Fourth Sunday of Lent

Jan 08 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, upwards, 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. Suicides 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 08 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 woken up 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.

Dec 16 2024

A Different Kind of Seeing

First, there is the seer (a “see-er”) who doesn’t see. Samuel, God’s prophet, was sent to anoint a replacement for King Saul. When his eyes fell on the oldest son of Jesse, Samuel thought he was seeing the next king of Israel. Eliab had some of the same qualities as Saul: tall, striking in appearance. But God was looking at the heart and the divine gaze turned elsewhere—indeed, outside the room, to where the youngest of Jesse’s sons was tending sheep. (Ever since Abel, God seemed to be partial to shepherds!)

In the Gospel, the man born blind is the only one who does see clearly, or rather, who comes to see clearly. As with most of us, he comes to a 20/20 spiritual vision gradually. When they first ask him who healed him, he replies forthrightly, “The man called Jesus made clay and anointed my eyes.” And when they say Jesus can’t be from God and heal on the Sabbath, the cured man asks how Jesus could be a sinner and do what he did; then he calls Jesus a prophet. Later, he says, “If he were not from God, he would not be able to do anything.” And, finally, on meeting up with Jesus again, he acknowledges him as Son of Man and as Lord.

On the other side were all these seeing people who do not see Jesus for who he was. To really see Jesus, you need faith. This gift will be generously given—in God’s time—to those who seek it.

Consider/Discuss

How do you see Jesus?
Are there people who do not see who Jesus is? Have you asked God to given them the sight of faith?

Responding to the Word

Lord Jesus, you are the light that lifts the blindness from the eyes of our heart, mind, and spirit. To see you is to come to faith in you as Lord and Savior. Give this gift of sight to those who do not have it. Grant, Lord, that they may see.

Dec 16 2024

Scripture Study for

The search for the new king and the choice and anointing of David open a new chapter in the story of Israel. The anointing of David is a solemn and sacred action that ceremonially sealed God’s choosing him. Following the ritual, the spirit of the Lord rushes upon him. This spirit was understood as a principle of dynamic divine action, a force that had visible effects in human history. Those seized by the spirit were thus empowered to act within the community in some unique fashion. This story recounts how it took hold of a future king.

The move from darkness to light is the principal metaphor used in the Letter to the Ephesians to describe the radical change that takes place in the lives of Christians as a result of their commitment to Christ. Christians are not only warned about the works of darkness, but also urged to expose them. This counsel is given as a play on the difference between virtuous behavior that can be plainly seen, because it is done in the light, and shameful behavior that is hidden in the secret of darkness. Christians have entered into a new state of being, which will require a new way of living.

The struggle between darkness and light is a thread that runs throughout the account of the man cured of blindness. Jesus uses this two-part form to underscore the urgency of his ministry. He and his disciples must do God’s work while it is yet day, for the night will come when such work will have to cease. Jesus identifies himself as the light of the world. The man who was brought from physical blindness to sight moves from spiritual blindness to religious insight. This is not true of the Pharisees. They are blind to the truth that the newly cured man saw so clearly. The one who was blind now sees, and those who can see are really blind.

Dec 16 2024

The Greatest Virtue

If somebody were to ask you what your greatest virtue is, what would you say? A virtue is a habit of doing good, according to Thomas Aquinas. A virtue is something you are able to do because you have been graced by God. And being graced means being gifted. So another way of asking this question is: what is the greatest gift you have been given? You might immediately answer, “Love,” as St. Paul himself writes in his Letter to the Corinthians (1 Corinthians 12:31 — 13:13).

Now, love has many faces: patience, kindness, and compassion, to name a few. But I would propose that the greatest expression of this gift—and the most difficult one to carry out—is forgiveness. The story of the prodigal son is really the story of a father prodigal in forgiveness for his children. This father speaks to us of our merciful God, always ready to forgive. And this story was Jesus’ answer to why he hung out with sinners.

During this season when we are preparing to renew our baptismal promises, we would do well to examine how well we are living out the virtues given to us at baptism; we call them theological virtues: faith, hope, and love. In this season, when we often turn to the sacrament of reconciliation to ask forgiveness from the Father who continues to reconcile the world to himself through Christ, it is also good to ask how are we doing as forgivers, as agents of reconciliation.

Consider/Discuss

Is there someone who needs your forgiveness?
Is there someone from whom you need to ask forgiveness?

Responding to the Word

Loving Lord, when we look at the cross, we see the love of the Father embodied in your saving death for our salvation. Because of your death and resurrection, we are part of a new creation, reconciled to the Father. Make us your worthy ambassadors, able to embody your merciful love.