5th Sunday in Lent 2016

5th Sunday in Lent

Today is the last Sunday in Lent. Next Sunday will be Palm Sunday, then Holy Week and the
following Sunday will be Easter. The readings today are full of hints that anticipate what will take
place in the next two weeks: the commemoration of Jesus the passion, death and resurrection.
1. In his letter to the Philippians, Paul is talking about the end of his life and hoping to share not only
in Jesus suffering and death, but also in his resurrection
The first part of the reading is about the old conflict Paul had for most of his life with those who wanted
Gentiles to convert to Judaism before being baptized as Christians. So Paul starts by saying, look, I am as
good a Jew as anyone else, my Jewish credentials are impeccable.
Then Paul goes on to state that righteousness or the right relationship with God, does not come from
obedience to the laws of Moses, but from faith. Jesus sacrifice reconciled humanity to God, and we join in by
having faith in Jesus and being baptized.
Finally, Paul goes on to state that he had done his best to imitate Jesus in his life, and soon he will also
imitate Jesus in death in the hope that he will also be worthy to share in Jesus resurrection. Paul was under
house arrest as he was writing this letter and eventually was executed.

2. The Gospel prepares us to commemorate Jesus Passion and death with a series of hints about
what is to come:
Six days before Passover, the holiday during which he would be arrested, Jesus went to dinner at his friends
house in Bethany
We think of Jesus as God, and its hard to imagine him as a regular guy. But, in addition to being God, he was
a human being, who loved his friends Lazarus, Martha and Mary. His friend Lazarus had died, and Jesus had
raised him from the dead. Now Jesus knew that he was about to die, and needed their support of his friends.
The Gospels cast Martha and Mary in classical roles: Martha was a doer, the practical one. She managed the
household, made sure the house was clean and dinner ready. Mary was the spiritual one, she was not
interested in housework and more interested in listening to what Jesus had to say.
During dinner, Mary washed Jesus' feet. Washing the feet on a guest was part of the welcoming ritual. But Mary
went well beyond the welcome ritual and washed Jesus feet with expensive perfume.
The washing of Jesus feet anticipated what Jesus would do on the last day of his life on earth: he washed the
disciples feet to teach them that, in his kingdom, those in authority are called to serve humbly the other members
of the community, and not to dominate them.

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The humility required by those who would lead the church is represented by the next action of Mary who not only
washed Jesus feet with perfume, but also dried them with her hair.
Then Jesus personally linked the use of the perfume to wash his feet with his upcoming burial. In ancient Israel,
the bodies of the deceased were washed and perfumed to prepare them for embalming.
At this point Judas Iscariot stepped in and criticized Mary for spending so much money on perfume. The money
could have been saved and given to the poor rather that spent on something superfluous such as perfume
Up to now, the Gospel of John had given no hint that Judas would betray Jesus. He was one of the twelve
apostles. But here with 2 sentence Judas is unmasked: he was the group treasurer who was stealing the money
given to Jesus and he was the one who would betray Jesus.
Note that Judas criticism appears to be based on concern for the poor: the money spent on perfume could have
been used to help the poor
But was just an excuse, the Gospel of John points out that Judas was not concerned for the poor but that he
wanted cash to steal it later.
Jesus spoke up and defended Mary, saying that she had bought the perfume for his burial. By saying this, Jesus
once again reminded the disciples that his death is imminent.

3. Then he made another comment, You always have the poor with you, but you will not always have
me.
The words the poor will always be with you is a quote from the book of Deuteronomy, but the context in
Deuteronomy is completely different. In Deuteronomy, there are laws about the sabbatical year. The sabbatical
year occurred every 7 years. On the sabbatical year, all the debts of the poor had to be forgiven. To bypass that
law, money lenders would stop making loans as the sabbatical year was getting closer, because they did not
want to lose their money. The book of Deuteronomy was legislating charity and forbidding the rich money
lenders to stop making loans before the sabbatical year, because poverty did not stop on the 7 th year. They had
the duty to be charitable, and could stop being charitable as the 7 th year got closer.
But Jesus used the passage from Deuteronomy to say something else, "In a few days I will be dead, so if my
friend Mary want to do something special for me, let her. Dont use the poor as an excuse to stop her.
Oddly enough, throughout the history of the church, this statement has been interpreted in different ways: some
believe that the church should use all its resources to help the poor. Others would use resources mainly for the
church: to build beautiful cathedrals, to buy expensive chalices and vestments and they point to this passage
to claim that they are doing this to honor God. There are dangers here on both extremes:

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The church is called to help the needy, but it is not a merely social services agency. It is a
community of faith and communities need places to meet, and resources to worship God in a
dignified manner. However, it is easy to go overboard and think that, since nothing is good
enough for God, even the most outrageous expenses are justified. We cant ignore the needy.
Remember that in the final judgment we will face Jesus who will say, I was hungry Did you
feed me?
Every Christian community needs to find the right balance between the commandment to love
God with all our heart, with all our soul and with all our minds, and the commandment to love
our neighbor as ourselves.

4. The Epistle and the Gospel hint at the death of Jesus. The Old Testament
readings hints at his resurrection.
Isaiahs prophecy was directed to the Israelites who had been exiled in Babylon. After nearly
nearly 50 years of exile, God was about to set them free. Now that the exile was over, they
would cross the desert again to go home. The same God who had fed their ancestors in the
desert, would now smooth their return home, make all things new again, and help them rebuild
their cities and their way of life.
The Church takes the words written by Isaiah and re-interprets them to remind us that after
the suffering and death of Jesus, came the resurrection. Just as the Israelites had been
defeated, and buried in a foreign land, but were later rescued and set free by God. So too
Jesus, would be captured, tortured and killed, but then He would be raised from the dead in
triumph and taken up to heaven.
So the readings today are preparing us for Palm Sunday, Holy Week, and Easter.
a. The Gospel includes a whole series of anticipations about Jesus betrayal, death and burial
b. The words of Isaiah are a reminder of Gods power to conquer death and create new life and
thus remind us that after the passion and death of of Jesus there will be the resurrection.
c. Pauls letter to the Philippians invites us to imitate Jesus in his suffering and death as Paul