Lent

Jan 24 2025

Led by the Light

In some places in the U.S., flowers are blooming and the sun is shining: spring has come. Here at my house in the Midwest, it is still late winter. This particular week in March is when I plant my tomatoes and my peppers in my seed room. I suspend bright lights two inches above the flats to keep them warm. Where light glows, the plants spring upward when they germinate. Did you know that seeds with no light will grow in any direction—sidewise, upward, or upside down?

Similarly, people in nursing homes or hospitals, having only artificial lightbulbs, can lose track of the natural rhythms of night and day. Third-shift workers may experience that same disorientation. The body does not know when it is dark and when it is light.

I recall a disoriented time in my life at seventeen. The world felt directionless. Was there was a purpose to anything that I did? I remember thinking, as we sped down the interstate, “If I opened the door and fell out of this car and died, nobody would really care.” I had a vague sense of God’s care, but that love was like a weak light bulb far away.

The Letter to the Ephesians calls us from darkness to light: “Live like those who are at home in the daylight.” Jesus touches the blind man’s eyes and he sees. The “light of the world” changes things. He did for me. I hope that he has done so for you.

Yet some may prefer the darkness, Jesus says. Nobody enjoys being directionless, so other directions are marketed to “save us,” to lift us from darkness to light —from football to coffee, yoga, and massage therapy. But can any “thing” truly replace Jesus as Savior, the true light of the world?

Consider/Discuss

Depression and despair are growing in our culture. Suicide and drug use rates have lowered life expectancy. How do we help those we love to transform from a perception of God as “a weak light bulb far away” to the radiant Love who is near? What can we personally do to be Jesus’ light to a world that feels hopeless and directionless?
When have you ever felt like the man born blind? When have you experienced Jesus as the light who brings you out of that darkness? Personal stories are most effective in bringing about transformation. Could you share that story with someone who is feeling as though he or she lives in the shadows?

Living and Praying the Word

Jesus, light of the world, thank you for leading us through dark valleys and out of despair. Like young David, anoint us to follow you wholeheartedly wherever you direct. We want to sprout. We want to grow. We want to bear fruit that will nourish others. Help us to grow always toward your light.

Jan 24 2025

Scripture Study for

In the Bible, God typically chooses leaders who, while always flawed and sometimes sinful, nevertheless are fundamentally obedient and loyal to God. An exception to this rule was the first king chosen to lead Israel, Saul, who proved to be unwilling to listen to God’s spokesman, the prophet Samuel. Now God chooses another king, the youngest son of Jesse, who will turn out to be a man after God’s own heart (Acts 13:22). God looks past David’s youth and sees a child who, with divine help, will be capable of following God “wholeheartedly.” And so immediately the newly chosen king receives God’s Spirit, equipping him to rule God’s people.

The New Testament letters make it clear that receiving new life in Christ entails personal transformation right now, not just forgiveness of past sins and future beatitude. To be reborn in Christ is to be rescued from the darkness of the world and to live in the light of the Lord. This light allows Christians to assess reality from the divine perspective, exposing “the fruitless works of darkness.” It also allows for transformation, producing in the individual “every kind of goodness and righteousness and truth.” It is in this sense that Christians have already awakened from the death of darkness and now walk in the life of Christ’s light.

At the end of today’s Gospel, Jesus says he came so that those who do not see might see, and those who do see might become blind. The blind man received healing because he knew he could not see (i.e., was a sinner), and knowing it left him open to spiritual healing. The physically sighted leaders, who do see, paradoxically do not see their sinfulness. Their “sight” is illusory; they are just as “spiritually blind” as the blind man, but they don’t know it. Jesus forces a choice on them. Will they recognize that they do not see, or will their hardheartedness lead them to reject the light of the world (John 1:9) and thus become truly blind?

Jan 24 2025

Born Again—from the Inside Out

Nicodemus, the Jewish leader, came to see Jesus at night. He wanted answers. But why did he prefer to come in the darkness and not in the light? Was he was concerned about his reputation, protecting his “street cred”?

Is that what we’re living for— “street cred” or the number of “likes” that we get? Does the number of our social media “followers” determine our worth? “Looking good” is what an older generation calls it. “Saving face” is critical to the politics of many nations.

We do need encouragement. Affirmation is necessary for human growth. But some positives can turn into compulsions. An institution can be overpowered by a fixation on safeguarding its reputation. You and I can be personally overwhelmed by the culture of applause.

A young man once talked to me about how he had gained “street cred” for looking like “a good Catholic boy” at a Catholic college. He got affirmation for attending Mass daily. It felt good. But the Holy Spirit asked him in prayer to start over, to shed that mere living for external approval that had birthed his persona, and to make it new from the inside. He began to focus on integrity, to be reborn from within—not just to look good, but to be good. It felt healthy to start afresh.

Maybe Nicodemus was weary of the posturing that swirled around him. Maybe he came to Jesus because he saw a refreshing grace. Jesus suggested to Nicodemus, “Start over, begin anew.” He extended a hand to help this Pharisee begin again, differently—to come out of the darkness and into the light.

