Prophets Embody Faith, Hope and Joy

by Fr. David M. Knight

April 18, 2024

Thursday of the Third Week of Easter

Lectionary No. 276

Acts 8:26-40/Jn 6:44-51

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/041824.cfm

The Responsorial Psalm has the same response as yesterday — “Let all the earth cry out to God with joy” (Psalm 66) — but the verses selected focus on God’s saving help rather than his “tremendous deeds.” The readings likewise focus on the joy that comes from being saved: saved from death through the gift of everlasting life.

In Acts 8: 26-40 Philip is asked to explain a passage about the suffering of the Savior that does not seem to speak of joy: “In his humiliation justice was denied him. Who will tell of his posterity? For his life is taken away from the earth.” But when Philip explained about Jesus, the meaning of his death and the triumph of his resurrection, his listener believed, was baptized, and “continued on his way rejoicing.” Even suffering, whether Jesus’ or our own, need not deprive us of joy if we can find meaning and value in it. “Let all the earth cry out to God with joy,” for Jesus has risen from the dead and so will we.

Philip brought joy to the eunuch by teaching him the meaning of Scripture, as Jesus did: “I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete” (John 15:11). But joy actually comes through the new life given in Baptism. Jesus said, “I came that they might have life and have it to the full (John 10:10). He gives us joy by giving us the divine life of God.

John 6: 44-51 presents the same sequence of learning-believing-life. Jesus quotes Isaiah 54:13: “They shall all be taught by God,” and continues, “Everyone who listens to my Father and learns from him comes to me.” It is not just listening and learning that saves; it is choosing to believe: “Whoever believes has eternal life.”

Believing involves coming to Jesus in faith. We find divine life in living contact with Jesus: “I am the bread of life…. Whoever eats this bread will live forever.” Divine life comes through incorporation into Jesus, through assimilation into his body.

This is expressed, experienced and realized in a unique way in Eucharist. Saint Augustine explains that in contrast to ordinary eating, when we receive Communion we become what we eat. We are transformed more fully, assimilated more completely into Christ. Because we “become Christ” by the sacrament of Baptism (St. Augustine again), we can no more be overcome by death than Jesus was. Because his life in us is sustained and nurtured by the Eucharist, we will “eat and not die.” “Let all the earth cry out to God with joy,” because in Jesus we have the Bread of Life, now and forever.

Initiative: Be a prophet. Embody your faith, hope and joy in the way you participate in Eucharist — through your words, actions and enthusiasm.

Reflections brought to you by the Immersed in Christ Ministry

www.ImmersedinChrist.org

Prophets Makes the Spirit of Jesus Visible

by Fr. David M. Knight

April 17, 2024

Wednesday of the Third week of Easter

Lectionary No. 275

Acts 8:1b-8/Jn 6:35-40

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/041724.cfm

The Responsorial Psalm invites us to Easter joy — all year long: “Let all the earth cry out to God with joy” (Psalm 66). The key to this joy, affirmed in all the readings, is seeing and believing. The Psalm continues: “Come and see the works of God …. Therefore let us rejoice in him.”

Acts 8: 1-8 begins with persecution and the “lament” over Stephen. But it ends with “great joy” in the city where Philip, fleeing from persecution, proclaimed Christ and worked miracles. Those who “paid attention” to Philip’s preaching and “saw the signs he was doing” found faith and joy. The pattern is seeing, believing, rejoicing — even in persecution.

In John 6: 35-40 Jesus promises: “Anyone who sees the Son and believes in him [will] have eternal life,” joy now and forever. The source of our joy is Jesus himself, just the fact of knowing him, being in union with him, sharing his divine life: “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” In Christ we will find satisfaction, peace and joy.

What do we have to “see” in order to believe and receive this joy? In the first period of evangelization God supported the proclamation of the Gospel with “signs,” miracles of healing and deliverance from demonic possession. But what people really saw in these signs was not just the miraculous event; they saw Jesus acting, proof that he was risen and alive. Miracles that don’t reveal the person of God are worth nothing; they certainly don’t lead to real faith or joy. What we need to see is Jesus alive in the members of his body on earth and acting through them. We don’t need miracles to see this, just prophets, people acting in ways that cannot be explained without grace. When divine faith, hope and love are made visible in action, then people can “see the Son” and believe he is truly risen and alive. This is our joy.

A prophetic Church makes the Spirit of Jesus visible. Insistence on law observance doesn’t do this; especially if we exclude from full participation sinners who are seeking greater union with Christ. Jesus said, “I will not reject anyone who comes to me, because I came, not do my own will, but the will of the one who sent me,” which is “that I should not lose anything of what he gave me.” Our first pastoral concern as Church should be to embody this same accepting love of Je- sus and express it in all our ministries. If people are weak and failing, we need to draw them in, not drive them out. We want all the earth to “cry out to God with joy,” finding his love in us.

Initiative: Be a prophet. Let people see Jesus in you, especially in the way you embody his love for the sinful, the struggling and the weak.

Reflections brought to you by the Immersed in Christ Ministry

www.ImmersedinChrist.org

Prophets Have Life to the Full

by Fr. David M. Knight

April 16, 2024

Tuesday of the Third Week of Easter

Lectionary No. 274

Acts 7:51—8:1a/Jn 6:30-35

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/041624.cfm

The Responsorial Psalm is a response to make at the moment of death and at every moment in life: “Into your hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit” (Psalm 31).

These are the words Jesus said to the Father when he died (Luke 23:46). In Acts 7:51 to 8:1 Stephen addresses the same words to Jesus as he dies: “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” In both cases they are a profession of belief and hope in life after death, life with God, life “to the full,” that only God can give. And so, to act on this hope is a prophetic witness to the divine life of God within us.

In John 6: 30-35 Jesus says we can have this same “life to the full” now. It is not the unmixed fullness of total joy we experience in heaven, but it is joy and essentially the same. We have now the joy we will experience in its fullness when we die. That is why the refrain of our hearts should be constantly, “Into your hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit.” Into your hands I commend my thoughts, my desires, my priorities and purposes, all my words and actions. “Lord Jesus, I give you my body — as I did at Baptism, as I will at the moment of death. Live this day with me, live this day in me, live this day through me. Let me think with your thoughts, speak with your words and act as your body on earth: Into your hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit.”

Jesus says that he himself is the “true bread from heaven.” He is the bread that “gives life to the world.” If we have him we have life and joy. And we can have the experience of possessing him — a human, physical, concrete experience — every time we receive him in Eucharist. He is our life, not only hereafter but here.

Bread is not just life-giving; it is satisfying. It satisfies hunger and gives pleasure. Eating together brings people together in joy. We eat and drink to celebrate.

This is what Eucharist is — “whoever comes to me will never hunger” — and the aftermath of Eucharist is a deeper, more abiding awareness of the presence of Christ in our hearts, of our union of body, soul and spirit with him and with one an- other. In Eucharist, when the host is lifted up and we offer ourselves with Christ and in Christ, saying with him “This is my body given up for you,” we are saying “Into your hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit — and my flesh, my whole existence, all I do.” In Communion we say it again as Jesus gives himself totally to us and we to him. This is “life, life to the full” (John 10:10). This is Christian joy.

Initiative: Be a prophet. Change the way you participate at Mass. Listen intently to the words, grasp their meaning, make their meaning your own. Live them.

Reflections brought to you by the Immersed in Christ Ministry

www.ImmersedinChrist.org