Your Son Will Live

Your Son Will Live

March 11, 2013

Monday of the Fourth Week of Lent

See, I am about to create new heavens and a new earth; The things of the past shall not be remembered or come to mind.  Instead, there shall always be rejoicing and happiness in what I create; For I create Jerusalem to be a joy and its people to be a delight; I will rejoice in Jerusalem and exult in my people.  Isaiah 65:17-19a

The royal official said to him, “Sir, come down before my child dies.”  Jesus said to him, “You may go; your son will live.”  The man believed what Jesus said to him and left.  While the man was on his way back, his slaves met him and told him that his boy would live.  He asked them when he began to recover.  They told him, “The fever left him yesterday, about one in the afternoon.”  The father realized that just at that time Jesus had said to him, “Your son will live,” and he and his whole household came to believe.  John 4:49-53

Piety

Father, we give you praise because despite our weakness, you rescue us always from the obstacles that we erect in the path that leads to friendship with you.

Study

Despite what we do, God persists in goodness.  Creating a new heaven and earth just for you and me.  Forgetting the things of the past.  Always rejoicing. 

As a Jewish man, Jesus would have had ample reason to reject the royal official's request.  He represented a belligerent force from Rome that had enslaved the native people of Jerusalem.  In fact, his neighbors might have been happier if Jesus had turned the royal official away.  Or the centurion.  Or the lepers that the people kept outside the gate. Or the woman at the well.  But Jesus rejected none of these.  The stone that the builders rejected did not measure out rejection in the way he faced rejection.

Action

Their stories are our stories, too.  Bet in our Little Lenten Instruction booklet, the royal official gives us hope -- hope that we can change like he changed.  Hope that we can turn to Jesus for help as he turned to Jesus.  That royal official knew he had to save his son as much as the father knew he had to save his son in the parable of the Prodigal.

How is Lent calling you to change?  From what will you turn away?  Toward what will you set your face?