Tuesday March 23

FIFTH WEEK OF LENT

 

Look Up to Christ

 

Introduction

An incontestable truth is that only faith saves. For the Jews wandering in the desert, faith in God’s power—presented here in the form of a bronze serpent—will save the rebellious people of God. The Pharisees have to accept Christ in faith if they want to be saved. We too must look up to the cross with eyes of faith to become free people and God’s sons and daughters. And we, the Church, must become the sign of salvation raised above the nations.

 

Opening Prayer

Our saving, merciful God,
wandering in our deserts
of injustice and lack of love,
we cry out with fear
or are stunned into silence,
some into doubt or despair.
Give us enough trusting faith
to look up to him
who took our evil and doubts upon himself,
suffered for them on a cross, and rose from them,
Jesus Christ, our Savior and our Lord.

 

Reading 1: Nn 21:4-9

From Mount Hor the children of Israel set out on the Red Sea road,
to bypass the land of Edom.
But with their patience worn out by the journey,
the people complained against God and Moses,
“Why have you brought us up from Egypt to die in this desert,
where there is no food or water?
We are disgusted with this wretched food!”

In punishment the LORD sent among the people saraph serpents,
which bit the people so that many of them died.
Then the people came to Moses and said,
“We have sinned in complaining against the LORD and you.
Pray the LORD to take the serpents away from us.”
So Moses prayed for the people, and the LORD said to Moses,
“Make a saraph and mount it on a pole,
and whoever looks at it after being bitten will live.”
Moses accordingly made a bronze serpent and mounted it on a pole,
and whenever anyone who had been bitten by a serpent
looked at the bronze serpent, he lived.

 

Responsorial Psalm: Ps 102:2-3, 16-18, 19-21

(2) O Lord, hear my prayer, and let my cry come to you.
O LORD, hear my prayer,
and let my cry come to you.
Hide not your face from me
in the day of my distress.
Incline your ear to me;
in the day when I call, answer me speedily.
R. O Lord, hear my prayer, and let my cry come to you.

The nations shall revere your name, O LORD,
and all the kings of the earth your glory,
When the LORD has rebuilt Zion
and appeared in his glory;
When he has regarded the prayer of the destitute,
and not despised their prayer.
R.  O Lord, hear my prayer, and let my cry come to you.

Let this be written for the generation to come,
and let his future creatures praise the LORD:
“The LORD looked down from his holy height,
from heaven he beheld the earth,
To hear the groaning of the prisoners,
to release those doomed to die.”
R.  O Lord, hear my prayer, and let my cry come to you.

 

Verse before the Gospel:

The seed is the word of God, Christ is the sower;
all who come to him will live for ever.

 

Gospel: Jn 8:21-30

Jesus said to the Pharisees:
“I am going away and you will look for me,
but you will die in your sin.
Where I am going you cannot come.”
So the Jews said,
“He is not going to kill himself, is he,
because he said, ‘Where I am going you cannot come’?”
He said to them, “You belong to what is below,
I belong to what is above.
You belong to this world,
but I do not belong to this world.
That is why I told you that you will die in your sins.
For if you do not believe that I AM,
you will die in your sins.”
So they said to him, “Who are you?”
Jesus said to them, “What I told you from the beginning.
I have much to say about you in condemnation.
But the one who sent me is true,
and what I heard from him I tell the world.”
They did not realize that he was speaking to them of the Father.
So Jesus said to them,
“When you lift up the Son of Man,
then you will realize that I AM,
and that I do nothing on my own,
but I say only what the Father taught me.
The one who sent me is with me.
He has not left me alone,
because I always do what is pleasing to him.”
Because he spoke this way, many came to believe in him.

 

Intercessions

• For people who suffer much, that they may look up in faith and hope to Jesus on the cross for strength and healing, we pray:
• For a deep faith in the love of God, whose Son Jesus suffered for us on the cross, we pray:
• For all of us, that we may look up to the cross as a liberating sign for all those who follow Jesus, we pray:

 

Prayer over the Gifts

God our Father,
we celebrate the memorial
of the passion and death of Jesus.
May our encounter with your Son
save us from the evil in us
and help us to rise above it,
for we know and believe
that he is with us,
and that he is your Son,
one God with you and with the Holy Spirit,
now and forever.

 

Prayer after Communion

Lord our God,
you have called your Church –
that is us – to be your sign
set in the sight of nations.
May our living faith in your Son
inspire people to discover and encounter him,
that with him we may always do
what pleases you and serve you.
We ask you this through Christ our Lord.

 

Blessing

Pain, suffering, death, will always remain a scandal and a mystery, something difficult to bear. Yet there is Jesus, who accepted the cross to save us. We are disciples of him who died on the cross. However hard it may be, let us learn to bear it when it comes to us in the circumstances of life. May almighty God bless you, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

 

Commentary  

The rebellion of Israel in the desert is a constant theme that the Church takes up for the liturgical reflections. Israelites in the desert heading for the promised land – that is the entire story of exodus has so much in common with the life of the Church in the world.

Israel wanted freedom from slavery. But the path that led to freedom involved risks and troubles. Indeed, liberation is not a bed of roses. Like the people of Israel in the desert, we the Church lives in the world, moving towards the promise of God – towards freedom and salvation. But like the Israelites of the Old Testament, we are not willing to go through pains and sufferings. We are tempted to correct the plans of God, we want to tell him how he should free us, heal us, save us.

Being from this world, being from below, implied being under the power of sin. For the author of the Gospel, the world to which he referred was the society in which he lived – that was distorted and clouded by sin. Until people could see through their illusions and detach themselves from the power of their various groupings, they would remain blinded by the sin.
A way out of their blindness was to listen to Jesus. Until people acknowledged the identity of Jesus as God and were prepared to surrender to him in faith, they would die in their sins. But instead, if they surrendered to him in faith, they would live for eternity in the embrace of God.
The lifting up of the Son of Man referred to Jesus’ being lifted up on the cross. Jesus would show to the world the heart of God and the depth of God’s commitment to save. People might not listen to him now, but his death and resurrection were still to happen. In the light of them, he hoped people would finally come to realise the truth of this divine reality. Jesus had revealed why he was able to face his threatening death with equanimity.
To fail to recognize who Jesus is and where he came from is to remain in darkness – the darkness of sin, ignorance, and unbelief. But if we look to Jesus and listen to his word of life and truth, then we will find the way to lasting peace and joy with God. Our time here in this present world is very limited and short, but how we live it today has consequences not only for the present moment but for our eternal destiny as well. Which direction is your life headed in right now?