Reflections on the Lectionary Year B Easter 3

Acts 3:12-19
1 John 3:1-7
Luke 24:36b-48


Exegetical comments:

a. The Luke-Acts tradition is, like all the gospels a “making sense” of the Christ event . . . the coming of one who was life and love, who was killed and is now risen, present with those who confess the name.
b. However, the event needs some explanation, some framework to understand, some matrix within which to live.
c. There was great expectation and joy as one came from God, who seemed to make everything right, whom to know was life
d. Then, he was taken away and unjustly and brutally executed ... All the hope, expectation and longing were shattered in the events of a night and a day.
e. But then restoration as the one who was crucified comes to them alive. Death shattered. Hope renewed. A new power, as the presence is now within . . . the Spirit of Jesus no longer an external friend, but an internal presence. [In the Johannine tradition, there is no Pentecost. The risen Jesus breathes on the disciples on the night of resurrection, the Spirit is within from the day of resurrection. In the Lukan tradition, there is a period of waiting and preparation.]
f. In this first flush of astonishing presence and power, it is assumed that the coming reign of God will be soon. If Christ has come in the Spriit of Jesus, then surely the longed-for consummation of all things is near. But no. Time passes and the Messiah does not return. How are we to explain this?
g. In the lectionary today we have two streams of interpretation. In the Lukan stream, in the gospel the explanation is that when the inner empowering happens, it is for the purpose of taking the good news of God’s love in Christ to all the nations. It is implicit, that when this gospel has been heard and received by all that the consummation will come. In the Acts, the mission of Jesus continues in the healing of the lame with sign and symbol that the work continues. This will continue in the name of Jesus until the restoration of all things. This universal restoration is yet future, and Acts leaves us with the job only beginning as the gospel of Jesus is brought to Rome.
h. In the Johannine tradition, emphasis is on inner transformation from sin to life and love, knowing that one day as God’s children we will see God and be like God, though we do not know what that will be like. [There is some difficult to understand parts of John, like “those who have been born of God do not sin. It raises important and difficult questions such as what is sin, what is to be born of God, which we cannot now stay with.]


Reflections:

i. What are we to make of these passages put together in this way today?
j. Common to them all is a looking forward, a message of hope.
i. In Luke, the hope is that all nations will find the forgiveness of God in Jesus through a change of heart and mind.
ii. In Acts, the hope is one of universal restoration when all shall be made well.
iii. In I John, the hope is transformation into the image of God in Jesus.
k. Key words are: forgiveness, restoration and transformation and these are close to the heart of the message of Jesus.
l. We, and the entire world, are in process. The process is toward a fulfilment of goodness and love and justice, when all will be made well.
i. It takes trust to believe such. Trust that in God, all shall be well and that is given to us in the resurrection of Jesus.
ii. This side of death all is not made well. In the world there is so much injustice, suffering, wrong this is not well at the time of death. That is why death is such an enemy. Death seems to rob us of justice. Death seems to end love. Death interrupts goodness.
iii. The gospel of Jesus tells us that there is life through death. Death is part of the process through which life eventually triumphs. [Sitting in the garden in spring, look around you is a sign. Death is swallowed up in life.]
iv. It is sometimes hard to trust. In the midst of aging, illness, failing senses, can we trust that all shall be well? That is the message of Easter.


+Ab. Andy