but the world must know that I love the Father
and that I do just as the Father has commanded me.
Jesus deeply desired to show the world how much he loved his Father. He desired this for our sakes, to show just how worthy of trust his Father was. He knew that the command of the Father was eternal life, and he desired to demonstrate that fact by keeping that command to the end. Jesus did this for a humanity that did not have an easy time trusting, did not necessarily believe that God had their best interests at heart, and who tended to think of commandments as about anything but the fullness of life. By demonstrating that his Father was trustworthy Jesus desired to put humanity back into right relationship with him, helping us to love him as he himself loved him.
‘I am going away and I will come back to you.’
If you loved me,
you would rejoice that I am going to the Father;
for the Father is greater than I.
In his human nature Jesus provided a model for his disciples, so that they too could orient the trajectory of their lives toward the Father. Compared to what could be theirs in union with the Father anything they could pursue apart from him was insignificant, undeserving of the effort. Layers of difficulty could be added, even the full opposition of "the ruler of the world", the devil himself, but it would only serve to reveal and make evident the love of the Son and the greatness of the Father. If we allow ourselves to be directed to the Father, turned toward him by his own love for us, even the ruler of this world will be unable to harm us. True, he may harm our circumstances, but not our souls. He may take our comfort, but he need not steal our joy, as long as that joy is rooted in the peace Jesus left for us.
Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.
Not as the world gives do I give it to you.
Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid.
We should be able to see difficulties in the world and in our lives and continue to believe in Jesus, because he told us before any of it happened. There may even be times when God himself seems distant, just as Jesus suffered agony in the garden and feelings of abandonment on the cross. But his love for the Father was unwavering and at the deepest level of his heart he remained untouched by the evil one. His human emotions may well not have been those we would associate with joy. But at a deeper level his confidence in the Father was absolute and unshakable. It was for this reason that he was able to commend his spirit into the Father's hands with his last breath. And this is what we want for our last breath as well. So let us learn from Jesus to trust the Father, to receive our joy from him rather than looking to the world in order to receive it. Let us open ourselves to the gift of the Spirit who unites us to the Father as sons and daughters, and in doing so gives us a taste of what love, joy, and peace are truly meant to be.
Paul demonstrated what was possible for those who would let themselves be filled with the Spirit and trust in the Father. He reproduced in himself the life of Jesus at a smaller scale.
They stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city,
supposing that he was dead.
But when the disciples gathered around him,
he got up and entered the city.
It was very much as though Paul had risen from the stoning as though by resurrection. He showed his commitment to the work of the Father, his unwillingness to compromise or turn aside from a Kingdom trajectory. He saw the "hardships" as part of the plan, and did not let them shake his confidence or even slow down his mission. For our part, we tend to be shaken by lesser suffering than stoning. But Jesus told us before us about these things before they happened, and provided his own peace, stemming from his own relationship with the Father, as the antidote. Let's hear him when he tells us individually, "Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid" and let us follow in his steps.
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