C Cycle – 5^th Sunday of Lent 25

John 8:1-11

Change is a fact of life and at certain stages of life it is hard to accept.  When we were young, we looked forward to our first year in school, our birthdays, our becoming a teenager and our 16^th birthdays.  We look forward to the future.  However, as we age, we become more resistant to change and have a harder time embracing any changes which are forced upon us.  A new boss, divorce, death of someone we love, health issues, and yes changes in how we worship.  If you are my age, you will remember the uproar when the Vatican II changes were implemented.  People resisted and complained about the loss of “reverence” due to the changes. Eucharistic Ministers, communion in the hand versus on the tongue, standing versus kneeling to receive communion.  Remember when the more recent changes were made in the posture of the congregation during the distribution of communion – standing versus kneeling in reverence. 

But if you pay attention to the teachings of the church you will discover how change is exactly what God desires for us.  Did you ever notice how Jesus never let the disciples get comfortable with anything He was revealing to them.  They, like us, had rituals they followed and were accustomed to performing without ever thinking about doing.  How Jesus challenged the Pharisees because they performed rituals for people to see while their hearts were far from God.  How the disciples thinking was as man thinks not as God desired them to think.  Jesus challenged them to feed the five thousand by themselves.  Lord, you must be kidding, it is impossible. 

What did Jesus say to them as they discussed the impossibility to feed the people?  What do you have?  When they though they were going to die because of the storm what did Jesus invite Peter to do?  When Jesus sent them out two by two to heal the sick, cast out demons and proclaim the good news, we do not know how they reacted. The scriptures do not reveal how they reacted but in the Chosen they doubted but went out and came back rejoicing. 

That one story tells us all we need to know about what will happen if we would just embrace the journey of acting on our belief that all things are possible with God.  Today’s readings are a reminder of what God will do if we just allow ourselves to desire what is uncomfortable for us – change.  God wants us to unshackle ourselves from routine practices and long held beliefs to experience something new and life changing.  God wants to change the dry, unexciting practices into something that produces excitement, joy, peace, a world of miracles, wonder and awe.

Why does God desire this instead of our faithful, presence?  So, we like Paul can grasp what God has done for us is something we cannot ever do on our own.   That we would realize how our obedience to law will never allow our hearts to hunger for the presence of Christ.  Like Paul, we are fixated on adherence to a learned behavior that will never allow us to modify our behavior and hear the voice of Christ inviting us to experience the presence of God inviting us to something new.  To learn our righteousness is not earned by our behavior but is a gift of grace from God to us.

So here we are at the end of Lent, and we can pat ourselves on the back because we have faithfully done what is required of us during Lent.  But has what we have done changed us or will we just return to our old familiar routines?  It is not by chance that last week we heard the parable of the prodigal son and this week about the woman caught in adultery.  At the heart of those readings is the fundamental desire of God – our restoration as holy men and women of God.  God’s plan from the beginning of creation and what we lost by the sin of Adam.

It is not a change we can make on our own but only by the work of the Holy Spirit to transform our hearts and the sacrifice of Jesus to remove the penalty of our sinfulness.  Both parables go beyond what we consider fair treatment for someone whose sin is so evident and grievous.  Both parables challenge our sense of what is fair when we are wronged.  Jesus describes the older brother’s behavior for us to see how we are locked in on what we perceive as justice.  These parables show us how God perceives us – restored by the grace of forgiveness.  Untainted by our sin, even when we feel our sinfulness does not deserve forgiveness.

The challenge we face is to overcome our own tendencies to punish wrong and to embrace the promise of God to welcome us and clothe us in righteousness.  Lent is over so the challenge facing us is do we celebrate the gift of forgiveness or will we slip back into old ways of thinking and back into practicing our faith instead of living our faith.  Will we allow God to do something new within us or will we resist the changes and ignore the invitation to begin a journey of discipleship. Knowing that God will never allow us to get comfortable until we conform to the image of His Son.