The LORD “makes a way in the sea…” Impossible. Mary lavishes Jesus’
feet with anointment one cannot imagine being able to afford. Incredible. And
in the Epistle to Philippians, Paul claims that everything in his life, in this
whole world, is “rubbish” compared to “the righteousness from God based on
faith” in Christ. Too strong?
The impossible, incredible, unthinkable is exactly what
God is about. It’s a new thing. Preachers have to imagine our way into this
promising prospect so that those who have come to worship on this Sunday will
leave with an inkling of the goodness that comes through the cross. This day is
full of hinting paradoxes that will arrive with increasing force as Good Friday
approaches.
John 12:1-8
The story of Jesus’ dinner with his good friends – when
Mary anoints his feet and wipes them with her hair (surely one of the most
exotic and evocative events in the Gospels) – could appear at first glance to
be sort of normal. Friends for dinner. And yet…
The scene marks a key transition
and link from Jesus' teaching and healing ministry (the gospel of signs) to his
paschal ministry (the gospel of glory). The author drops many clues and
prepares the reader for any number of elements of the story to come: the death
of Jesus at Passover, the anointing oils of burial, the resurrection story of
Lazarus, now extended into the “prequel” to the resurrection story of Jesus,
and the betrayal of Judas...
The reading concludes. . . “You
always have the poor with you. . .” The saying is unfortunately used to . . .
excuse indifference toward the ministry of care for the poor.
An effective homily will challenge
these hidden assumptions and equip the listener to challenge it appropriately
whenever it emerges in conversation. . . The poor we will always have; they are
not helped by theft from the common purse. And, they are not hurt (but will be
helped) when Jesus completes his earthly mission and unleashes the power of
God's Spirit through his risen body. – Jeffrey VanderWilt
Isaiah 43:16-21
This new thing is a liberation on all fronts.
The forty years of wandering in the
Sinai wilderness is no different than the forty years of exile in Babylon.
Indeed, it could be argued that the stories of Moses and the Israelites were
solidified in the time of Exile precisely in such a way as to make sense of the
captivity in Babylon and the difficulties faced by the returning Israelites. .
. God will “make a way in the wilderness” for the returning exiles. – Jeffrey
VanderWilt
Philippians 3:4b-14
Paul urges freedom
from cultural patterns and cultic practices in order to see beyond temporal
gain. In other words, the passages calling for the vision of the new thing
come, at last, to reside in our very bodies.
Some Philippian Christians were
apparently being pressed to accept circumcision, if for no other reason than to
avoid persecution under Roman law; if circumcised. . . they could claim to be
Jews and so be exempted from the requirement to worship the emperor. Paul's
argument, in a word: do not put your trust in a sign of the flesh or even in
righteousness under the law. Rather, share in the sufferings of Christ and
become like him in his death, prepared to lose all things, so as to gain all
things in the power of his resurrection. – Jeffrey VanderWilt
How does this focus on the “new thing” lead us to the
ending of Lent when we contemplate the enter point of our faith?
Each year the readings for the last
Sunday in Lent confront us with the claim that God's new thing, the new life we
have together in Christ, our hope in Christ for the resurrection of the dead,
for God's future, is grounded in the suffering and death of Jesus. Our own
agendas are nothing next to this. Any pain we may suffer in keeping or breaking
our Lenten discipline is as rubbish next to this: that the suffering and death
of Jesus are essential to God's plan of salvation. Mary “got it.” Judas never
did “get it.” And it is in our own “straining forward” to “get it” for
ourselves that we “press on” to Holy Week and the Great Three Days. – Paul G.
Bieber
Paul Bieber is pastor of All Saints Lutheran Church, San Diego, California.
Jeffery VanderWilt,
author of Communion with Non-Catholic Christians (Collegville, MN:
Liturgical Press, 2003) teaches at Santa Margarita Catholic High School in Southern
California.
Homily Service 40, no. 4 (2007): 33-44.
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