Reading of the holy gospel according to Saint John. Jesus said to the Pharisees, I'm going away. You will look for me, but you will die in your sins. Where I am going, you cannot come. At this, some of the Jews began to ask, does he mean to kill himself when he claims, for I am going, you cannot come?
Jesus went on to say, you belong to what is below. I belong to what is above. You belong to this world, a world which can't hold me. That is why I said you would die in your sins. You will surely die in your sins unless you come to believe that I am.
Now that I am, of course, here is printed in big type. But you see, that's the definition of god that he gave of himself in the scene of the burning bush. I am. So you can see that Christ is claiming to be god. Who are you then?
They asked him. And Jesus answered, what I have been telling you from the beginning. I could say much about you in condemnation, but no. I only tell the world what I have heard from him, the truthful one, the one who sent me. They didn't grasp at all that he was speaking to them of the father.
Then Jesus continued, when you lift up the son of man, you will come to realize that I am and that I do nothing by myself. I say only what the father has taught me. The one who sent me is with me. He has not deserted me since I always do what pleases him. Because Jesus spoke in this way, many came to believe in him, and this is the gospel of the lord.
The name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit. Amen. Going back to that first reading this morning, we are with the the Israelites. How many thousands? I don't know.
In one case, Moses says there were 600,000 soldiers alone. So this this was a a huge crowd of people moving through the desert, desert, and they've been at it for years. It's a desolate place. Some of you may have been down in the Sinai. And here in one little sentence, you have such a view of life as we live it.
It says, their patience worn out by the journey. Their patience worn out by the journey. Now, every anybody who has tried and we are all trying and that's what God wants. Who who has tried to follow Christ through the desert, and we all have those spots. We don't all not all life is a desert.
Not all life is in the valley of darkness. There's plenty of high spots. But we don't live very long on the high spots, and the biggest mistake we make, you see, is to think that's the way life should be all the time. Some of us never get over in in in thinking of the religious life and following Christ. We never get over our first holy communion business or some retreat we made, which lifted us up.
And, we felt we were we were on we were up on the Mountain. We were up where God revealed himself to our blessed Lord and to his to his two disciples, Peter and John. And he said, oh, Lord, let's stay up here. This is great. This is wonderful.
This is triumph. This is glory. Let us build tents. Nail them down solid. Let's stay up here indefinitely.
That's plain human nature. That's the way it is with everything. Whether you're trying to be a good runner, a good soccer player, or a good flutist, or what have you, there are moments when it just seems that that's all you need is to give everything to all the thrust of your life into that venture. We we all have had that experience, and it comes more or less often, infrequently, but we know what it is. But the biggest mistake we can ever make is to think we're gonna be a great soccer player by expecting to be always on top of that wave.
The little girl who goes out here at 05:00 in the morning to do her figure skating week in and week out in the cold of the winter or goes to a swimming pool, she or he is not always on top of the wave. Now to me, I'm no great patron of the Old Testament. I could live comfortably without it. But there some of it is tremendous. And one of the most fascinating things for me is the psychological insight.
These people were en masse. They were a huge group of people. And you know what Horace said about the great crowd? I hate them, and I keep them at a distance. And Archie.
I don't want any parts to do with. I don't wanna get mixed up with that proletariat. Look what's look what's going to happen Sunday. Palm Sunday, they all rejoice in Christ and they lay our garments on the road and they're shouting Hosannas and within days are saying, Crucify, crucify. That's the crowd.
You see, and we think we're not we're not that kind of people, but we are. Our patience wears thin. Anybody, really anybody, can be a hero if it doesn't take too much time. Something that's thrown on the spur of the moment, bang, and you're a hero. But it's the long, hard drive that counts.
The long, hard, lonely, forlorn, faint, and stark hours that we put into anything, anything at all. I'm not just talking about religious, I'm talking about marriage or being a good figure skater or writing a book or anything. Anyone who's tried to do anything worthwhile knows what I'm talking about. It's a lonely, hard road, and our patience wears thin. Now I I hope some of you saw the final installment last night of Brideshead Revisited.
To me, I saw the first and second installment in last night. Read the book so many years ago that I didn't have much of a remembrance of the book. But that's installment last night was fantastic. And there's just one sentence that came out so strong. When Lord Marshman has die has died, his daughter who's broken up one marriage and has had a very lurid life, is about to enter into a second marriage with a man who's being divorced.
She is the one who finally brings the parish priest in to give the old man the last rites. They are sitting down, and you know what's going on in her head. I can't go through with this second marriage. And she she's trying to make this other writer understand, And he has greater understanding than she thinks, but here's her here's the sentence she she makes. Said, the worse I am, the more I need God.
The worse I am, the more I need God. That's a tremendous at least I think it is. That when I'm in the valley as we said saw yesterday, in the valley of darkness now notice the valley of darkness. Have you ever been in a dark valley where you can't see your hand before your face, literally? Where every there seems to be no hope of any light.
Have you been there? That's when you need God. When you're at your worst, that's when you need him the most. And so this this these excerpts from the Old Testament of the the chosen notice that the chosen people who were liberated. They were liberated from Egypt.
And what happens? They wanna go back where there's food and shelter and security and and water. And that there happens. Tithe it's not just once because there just seems to be a constant wave. In one minute, they're all for god, and then and they're saying, well, do everything you want, oh god.
You you're taking care of sending us the manna in the morning. You're sending us the the whatever they were, the pigeons or what in the in the evening for meat. Remember that their clothes didn't wear out in forty years. When they needed water, it came. But by golly, in spite of it all, their patience wore out.
And they asked, why did you bring us out here to die? We could have died much more comfortable in Egypt. It's better to be slaves there than out here being sacrificed to the sun and and to the elements. Their patience wore very thin, and so does ours. Yes.
We have a right to expect it. Let's not put ourselves up on a on a pedestal where we we don't belong. But we don't we don't belong down there either. We belong where we are as baptized Christians, as saved Christians. Saved from what?
Saved for what? We we have been saved by this very fact that when we are in the valley of death, in the darkness, when our patience wears thin, when we need god the most, is when we most often are at our worst. And that's why we have a savior in Jesus Christ. In the name of the father, the son, and the holy spirit. Amen.