Tuesday of the Fifth Week in Lent
(Numbers 21:4-9; John 8:21-30)
The Gospel of John is
quite heady. Its many plays on words
require help to decipher. In today’s
passage Jesus says that when he is lifted the Jews will realize who he is. Does he mean lifted up on the cross like
Moses mounts lifts up a snake on a pole in the reading from the Book of
Numbers? Or is he referring to the resurrection? He means both. In John’s gospel Jesus’ crucifixion is
triumphal. He has drawn everybody to
himself – friends and foes; Romans and Jews.
He founds his church when he gives his mother to beloved disciple. And, most importantly, he completes the work
of salvation with his death.
Jesus’ odd-sounding
self-reference “I AM” also needs explaining.
It is the Gospel of John’s cryptic way of referring to Jesus as God, the
great “I am who am” in the Book of Exodus.
The gospel is declaring that people have to believe in Jesus as God to
have their sins forgiven. If they do not
believe, they cannot be Jesus’ brothers and sisters. Only in close relationship with Jesus can
they have access to eternal life with the Father.
We might want to ask
ourselves if it is correct that one must believe in Jesus as God to be
saved. But there is a more important question
for us as we prepare to enter Holy Week.
How fully do we embrace Jesus as the Son of God? We want to learn from him, to pray to him,
and to follow with his help what he has told us.
