Thursday, October 18, 2018

Sunday Gospel Reflection, October 21, 2018: Can you drink the cup that I drink?


What does it mean to sacrifice for another? 

   Well into Mark’s Gospel, Jesus’ disciples still really don’t understand the mystery associated with Jesus (who he is, why he came, what he intends to do), or Jesus’ notion of the kingdom of God.  James and John demonstrate their limited understanding when they ask Jesus to grant that in his glory, they may sit one at his right and the other at his left.  Their idea of the kingdom is earthbound – concrete and limited to human parameters.  Jesus responds, Can you drink the cup that I drink?  Can you share in my experience, in other words, and come to understand what it means to sacrifice for another, to lose your life for another?  This is the true kingdom, a kingdom grounded in sacrifice and service.

   As he makes perfectly clear, Jesus came not to be served but to serve, to die for them, for all.  He is the incarnation of the suffering servant in Isaiah, who accepts the sacrifice requested of him, giving his life as an offering for sin.  And the Lord is pleased to crush him in infirmity, Isaiah tells us, because that infirmity, or suffering, is necessary to the Lord’s plan of salvation:  if the servant is crushed, the plan has begun to unfold, and the Lord is pleased because he wants salvation for his people, so that they might be justified.  Jesus, as the Book of Hebrews notes, has been tested in every way and can therefore sympathize with our human weakness.  If we believe that Jesus Christ is mercy, that he died and rose so that mercy, and therefore grace, might be ours, then we are demonstrating the trust described in Psalm 33.  Only if we trust, and open ourselves to that grace, allowing it to fill us, can we ever come to understand what it means to drink the cup that he drinks, and to see how the will of the Lord was accomplished through Jesus; only then can we know his mercy. 

   Imagine:  what if the will of the Lord were accomplished through us, through the cup we accept?  How might we learn to sacrifice ourselves and be servant of all, following in the footsteps of Christ?

This class was based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture class.
Image source:  www.wordle.net

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