"If you love me, keep my commandments," ... or, "How wrestling shows us how to love Jesus!"

+ J. M. J. +

Draft Homily for the 6th Sunday of Easter

It is already the Sixth Sunday of Easter! Next Sunday, not only will it already be June, God save us all, but we will also celebrate the Ascension of the Lord, and after that, Pentecost! Our 50 days of Easter are drawing to a close, and the readings are shifting towards preparing us for the celebration of the gift of the Holy Spirit. We hear in the first reading of ministry of the Apostles, and the way that even the Samaritans received the gift of the Holy Spirit.

The central mystery of our Christian Faith is the Trinity, because this mystery gives us a glimpse into the reality of God Himself, God in Himself. The mystery of the Trinity is both the hardest to think about, and the most important! However, for that reflection to bear fruit, it has to go from speculation to application in our lives!

In the Old Testament, we see God often represented as Creator, Lawgiver and Judge, but also as Husband. The most common Old Testament metaphor for God’s relationship to His People Israel is marriage… God, as it were, marries His people, takes them to Himself in fidelity and love. In calling His the Chosen People to Himself, though, God wasn’t finished!

Rublev's Trinity

In the fullness of time, God came Himself ; the 2nd Person of the Trinity, the Word, took on flesh and dwelt among us, Jesus Christ, both God and man. The Law and Word that God had spoken to His people dwelt with them as one like them in all things but sin. We can think of God the Father giving the Law, and God the Son living the law in perfect fidelity. That authentic living came to its climax in all that we celebrate in Lent and Holy Week and now Easter.

As amazing and transformative as the Incarnation, Passion, Death, and Resurrection of Christ are, that’s still not it, not the end of what God has done and is doing… we’re beginning to prepare for this mysterious gift of the Holy Spirit as we hear in our readings of the Paraclete, a Greek word meaning helper, comforter, advocate. Risen from the Dead, Jesus doesn’t simply stay put back where He began with His Apostles, because soon He ascends into heaven to the Father’s Right Hand.

The Father gives the Law, the Son lives the Law, and the Holy Spirit sets the law on fire in the hearts of believers. The Holy Spirit brings the bold fire of love, of generosity, of self-control, of self-giving. Filled with the Holy Spirit, the followers of Jesus Christ, men women and children from then until now have faced every obstacle and overcome every fear, facing even death itself in martyrdom and persecution, giving of themselves in beautiful and fruitful ways.

Let me give you a simple analogy… as I think I’ve shared before, I wrestled in high school. I also ran and enjoyed track and cross-country, but not with the intensity with which I loved wrestling. Nothing I’ve done is quite so pure and distilled as stepping out onto the mat face to face with one other man. As you begin to learn how to wrestle, you start out with rules… you have to wear a headset, you can’t have long nails, you can’t have razor stubble (it’s really the only time in my life I’ve really shaved regularly). You can’t punch or hit, you can’t use a Full Nelson. Now… learning those rules, that law, is hardly the fullness of wrestling, but without it you’ve just got a brawl, a bloody fight. After the basic rules, you also have to learn the moves… don’t stand up straight, don’t lean forward too far, keep your elbows in… And you’ve got to learn the different holds, how to escape from them, etc. You drill and sweat and lift weights and run… and still you’re nowhere near the pinnacle. Once you know the rules, once you are putting them into practice… what’s make the difference between a mediocre wrestler and a great one? There has to be a spirit of competition, of not giving up, a spirit of speed and resolve. A very good wrestler has internalized the rules and moves and holds and postures, and begins to initiate and respond without even thinking.

Do you see what I’m getting at? Wrestling isn’t very important compared to life, compared to our families, compared to our work and homes and schools. But like all other sports, this basic pattern applies to life and to our Christian faith, and Jesus speaks of it in the Gospel:

If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always, the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot accept, because it neither sees nor knows him. But you know him, because he remains with you, and will be in you.

Jesus is really straightforward… “if you love me, you will keep my commandments.” That includes the 10 commandments, the Beatitudes, most essentially loving God and neighbor. There’s no authentic following of Christ that ignores God’s commandments, however marketable such an idea may be. Jesus doesn’t love sin, even though He loves sinners! Jesus understands how hard it is to turn away from sin… and so he tells us of this Advocate, this Spirit of Truth, the Holy Spirit who is not accepted by the world, but who will remain with us and in us. We have to know the Truth, which includes the rules, we have to live them…. But that’s not all! A beautiful life, a fruitful life, involves the fire and the power of the Holy Spirit, a creativity and joy and freedom which always rejects sin, but always embraces authentic self-giving! Only in relationship with the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit can we authentically live the Law of Truth and Freedom… only with the burning power of love that the Spirit gives can we reject what is false and embrace what is true. The wrestler who spends all his time trying to figure out how to bite his opponent while the ref isn’t looking isn’t going to be much of a wrestler, though he may be a jerk! The Christian who spends a bunch of time looking for loopholes or pretending that our Loving Father doesn’t want us to stop sinning isn’t going to be a saint!

Let me close with St. Peter’s beautiful words from our second reading:

Sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts. Always be ready to give an explanation to anyone who asks you for a reason for your hope, but do it with gentleness and reverence, keeping your conscience clear, so that, when you are maligned, those who defame your good conduct in Christ may themselves be put to shame.

Do we know why we hope? Do we live hope? Can we tell others why we live filled with hope? If we haven’t received the gift and attempted to live it, we’ll never have any gift of faith to give others! We can’t do this on our own, but we can do this empowered by the Holy Spirit! In moments we’ll receive the Lord Jesus at this altar, this Infinite Gift… may we open our hearts now to receive, so that we can live, and living, give this gift to others.

+ A. M. D. G. +