Fifth Sunday of Lent–Third Scrutiny
With the increase of AI and internet bots, it’s not uncommon for webpages that require a log-in to also require you to verify you’re human. Apparently, all it takes to be human is the ability to select pictures with bridges, traffic lights, or motorcycles. It strikes me as funny the different times and situations when we have to prove our identity. In an ever-more-automated world, I suppose we pray the price for security with electronic hoops through which to jump.
In the totally un-automated time of Christ, He still had to prove who He was. If we go through the Gospels we see Jesus proving His divine identity to the people. Sometimes it’s a whole crowd, other times it’s just the disciples or very few apostles. We have the miraculous catch of fish when Jesus calls Peter to follow the Lord. We have the healing of Peter’s mother-in-law (which maybe led Peter away from believing in the Lord’s goodness). Jesus turns water into wine at a wedding when it ran out. Then there’s the healing of the paralytic, lowered through the roof, where Jesus forgives the man’s sins and then heals the man of his paralysis. There’s the multiplication of the loaves and fish for thousands at different times. Jesus heals the blind and the deaf and mute. He calms the storm when the Apostles are in the boat and afraid they are about to drown. He walks on water, and even invites Peter to do the same. He expels demons, including once into a herd of swine. He heals the centurion’s servant from afar, and raises to life the daughter of Jairus and the son of the widow of Nain. Lepers approach Jesus, and not only does Jesus not catch leprosy, He heals them of it. Two weeks ago we heard Jesus reveal private details of her life to a Samaritan woman. Last week we heard of the healing of the man who was blind from birth, something that was unheard of, as the man testifies.
But apparently, even with all these miracles, people still wondered who Jesus was. Even with all these miracles, Jesus often bemoans the people’s lack of faith, and their ever-continuing doubt about His identity. They even accuse Jesus of being in cahoots with the devil when Jesus casts out demons from people, and accuse Christ of breaking the Law of Moses. In His own home town and in Capernaum, Jesus cannot do many miracles because of their lack of faith.
Certainly this would prove Jesus’ identity, even more than clicking boxes with bridges, traffic lights, and motorcycles. And yet, as we will hear next week on Palm Sunday, while many people believed–the crowd that would welcome Jesus in as the Son of David–there will still many who did not believe: certainly the Pharisees, scribes, and Sadducees, and maybe even Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Jesus.
Do we believe that Jesus is who He says He is? Do we take His miracles as proof of His divinity? Or do we doubt? Certainly, belief requires faith, which makes the leap from what is known to what is unknown or cannot be proven scientifically. But faith is also a form of knowledge. And when that faith has reason to assist it, even if we are not 100% sure, we can have a certitude in our faith. For example, I’m relatively sure that my car is in my garage right now. I can’t see it right now, so I don’t have scientific proof that it’s there, but I remember parking it there yesterday, and the garage door, last time I checked, was still closed and intact, so that I don’t have any suggestion that someone else has taken it without my permission. But, strictly speaking, I only know it’s there by faith.
When bad things happen to us, we can doubt in the presence of God, or that God truly loves us. We wonder why God would let us suffer so much? How could a good God let evil happen? The devil tempts us to abandon these true stories we have heard from the Gospels where God proves His love for us, because what we want didn’t happen, or because we had to undergo something bad.
In the midst of these temptations to doubt, our Lord invites us to look at the evidence: His teachings that help us live a happier life; His miracles which prove that He is God. Look especially to this miracle, the culmination of His previous miracles, as the nail in the coffin (pun intended) that God can do anything. But even greater than that, is the miracle that we will hear about over the next two Sundays: how God, in the Person of Jesus, died for us so that the reign of sin and death could be ended, and the punishment due to sin, which first entered the world through Adam and Eve, could be remitted. And then, to prove that nothing has power over God, God will raise Jesus from the dead to show us that we, too, can have new life if we are joined to Him through Holy Baptism and through following His way of life.
My dear elect, you are also signs to us of God’s love and the veracity of what Jesus said. You have come to believe in Him, through your own pilgrimage of faith, and your choice strengthens our faith. In these last few weeks, doubts may enter your mind. But have confidence in the choice you have made, and do not listen to the temptations of the evil one. God does not only tell us to believe in Him, He gives us miracles and signs which attest to His Divine identity and His power and grace. God desires to give you new life through His Death and Resurrection. Yes, faith is required, but it is not a blind-faith, but rather a reasonable belief that God can do all things, because we have heard and experienced through the millennia how He has done all things, even beyond the laws of nature.
All of us may have doubts from time to time. We may wonder if our faith will be rewarded, or if it’s just a desire. Look to the miracles in the Gospels and through the Church for 2,000 years. Look to the witness of the martyrs who died rather than give up their faith. Soon we will celebrate, once more, how Christ once-and-for-all proved His love and His power: through His Death and Resurrection which gave us freedom from sin and death, and opened the kingdom of heaven for us.
