Jesus, the Father’s ambassador
JESUS said to the Pharisees: “I am going away and you will look for me, but you will die in your sin. Where I am going you cannot come.” So the Jews said, “He is not going to kill himself, is he, because he said, ‘Where I am going you cannot come’?” He said to them, “You belong to what is below, I belong to what is above. You belong to this world, but I do not belong to this world. That is why I told you that you will die in your sins. For if you do not believe that I AM, you will die in your sins.” So they said to him, “Who are you?” Jesus said to them, “What I told you from the beginning. I have much to say about you in condemnation. But the one who sent me is true, and what I heard from him I tell the world.” They did not realize that he was speaking to them of the Father. So Jesus said to them, “When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will realize that I AM, and that I do nothing on my own, but I say only what the Father taught me. The one who sent me is with me. He has not left me alone, because I always do what is pleasing to him.” Because he spoke this way, many came to believe in him.
REFLECTION WHEN YOU LIFT UP THE SON OF MAN. In this passage, Jesus repeatedly warns the Pharisees that they will die in their sins because they continue to refuse accepting Jesus and believing that he has come from the Father.
Indeed, if we reject Jesus and embrace the world, we will go astray and live a life of wickedness. The world has a way of luring and deceiving us. It tells us that there is no life hereafter and that this is the only life we can hope for.
Someone made a public “confession” on social media that his neglect of regular reading of the word of God had led him to many wrong turns. But the good thing was that he realized this was happening to him and that he could stop it.
The world has a way of “swallowing” us whole, if we allow ourselves to be dictated by its values. Thank God, we also have many reminders out there — people, events, the word of God — to put us back on track. Have you experienced being overpowered by the values of the world? How have you come back on track?