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The Readings for Tuesday in the 4th Week of Easter (B2)
How long dost thou hold our souls in suspense? If thou be the Christ, tell us plainly.
The Feast of the Dedication. Jesus is chilling in the temple at Hanukkah. The crowds are like, “Really, Say Something”. His reply is “When I speak you don’t listen. When I perform the prophesied signs, you ignore them.” I’m reminded of the folks who eliminate sayings they don’t like from the Bible and then say, “But Jesus never claimed to be God…”
These are the answers we have, the text that we have, the Jesus we have. You can do do the Bible what Peter Jackson did to Lord of the Rings, or you can settle in and wrestle with it, with the claims it makes, with the pictures it paints. But really we do this all the time, right? The addict who ignores all the signs of her addiction. The couple that ignores all the signs of their relationship’s demise. The young Christian who ignores how dangerous sex is to his prayer life. The parish that ignores the culture outside until everyone is dead inside and no new members come in.
When something makes us uncomfortable we are willing to get so deep in denial that if we could come up for air we’d see the Pyramids.
Jesus says that his sheep will see what’s going on and understand. But if we’re not of his sheep we won’t get it. Well that makes it seem like a lot of folks are congenitally out of the picture, right? That’s not what he’s saying at all. Yet to become a sheep you have to take a risk: step out of line with the world and try trusting Jesus.
If you won’t accept any answers only because they were not the answers you wanted, then you’re never going to find Truth. You can sit on the sidelines and say “Show me” and “Prove it”. Or you can watch folks walking on fire and try it yourself.
The only thing you have to lose is the fear.
Doxos 