Eastertide
May 19, 2018
Scripture Reading: John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15
‘When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who comes from the Father, he will testify on my behalf. You also are to testify because you have been with me from the beginning. But I have said these things to you so that when their hour comes you may remember that I told you about them. –John 15:26-27
One of the most poignant sentences in the Bible is spoken by a politician, Pilate, when he says as he considered Jesus’ fate following his arrest: What is Truth? We are left to our own interpretation of what Pilate meant. I think at the least he thought Jesus might have been guilty of some Jewish law that matter little to Pilate and Jesus was no real threat to the Roman government with his message of love and not violence. The statement seems a bit wistful with a flavor of hope that the Jesus’s of the world represented the worst Pilate would encounter. Even the most successful politicians must surely get tired of playing the game. What they consider to be a naïve viewpoint is sometimes refreshing. We parse political truth, perhaps all truth, today by fact-checked percentages rarely gaining 100% and often meriting multiple Pinocchio’s illustrating just how wrong the statements are. Still, people believe the statements because it is what they want to believe, I think.
One of the most valuable statements in the Bible is spoken by Jesus, quoted in John 8:32: and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free. Facing the truth is one of the hardest things we do in life and one of the most helpful. John McCain faced the truth that death can happen at any time and is a part of life, years ago when his plane was shot down and he was gravely injured. Such truth seems to have freed him from the pitfalls of greed and lust for power and given him the freedom to recognize that each minute of every day is a gift to use for better things. I am sorry he had to learn such truth in such a horrible way and I thank him for sharing his experience with those of us willing to adopt it without having to face such dire circumstances.
Of course, the ultimate witness to this truth is Jesus who died on the cross and overcame death to marshal in the Kingdom of God ruled by love. That is the message to which the Spirit of truth testifies continuously. One we need to cling to in times like these.
Prayer: Thank you, Lord, for the gift of the Spirit of Truth, let your truth be the foundation of all that we do. Amen.