How do you understand the power of God?
In Luke's Gospel, as Jesus suffers on the cross before the rulers and soldiers of
Israel, they mock him because of the inscription above his head; If you are King of the Jews, save yourself,
they say. What they fail to understand
is that God’s power lies precisely in the apparent weakness, or foolishness, of
the cross: the crucifixion is the
ultimate fulfillment of God’s promise of love, and so Jesus dies in the
ultimate expression of that love. We
have been brought into a kingdom that is not ruled as the world rules, because
the world’s definitions do not include the fullness of God, God’s infinite
love. We can’t comprehend that love, but
we can begin to experience it when we allow the power of the love of God to
transform us. One of the thieves hanging
on the cross beside Jesus comes to understand this: dying to his own past sin, he is transformed
as he acknowledges that Jesus is
King: Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.
This understanding of strength in conjunction with apparent
weakness is present as early as the stories of David told in 2 Samuel, where
Israel invites David, already the King of Judah, to be its king as well; David
and Israel share bone and flesh,
strength and vulnerability. In accepting
to be king, David is accepting full
responsibility; as shepherd, he must
embrace humiity as well, so that when he takes his judgment seat, as Psalm 122 reminds us, he will proffer justice
grounded in the wisdom and love of God.
Thanks to that love, Paul reminds the Colossians, we, too,
are fit to share in the inheritance of
the holy ones in light. Why? Because Jesus, God’s beloved Son and the firstborn
of all creation, has made peace by
the blood of his cross. Only through
the cross can we come to be transferred
to the kingdom, that kingdom of inversion in which the values of power and
possession beloved by the world are turned upside down. From a place of humility, then, Let us give thanks to the Father for the
gift of this inheritance, an inheritance of love, the true and
infinite power of God, and the single most important indicator of God’s
kingdom.
Happy Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the
Universe!
This post is based on Fr. Pat's Scripture class.
Image source: Wordle
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