Our first reading today began with the words:
Behold,
my servant shall act wisely.
And we are here today to learn from Jesus’ supreme wisdom,
how to face up to the end of our days with love and commitment, for, as we were
told in the second reading:
In the days of His flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications,
with loud cries and tears, to Him who was able save Him from death.
Our faith teaches us that the only wise way to lead one’s
life, is, indeed, to “offer up prayers and petitions” with Jesus. Today, however, lots of people want to just
slip out of life easily and comfortably with assisted dying, drugs, or the
oblivion of ignorance:
The
fool says in his heart, "There is no God." (Ps. 14:1)
We know, however, because the book of Proverbs assures us
(14:16) that:
a fool is reckless and
careless;
one who easily and quickly turns to evil ways and actions,
actions that are but an outer manifestation of the inner folly of his thinking
“There is no God”. How could it be
otherwise, because Scripture (cf. Job 1:8) assures us that only a truly wise person
fears the LORD and shuns evil?
Such then is our philosophy of life as disciples of
Jesus: to live wisely by seeking what is good, shunning what is evil, and
offering up prayers and petitions to God.
However, it does sound somewhat strange when we recall
the words of the second reading where it said:
During the days of Jesus' life on earth, He offered up
prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him
from death, and He was heard because of His reverent submission.
How was He heard??
Jesus cried out in His troubles and He was not, it would
appear at first glance, heard, because the cup, the chalice, of suffering was
not taken away from Him. Far from it: He
was given the most atrocious cup of suffering to drink; that cup loathed and
feared above all by even the cruel Romans who were aware and very appreciative
of the world’s stock of tortures: Jesus’ cup was the cup, the chalice, the
torment, of crucifixion.
But Jesus was wise and He did not let appearances or fear
persuade Him that His Father had turned away from Him. No! He
trusted all the more. And this is what
we have to learn, this is the elixir, the touchstone, of life: God’s wisdom
is beyond our scrutiny, but God’s wisdom is infinite love, and is infinitely
beautiful.
The Father was leading Jesus along ways He could not
fathom, ways that threatened pain and promised darkness to His human eyes, but
which were -- in the infinite wisdom of His Father’s plan -- ways of infinite
love and unimaginable beauty. Jesus
trusted His Father, and in that He was, as the prophet foretold, infinitely
wise.
Now that is indeed a difficult life question for many who
merely glance at Christianity and then turn aside; but very that same question
leads us who are disciples to the very fount of wisdom, as we were advised in
the first reading:
See
(look carefully at, learn from) my servant acting wisely;
because if you learn aright from Him, you too, will, with
Him and in Him:
Be raised, lifted up and
highly exalted.
We, dear People of God, must learn this lesson from
today’s liturgy: no matter how threatening the clouds of difficulty and trial
may be in your life, if you are trying to walk according to God’s commandments,
then His love will be infallibly enfolding and embracing you. If you trust God, if you imitate Jesus who
trusted His Father totally:
Father,
not my will but yours be done.
Into your hands I commit My spirit
(Luke 23:46) then, it will be the Father’s embrace that
leads you on to what He has planned for you, something more beautiful than you
could ever imagine:
It is written: "No eye has seen, no ear has heard,
no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love Him" (1 Corinthians 2:9)
