God's Boundless Love and Redemption
March 13, 2024 - Wednesday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Isaiah 49:8-15; Psalm 145:8-9, 13cd-14, 17-18; John 5:17-30
Psalm 145 concludes the fifth and final collection of the Psalter (Psalms 107-145), celebrating the kingship of God. While kingship is often associated with power and authority, the psalmist highlights that God's kingship is evident in His mercy: "The LORD is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and of great kindness" (Ps 145:8; see Exodus 34:6). This belief in God’s magnanimity permeates Israel's faith and is invoked in times of national and personal crises, such as the people's complaint in Isaiah 49:14: "The Lord has forsaken me, my Lord has forgotten me."
The passage in Isaiah, encompassing the people's complaint and God's response, is situated within the broader narrative of the Servant of the Lord and serves as encouragement for Judeans in Babylonian exile. God's love for them surpasses even a mother's love for her child: "Can a mother forget her infant, be without tenderness for the child of her womb? Even should she forget, I will never forget you" (Is. 49:15). God promises to bring all the exiles back to the Promised Land.
Of particular note is how God addresses His servant. In our liturgical translation, it is rendered as "a covenant to the people," similarly translated in the Septuagint as "I gave you as a covenant to nations" (Is. 49:8). The early Christians identified this statement with Jesus Christ, who, through His sacrificial love, established a new and everlasting covenant between God and humanity. This statement leads us into today's Gospel, where Jesus declares: "My Father is at work until now, so I am at work" (John 5:17).
In today's Gospel, Jesus employs the analogy of apprenticeship to illustrate his relationship with the Father. Similar to the ancient method of learning, Jesus emphasizes that everything he does, he learned from the Father. This concept operates on two levels—just as he learned practical skills from St. Joseph, his foster father, he also learned about compassion, healing broken hearts, and restoring lives from his Heavenly Father. Jesus states, "Amen, amen, I say to you, the Son cannot do anything on his own, but only what he sees the Father doing; for what he does, the Son will do also" (John 5:19). Within this apprenticeship analogy, today's Gospel highlights two significant aspects: Jesus has the power to give life and the authority to judge. Moreover, Saint John indicates that the judgement focuses on those who have done wicked things in this life (see John 5:29).
Jesus Christ, the Son of God, equal with the Father, brings all those who believe in him from a more tragic exile than the Babylonian one. Jesus has transferred us from death to life (see John 5:24). The Lord has neither forgotten nor forsaken us. He has sent His beloved Son, who died for us so we could live. The Paschal Mystery of Jesus Christ that we are about to celebrate is the greatest expression of God's love and mercy.