Facing the finished work (John 17: 1-5)
When we reach for the Scriptures, we are invited to an extraordinary relationship with God. God opens the treasury of his mysteries to us, so that we can get to know him. And it is not about intellectual knowledge, but about the experience of God. This is a meeting during which a person changes under its influence. Only then can one speak of knowledge. Through the Word, into which we are immersed by grace, we touch matters unknowable with our senses. The spiritual world opens up to us. To the eyes of the soul, uncreated beauty, inconceivable wisdom, infinite power and infinite love appear. Through this Word, man "touches" God Himself. However, this touch is not full knowledge. It is only the touch of the One who cannot be seen with the eyes on earth. Man experiences, his heart experiences, and yet it is difficult for us to describe this experience. Man knows its God. We feel the incomprehensible depth of His wisdom. We feels His love that surrounds us and manifests itself in everything around us. Under the influence of this experience, a person transforms. Slowly our life is getting closer and closer to God's life. Slowly this God's life becomes our life. It slowly begins to pulsate in us.
Today you are invited to a very important event, to Jesus' prayer. Invited to be inside it. To be a witness to it, but also to become its content to some extent. Jesus turns his eyes to heaven and says the words: Father, the hour has come. Can you feel the uniqueness of this moment? What do these words mean? They mean that the most important time in the entire history of mankind is about to begin. Time that will have an impact on the life of every person from the beginning of their existence on earth until the end. It is a time of full revelation of God. Time through which mankind can know Who God is.
It is during this time that man receives the fullness of revelation. Man can come to know the essence of God, and that is LOVE. Jesus says more. He is talking about the glory that God is surrounded. Through Jesus' work as a fulfillment of God's will, this glory will also be revealed in every person. And God will be glorified in every human being. How to understand these words? Glory surrounds God unceasingly. It is His immeasurable strength and power, His holiness and perfect purity, this is the brightness in which He dwells. This is His greatness. At the same time, this glory is revealed in every creature, in everything that surrounds man. Everything bears the mark of God the Creator.
Man gives glory to God most fully when he does His will. Jesus perfectly fulfills this will. So he is giving glory to the Father in a perfect way. The fullness of the Father's glory is revealed in Jesus. The will of the Father is that the Son should save man, that is, grant him eternal life. It is divine life, life in the glory of God. Living glory. It is a full and conscious participation in this wonderful, incomprehensible life of God. Now on earth every creature, through the very fact of being created by God, already carries His glory within itself.
But how few of us realize this! God wants every human being to fully participate in His LIFE, in His glory! The life that will be revealed in everyone who is saved will be the glory of God. By the life alone in eternity, man will glorify God and will adore God continually. Man's existence will be love, and love is the nature of God. Man will participate in it, will be a part of it, man will be the glory. Through this fact, man will become the glory of God.
All thanks to Jesus. Jesus talks about all of this when he prays to the Father. He is asking for this to be done. He is asking that what the Father has planned for the ages to be done. In this way everything will be fulfilled and man will know God. Not anymore as the Israelites knew. It will be knowing fully. For the chosen people did not know the Son, they rejected him. The knowledge will embrace all God in Three Persons. Failure to accept one of the Persons results in incomplete knowledge. We don't know God.
Jesus' prayer is amazing! It introduces man to the reality of God. It introduces to His work. Just today, through this passage from Scripture everyone can participate in what is most important, the greatest and the incomprehensible! Everyone can become aware of the uniqueness of what he is invited to it through the words of Jesus. How great must God's love be that it invites man to the history of salvation? What a great exaltation is a man! He can participate in the glory of God. In him this glory is revealed. Thanks to Jesus, man becomes a sharer in God's glory in an unprecedented way, in a way as its possessor not carrier. Nothing deserved this distinction. God's love made it happen. Inconceivable, infinite, perfect love that wanted to share itself with others. LOVE gave her Son to accomplish an unheard-of work. So that man can experience God's life. To live a divine life.
With this passage from Scripture, the Farewell Speeches of Jesus, called His testaments, you are starting an extraordinary adventure. You become a witness, participant and objective of the events of salvation. You are right in the center. Receive this gift with humility. By recognizing that although unworthy, you are nevertheless introduced to the very essence of the greatest work in history. Let our hearts humbly and trembling receive the words of Jesus and let them nourish you, because they are the best food that gives life.
Until Tomorrow
fr.george