on this world; they are skeptical of anything beyond this world.
Then, there was the clincher. Because later on in today’s Gospel Jesus tells us a mindboggling truth: “Amen, amen, I say to you, before Abraham came to be, I AM.” Some Catholic commentators on the Gospel say that these words are beyond comment, because they tell us unmistakably, in Jesus own words, that he is God. That means the New Testament Covenant words were spoken with the ultimate authority.
You know, we are not just observers in all of this history. We are part of it. The Gospel was written for our benefit. God so loved us that he gave His son and the Covenant promise to all of us. The question is: are we skeptical and looking for worldly solutions? Or do we believe in and live God’s Word? Are we keeping His covenant? Just like the cynical Jewish leaders of Jesus time, our world is full of cynics and unbelievers. They demand proof in human terms rather than accept on Faith; they apply humanity’s limited logic and reason to divine law rather than accept that God means what he says; and they value and glorify only things that are of this world; rather than value the Covenant promise of life everlasting. Some of them claim alternate revelation from God that denies Jesus is both God and man. They “stone” those who believe by persecuting them, ridiculing them, bullying them, and even putting them to death.
So, when are we going to learn what it means to keep God’s covenant? When we learn to believe; and to follow God’s word no matter what happens to us.
