A reading of the holy gospel according to Saint John. Today's reading continues the theme that we've had for the last two or three days, and that is texts from Saint John to confer the divinity of Jesus Christ. So the church is trying to bring home to us that this figure, this man who will be on the cross is not just human, but holy and completely divine. The son of god, one person with two natures. And so today, we have a continuation of that theme.
Remember, our blessed lord is being pursued by his enemies who wanna destroy him. So Jesus moved about within Galilee. That's the northern country. It's as far away from Jerusalem as you can get and still be in the holy land. He had decided not to travel to Judea, that's down in Jerusalem, because some of the Jews were looking for a chance to kill him.
He knew that perfectly. The Jewish feast of booths drew near. Once his brothers had gone up to the festival, that is, they went from the lake country south to Jerusalem, he too went up to Jerusalem, but as if in secret and not for everybody to see. Some of the people of Jerusalem remarked, is not this the one they want to kill? Here he is speaking in public, and they don't say even a word to him.
Perhaps even the authorities have decided that this is the messiah. Still, we know where this man is from. They knew he came from the northern country from up around Nazareth. When the messiah comes, they said, no one is supposed to know his origins. At this Jesus, who was teaching in the temple area as public as you could be, cried out.
That's what the text says in English. So you know me, and you know my origins? The truth is I have not come of myself. I was sent by the one who has the right to send, and him you do not know. I know him because it is from him that I come.
He sent me. At this now remember what I've said. What is the reaction of our lord's hearers? At this, they tried to seize him, to destroy him, But no one dared lay a finger on him because his hour had not yet come. And this is the gospel of the lord.
I was prepared to to say a few words on that text, but I so I have an inclination I thought I can't resist, so I give in to them. That's a way of getting rid of temptations, you know, give in to them. We just have been reading in this responsorial psalm, the lord is near to broken hearts. Have you been near to a person that we say has a broken heart? Have you ever experienced it either in your own life or been close to someone who has a broken heart?
Well, there's one thing that I must say is I didn't find the lord very near there. Suicide in some instances was much closer. Now that's the fact. Take a man like CS Lewis when he lost his wife. Here's a man who was a devout Christian, a very devout Christian.
He nearly committed suicide. Now when we say the lord is near to those with broken hearts, what what do we mean? What do we mean by near? As I have said many times, you can take your little finger or your index finger or any finger, and the sun can be out it looks like we're going to do it today. The sun can be out in its fullness.
And all you have to do is to hold your finger up close enough to your eye, and you won't see the sun. Is the sun near to you? Of course, the sun is near to you. What good is it doing you? Nothing.
Now, I mean, as far as singing is concerned. So when we say the lord is near, what do we mean by that? When you take a man like Maximilian Kobe who threw himself, maybe on the spur of the moment, it it certainly wasn't a it was not an anticipated, a planned gesture. What he did was done under the under the impulse of the minute. When this man who was selected to be sent into the into the cell to die of starvation, And when Colby said, I'll take his place, that was done like that.
Was the lord near him, or in what sense was he near him? I'm I wasn't around. I wasn't there, and I can't give you any text. But I'm willing to put my life on the line that the suffering that Colby went through of dying of starvation, no food and no drink for for over several weeks before he died. Well, he didn't die.
They had to kill him. Gave him an injection that he never thought of committing suicide. Now what's the difference? His state his situation was utterly hopeless. Was the lord near him?
We say, yes. He was. Was the lord near c s Lewis when he lost his wife? Well, what do you mean by the word near? Of course, the lord was near him.
But it the point I'm making is we can blank out the lord. We can exclude the lord. He stands at the door and knocks. And that painting of Hunt, remember, shows you the door, and there's no latch string. There is no doorknob.
There is no way that door can be opened from the outside where Jesus is standing. It can only be opened from the inside where I stand. The lord knocking on the door, is he near? Of course, he's near. But who's going to open the door?
He's not gonna give it a kick and walk in. He's not gonna call up a bunch of Boy Scouts and said, look, friends, there's somebody in there that needs me. Let's go in there and slam this door down so they get a ramrod and they push the door in. That's not the way god works. God respects us too much.
We are autonomous human beings as our holy father never ceases or gets tired of saying, autonomous, irreplaceable, individual human beings. And it's the individual human being that opens the door. His society can help him. His friends can help him. The environment can help him.
Culture can help him. Language can help him. Churches can help him. But in the last analysis, it's the I, the self that opens the door. The lord is near to those with a broken heart.
We know what the word broken heart we're not talking about a muscle. We mean that a person is practically at their wits' hands, that the whole bottom of life seems to have fallen out of it, that there is nothing hopeful on the horizon. I'm not exaggerating this. You take that young wife and mother who, you know, here it is early morning, she's got a million things to do, she dashes out of the house to go to the grocery store. She jumps in her car, puts it in reverse, backs it down the driveway right over her two year old baby.
And she comes in and kills herself. Happened up in Wilmington. I've never forgotten. It's years ago. That's why she just came in the house and got a gun and shot herself.
Was the lord near her with a broken heart? Of course, he was near her, but she shut him out. I don't know. I say that. I don't know whether she did or not.
I have no idea. But the point is we can shut God out. The fact that the Lord is near doesn't mean that that that it's going to be effective. He doesn't kick the door in to make me accepted. God never does it.
Not my will, but thine be done. That's an act of an individual person. And so when we say this you see, we use so many words, you know, and they just go flitting around. But when say the lord is near the broken heart, remember, a lot of people with broken hearts have no consciousness at all of the lord being near, believe me. Matter of fact, he's about as far away as it can possibly be.
Look at Job. But that does that mean that the lord is not near? Of course, it does. It isn't a matter of fact of the lord ever leaving me. The question is whether I will stay with him.
He's there. I can move around. I can desert him. I can abandon him. And there comes a time, you see, when we have to make an absolute act of faith.
You see, you hear so much today about religion being fulfillment. Whoever said that? If you want fulfillment, go into a bar and get a couple of shots of scotch. Religion is a relationship between me and God where I give God myself. That's a basis of religion.
It's thy and the Lord thy God. You shall have no other gods but me, not even yourself. So don't let's talk about self fulfillment, shall we? The greatest god we can put up is myself. And so let us face it.
We do, not all of us. Some of us go through life and never experience this. You're lucky. But plenty of people go through life and do experience it. Now how do they handle these great when we say they have been clobbered to the extent of a broken heart?
The doctor this is another side it's I've never forgotten it. Don't ask me where but it goes back years and years where a physician kept a bottle of whiskey on his desk right in his office to remind himself that when in one of his drunken sprees, he killed his wife. People do have broken hearts, and the lord is there with them if they remove that little finger and open their hearts to him with a tremendous act of faith. My lord and my god. In the name of the father and of the son, holy spirit, amen.