Week 51—Saturday John 9:1-5
Week 51—SATURDAY
JESUS THE CONCRETE WORD
Jesus did not try to prove heaven to his disciples—he went up into heaven before their very eyes.
He said to his disciples that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over their subjects but among them it shall not be so. He that would be great among them should be the servant of all. And when he came into Jerusalem announcing his messiahship, he came riding on an ass’s colt. Jesus rode into his kingdom on the lowliest of beasts.
He did not say anything about being Lord of nature—he spoke to the winds and the seas, and they obeyed him.
He said to his disciples that in the New Order revenge should be abolished—the Old Testament limited revenge—one eye for one eye—Jesus abolished it. When the Samaritans would not receive him because his face was set to go to Jerusalem and the disciples wanted to call down fire upon them—he rebuked them “and went to another village.”
When his disciples asked, “Who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus dismissed both hypotheses—he showed them how “the works of God might be made manifest” even through suffering and disability. Then Jesus proceeded to illustrate in his own life the price of using suffering, turning the worst into the best—he took the worst thing that could happen to him, namely his death, and turned it into the best thing that could happen to the world, namely its redemption.
Jesus was the Concrete, for he was the Word become flesh. Had he been the Word become word, he would have spun theories about life, but since he was the Word become flesh, he put shoes on all his theories and made them walk.
O Lord and Savior, I hear you speak and when I do I hear more than I hear—I see—see the meaning of your words in what you are. Theory and practice were one in you. And your practice makes luminous your theory. I thank you. Amen.
AFFIRMATION FOR THE DAY: I see it can be done—it was done in Jesus, and it can be done in me, by his grace.