FOURTH SUNDAY OF LENT – GAUDETE SUNDAY (2024)
Readings:
2 Chronicles 36:14-16, 19-23
Psalms 137
Ephesians 2:4-10
John 3:14-21
The readings for Lent seem to shift a little on this Sunday we call Gaudete Sunday, ‘Rejoice’ Sunday (from the first word used in the antiphon for Entrance to Mass). There is a reason to rejoice on this Sunday, where the focus of the readings remind us of God’s infinite mercy, while, ironically, highlighting the extraordinary sinfulness of the Hebrew people which led to their captivity in Babylon.
Chronicles notes that the princes, priests, and all the people “added infidelity to infidelity, practicing all the abominations of the nations and polluting the Lord’s Temple which He had consecrated in Jerusalem.” In spite of their “infidelities,” God sent His messengers “early and often,” for “He had compassion on His people.” Yet, God’s people showed His messengers no respect. They “mocked the messengers,” “despised” God’s warnings, and “scoffed at His prophets.” Their actions provoked God to allow their enemies to burn down “the house of God,” tear down their palaces and the walls of Jerusalem, and destroy their “precious objects,” carrying off those who survived to Babylon, where they would live in exile some seventy years.
God’s goodness to His chosen people could not be undone. The responsorial psalm [#137, made famous in the musical Godspell], coveys the upset of the Hebrew people: “By the streams of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion (Jerusalem)…. How could we sing a song of the Lord in a foreign land?” God recognizes the contrition of the Hebrew people, and after many decades have elapsed, God uses the benevolent pagan king of the Persians, to restore the Hebrew people to their homeland, even going so far as to rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem. With God all things are possible, even using a despised pagan to relieve the Hebrew’s misery.
The second reading from Paul’s letter to the Ephesians does a brilliant job of highlighting the theme of the day: rejoicing in God’s mercy! Paul states: “God, who is rich in mercy, because of the great love He had for us, even when we’re dead in our transgression (like the Hebrews in Chronicles), brought us to life with Christ – by grace you have been saved – raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavens in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come he might show the immeasurable riches of His grace in His kindness to us in Christ Jesus.” Most importantly, in a season which elevates giving things up and extra sacrifices, Paul reminds us that all is “gift.” We do not earn our salvation, we never change God’s will. We are saved through the faith that is shared with us as “gift,” and “not from works.”
This brings us to perhaps the most famous sentence in the Scriptures. The reference, “Jn 3:16,” is widely held up on placards at sports games all over the country: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal life.” God’s purpose of coming into our world was “not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.” Think about that phrase for just a minute! We sometimes act as though God is like our parents catching us with our hand in the cookie jar. God didn’t come into our world to condemn us, “but that the world might be saved through Him.” The light of Jesus Christ came into our world, but, like the people described in 2 Chronicles, “people preferred darkness to light.” The evils in the world are a result of people preferring darkness to the light. That darkness is what put the very Son of God on a cross. But, Jesus was “lifted up, so that everyone who believes in Him may have eternal life.”
What we are promised is “eternal life”! Not a world without hardship and difficulty, not a world where we are not touched by the painfulness of sickness and death, not a world without the scourge of wars, floods, tornadoes or hurricanes. Spanish Scripture scholar Jose Antonio Pagola tells us that “the eternal life Jesus promises begins in this life and reaches its fullness in our definitive [eventual] encounter with God. That means that eternal life is nothing less than union with God.” God looks to saving people, not by punishing them, but by drawing people into the “communion of eternal life.”
Nowhere in the gospels does Jesus promise us a cakewalk. As Paul tells us in the second reading, we are created in order that God might show, “in the ages to come,” the “immeasurable riches of His grace in His kindness to us in Christ Jesus.” We are to continue the work that Jesus began while walking on this earth. “Jesus said that He was sent into the world so that all who believe could enjoy a life free of suffering, but a life of communion with God…. God created [us], not to control us, but to entice us toward communion. If we believe that God works through us, instead of asking, ‘Why does God let [such and such] happen?,’ the prophetic question is, ‘How can people who believe in God and the power of love (made visible in Jesus, the Christ) let it happen?’” [Sr. Mary McGlone]
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