Lived Victory!

“I revealed Your name to those whom You gave Me out of the world. They belonged to You, and You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word. Now they know that everything You gave Me is from You, because the words You gave to Me I have given to them, and they accepted them and truly understood that I came from You, and they have believed that You sent Me.”

Thank you for joining today as we continue in our Easter joy. Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!

Over the past few weeks, we moved from Jesus’ post-resurrection appearances in the gospel passage to excerpts from St. John’s Last Supper narrative between Jesus and His disciples.

John’s Last Supper narrative is a very open and honest (what else could Jesus be?) discourse not just about what was to happen in the immediate aftermath of the Last Supper, that is Jesus’ arrest, torture, crucifixion, death, and burial, but out into the future – the forever future – a future of promise.

Jesus lays out a roadmap from His ministry with the disciples, what He taught them, their experiences of His ministry and miracles to His identity in the Father.

In today’s gospel passage He is bringing all this together in a farewell speech and concluding prayer. This prayer has been called the High Priestly Prayer of Jesus or the Arch Priestly Prayer of Jesus. Interestingly, this is specifically mentioned in the Canon of the Bishop Hodur Rite of the Holy Mass.

Jesus in this prayer is consecrating His followers in the Father. Indeed, Jesus’ whole life’s work was about connecting us to His Father, revealing Him, letting us know about His love, mercy, forgiveness, and thorough and complete healing. We learn, through Jesus, that His sacrifice was designed by the Father to save us. He is now blessing them in the Father.

We are heirs to this knowledge, to this revelation, and to its promises because we have, by God’s choice and the work of the Holy Spirit, accepted Jesus by faith in the same way the first disciples did. Therefore, we are possessors of the same glory Jesus has – the Father’s glory. Because we belong to Jesus we belong to the Father and so we are blessed in both the Father and Son. We have abundant eternal life in an ongoing knowing (being in relationship with) the Father and the Son.

Jesus speaks of the glory His Father will give Him and makes a very fine point about our possessing that same glory because of our unity with Jesus, our belief in Him, and in such our unity with God the Father.

Jesus, also being realistic, knows we remain here, unified with Him, but subject to the trials of the worldly and so He prays for them.

For us all this comes down to who we are, what we possess, and where we are going. As a faithful Christian I am in the Father through Jesus. I have the promise of eternal life. I am headed toward heaven – but there is still work I must do here.

Lived Victory!

“Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes in me will do the works that I do, and will do greater ones than these because I am going to the Father.”

Thank you for joining today as we continue in our Easter joy. Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!

Do you celebrate your baptism day? Do you even know when it was?

Because I do genealogy as a hobby I happen to know when mine was without digging through all the papers in that locked metal box in the closet (we all have those don’t we?). Mine was December 14th.

Sometime this week, open that box and look at the date. I know Carin (May 15th) and Vince (April 1st) had to do that to be godparents. Then put it on your calendar as an annual thing, and when it rolls around celebrate. Go out to dinner, have cake, take a trip, and share the time.

We celebrate lots of stuff: team wins, national whatever-it-is-day, a promotion or retirement. We celebrate love on Valentine’s Day. It is only right and fitting that we should celebrate that day when we met the greatest love of all time, the greatest love in all eternity – Jesus in our baptism.

You see, in baptism we are made one in Jesus. We enter the water dying with Him and are thus buried with Him to then rise-up out of the water to new life.

Our Holy Church does not look at this event, baptism, as some kind of ritual cleaning because babies are born all dirty and sinny. No! Indeed, we see baptism as that moment a person is regenerated, brought to new life in Christ Jesus. It is also why the Church must never be a place of criticism and condemnation, but rather a place of welcome, healing, and continual entry into God’s new life.

With this new life come the promises we hear in Scripture and in the Holy Mass today: You will do the works that I do, and will do greater ones. We have true power. You are “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people of his own.” We are set apart by God, made different by our baptism. I am going to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back again and take you to myself. We have an eternal home that Jesus built for us. If you know me, then you will also know my Father. We have intimate knowledge of God the Father because we know Jesus.

Yes, friends, celebrate the day you received the greatest gift of all. We can buy stuff, acquire, earn, give our children clothes, schooling, hobbies and sports – all good things, but the best gift for Olivia happens today because it is a forever gift, and it is free. 

It happened for you perhaps years or decades ago – don’t forget it, or just tuck it away in a little metal fireproof box. As you take out that paper and look at it recall that you were given the greatest gift ever. Pray in that intimate moment. Picture mom, dad, your godparents and their joy as they gave you this gift. And, thank God each day by living out the new life you entered with thanksgiving.