CHRONICLES 36: 14-17, 19-23, PSALM 137: 1-2, 3, 4-5, 6, EPHESIANS 2: 4-10, JOHN 3:14-21
SIN ENSLAVES AND THE CROSS LIBERATES
Rev. Fr. Emmanuel Salifu
As we focus on sin and its consequences in this season of Lent, our First Reading shows us the devastating consequences of our sins. It also reveals to us the redemption plan of God for all who have fallen. Chronicles recalls the history of Israel from the time of freedom to the time of captivity and the reason why they were captured by the Babylonians and eventually how God redeems them. This is not only the story of Israel but humanity as a whole.
The Book of Chronicles recounts how Israel at the time of tranquility lapsed into sin. The situation for the Writer of Chronicles was so bad that no one was exempted from being guilty of committing sin: “All the princes…the priest and the people added infidelity to infidelity, practicing all the abominations of the nations”.
Everyone was in a state of sin and the sad aspect of it was their inability to recognize their own state and how low they had sunk. Even when prophets and servants of God were sent to remind them, they ignored and mocked the messengers of God.
Every action has consequences and failing to change their ways, which drew them away from God further and further, the result was an exposure to the enemy from which God had protected them. If God was the one who always protected them from their enemies then it is simple to understand how they would be captured by their enemies for they have ignored the only one who could protect them.
This indeed is the condition of man. St. Ignatius of Loyola states in his rules of discernment that for persons who move from serious sin to serious sin, the enemy is used to proposing to them apparent pleasure so that they would remain in their sin and not have redemption.
Many of us are caught in the vicious cycle of sin; we wallow in it and are struggling to find our way out of it because the enemy proposes lots of pleasures in our lives which keep us in this cycle. It can only expose us to danger and destruction.
Indeed, on the Second Sunday of Lent, in the Second Reading, we realized that “if God is on our side who can be against us” (Rom 8:31). Perhaps today’s Reading reminds us of the contrary: if God is NOT with us everyone and everything WILL be against us.
Sin exposes us to the enemy and John (10: 10) reminds us that “the enemy comes to steal, kill and destroy”. Thus, everything the Israelites held as precious was destroyed by the enemy: the temples, the walls, palaces, and precious objects. Indeed the wages of sin is death and death indeed can visit one who has forsaken God and as a consequence has lost everything. For others they may not lose their lives but they are held captives by their OWN sins. They lose all power of themselves.
Let us consider a Christian man or a woman who is adulterous. He is enticed by apparent pleasure and refuses to listen to various calls to refrain from his or her deeds. He gets to the point of abandoning his family to follow his desires only to realize later that this other partner is not in any way interested in him or her.
Often by this time he would have lost his job, his family and lots of money as a result of such an action. For such a man he can lose his life and if he does not, he may struggle to find his way back and become a ‘captive’ of his own action.
But God promises redemption to even people in such conditions. Like the Israelites in the First Reading, salvation can sometimes come through one we least expect. God used Cyrus, a Persian King, to liberate Israel. And God can use our friends, Priests, Associates, children and so on to remind us that it is only in Him (God) can we find protection from the snares of the enemy.
Indeed, the Second Reading from Ephesians (2:4) reminds us that “God is rich in mercy; because of his great love for us he brought us to life with Christ when we were DEAD IN SIN”.
Jesus in the Gospel, tells Nicodemus how to receive eternal life (salvation). He reminds Nicodemus that salvation is an activity of God: “unless you are baptized by water and the spirit you cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven” John 3:5 (glory).
He shows Nicodemus that he is the ultimate “king Cyrus” who would save not only Israel but the whole world. And he would do so by being lifted up on the cross, dying for our sins. Indeed, the song Writer reminds us “in the cross, in the cross, be my glory ever till my raptured soul shall find rest beyond the river”.
In this action of Jesus, he also invites us to crucify and nail to the cross our sins, weakness and pleasures; for glory only comes with sacrifice. The attempt to enjoy ALL the pleasure of this life may be disastrous for us. There is the need to sacrifice and as Jesus would remind us, “to pick up our cross and follow Him” (Matt. 16:24) for in this is our glory and salvation.