What Jesus tells Nicodemus (and us) in John 3:16, that “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son,” isn’t just a placard to be displayed proudly at sporting events. By grace, we can start over. The Savior rescues us from living for the external applause of life, and rebirths us from within.

Consider/Discuss

We need affirmation to keep loving and giving and not to get discouraged. But what about the incessant pressures to “look good”? Can an addiction to applause and being liked throw us off balance? What happens to our self-worth when nobody claps? On the other hand, what can happen to our interior equilibrium if too many people applaud us? What kind of inner integrity does the Holy Spirit want to grow within us?
Where do we find the grace to “start over?” Grown-up life is no longer innocent. We have hurt others. We also have been hurt. We ought to be condemned for the deeds that we have done in darkness. When have you (or have you not) experienced Jesus’ hand of forgiveness as he says, “I do not come to condemn the world but to save it”?

Living and Praying with the Word

God of glory, you are fresh, you are new. There are times when this world wearies us with its posturing and demands. On this Lenten day, we turn to you for forgiveness and renewal. Give us the grace to begin again. Help us! As we close our eyes to seek you, the blessed light within, you even more are looking for us and drawing us to yourself. Holy Spirit, turn our hearts toward the goodness that is founded only on your love and your truth. Refresh us so we can be reborn anew this day.

Jan 24 2025

Scripture Study for

The first reading brings us to the period after the Exile, when newly-redeemed Israel looks back on its history. The author juxtaposes the continued infidelity of his people with the enduring commitment of God. Even before they entered the land, Israel turned away from their God and toward other deities, the “abominations of the nations.” God warned them of the consequences, but they did not listen, until finally they went into exile. Once again, God has shown mercy, bringing them back to the land and reestablishing the divine presence among them. Divine graciousness, human infidelity, judgment to bring the people back to God, forgiveness and restoration: this is the pattern of God’s dealings with the chosen people that we find throughout the Bible.

Paul emphasizes God’s graciousness and goodness, which has been shown not just to the Gentile Christians of Ephesus, but to the whole church. God is “rich in mercy,” has “great love for us,” “brought us to life with Christ,” has shown “the immeasurable riches of his grace in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus,” which is a “gift of God.” This is no grudging salvation Paul proclaims, but great-hearted goodness from a God who wants only to give life in place of death. All those who have been baptized into Christ now in some sense enjoy the full fruits of redemption; they are “seated . . . with [Christ] in the heavens.” This “realized eschatology,” which from the human perspective is yet to come, has in fact already been accomplished in Christ.

Again this week we see Jesus as the fulfillment of a “type” from the Old Testament. In this case, it is the bronze serpent that Moses had made to heal the Israelites (Numbers 21:4–9). The larger point Jesus makes to Nicodemus is that the love of God for the world is almost beyond belief: God has gone so far as to “give his only Son.” On the one hand, this gift is simply the Incarnation itself, which makes manifest on earth the glory, grace, and truth of God (1:14). On the other hand, this gift is the saving death of Christ. Sadly, it is not accepted by all because to accept is to open oneself to the “true Light” (1:9). As with many other instances in this Gospel, the presence of God in Christ forces a decision that one is unable to avoid making.

Jan 24 2025

The Tender Voice of Jesus

Around the corner from my office at Notre Dame is a statue by sculptor Ivan Mestrovic of the encounter between Christ and the Samaritan woman at the well. The Lord is looking straight at the woman. The woman is clinging to a large jar and looking down. It is midday. What did this woman expect when she woke up that day? Another dry and empty day as the pariah of the town? In Mosaic law, it is the husband who divorces the wife, so she has already been cast off five times. And her current live-in has not married her. Yet here is a bone-weary male Jewish stranger, asking her for a drink. Asking her for a drink. Apparently from her bucket. No wonder she is looking down.

This statue campus freezes time right there. But in the Gospel, we hear Jesus tenderly poke and prod and speak to her until she opens up and lifts her head. He holds out to her an abundance of the water of life, greater than she has ever imagined. And she takes it.

She drops her bucket (to which she clings so tightly in the statue) and runs to tell the news about the stranger. When she comes back, she doesn’t bring a bucket; she brings a whole village!

In art, we look at spaces, not just objects. What most impresses me about Mestrovic’s statue is the tenderness in the space between the two characters. Some of us are preachers, some are teachers. Whatever our ministry in life, when we seek to help people come to God, it is that tone of tenderness that crosses divides. More important than words, come into the space with gentleness. Living water will flow.

Consider/Discuss

Jesus also entrusts his thirst to us. We encounter him in order to be filled. Yet he has no bucket but ours. What is our role in fulfilling Jesus’ mission to the thirsty world in which we live?
Read through the Gospel again, this time imagining great tenderness in the voice of Jesus. How do you hear the passage differently?

Living and Praying with the Word

Like the woman at the well and the Israelites in the desert, Lord, sometimes we wonder if you—or anyone—cares. Yet you continue to tenderly poke and prod and speak to us. Help us to raise our eyes and see you looking at us with love. As we continue on through this Lent, bring us to repentance and to glory, but also deepen our tenderness in our mission to bring living water to those who thirst for you.