Introduction

This Sunday Gos­pel read­ing is an exten­sion and applic­a­tion of that of last Sunday (cf. John 13:31–35). Last Sunday, new com­mand­ment was giv­en. This Sunday, the the­or­et­ic­al com­mand to love is expec­ted to be demon­strated by heed­ing to the instruc­tions or words of the Gos­pel. It is the only evid­ence of faith­ful­ness. This is the major theme of this chapter. The kind of love Jesus is refer­ring to is expressed with agapē. This choice indic­ates that such love is uncon­di­tion­al and not attached to any bene­fit. Con­trar­ily, show­ing that one loves God by keep­ing to God’s word has the con­sequence of the Son (Jesus) and the Fath­er (God) mak­ing their dwell­ing place in that per­son. The life of Chris­ti­ans is not shaped by Jesus’ absence but by God’s abid­ing pres­ence. God’s pres­ence over­comes anxi­ety about God’s absence. And the present holds in it the seeds of a fresh future shaped by love, not fear or anxiety.

The proof of faithfulness

“If any­one loves me, he will keep my word, and my Fath­er will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. Who­ever does not love me does not keep my words; and the word that you hear is not mine, but is from the Fath­er who sent me” (John 14:23–24). Accord­ing to these words, the proof of faith­ful­ness to the word of God is obed­i­ence to the word of God. If we love God, then, we must obey, respect and keep His word as inter­preted by Jesus and doc­u­mented in the Gos­pel. In its gen­er­ic defin­i­tion, faith­ful­ness is the concept of unfail­ingly remain­ing loy­al to someone or some­thing, and put­ting that loy­alty into con­sist­ent prac­tice regard­less of exten­u­at­ing cir­cum­stances. A faith­ful per­son is.…

Conclusion              

The brief but very pro­voc­at­ive pas­sage of this Sunday Gos­pel con­fronts us in an exist­en­tial dynam­ic, the rela­tion­ship that is estab­lished between the Cre­at­or and the believ­er, and how the truth of love for God must be veri­fied. This love, the text says, is authen­t­ic only and only if it is foun­ded on guard­ing the word of Jesus. That is, per­son­al­iz­ing it and apply­ing it in con­crete life and in every­day choices. Yes! Because the Chris­ti­an faith is not a set of ideas meant for a kind of intel­lec­tu­al joy, but a liv­ing encounter with the Word, that which becomes flesh, which then must shape our entire life and exist­ence. Are we aware of this?

FOR DETAILS, GET YOUR OWN COPIES OF THE BOOK “THE WORD OF LIFE:
SUNDAY REFLECTIONS” (vols. I‑II-III)!! The reflec­tion for the Sixth Sunday of Pascha © is found in vol. III pages 260–270. Happy reading!

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