Have you ever thought that some people just shouldn’t be allowed to drive?
Or to own a hand gun?
Or to cook?
Lord knows the things I shouldn’t be allowed to do! Like filing my own taxes or talk about what
ever sport season happens to be occurring.
Sometimes I think that some people just shouldn’t be allowed to read the Bible or to use the
Bible.
If we are full of the urge to hate or kill or point the finger or to denigrate then we should just stay
away from the Bible, or at least everyone else should just stay away from us. The ancient
Church called this making anathema.
The Bible is about something very different from what the vile and the violent make it out to be.
The Bible is about the crazy love that holds the Universe together.
God is love. Period. Full stop.
We should make bumper stickers that say, “The Bible is for lovers.”
Just because we sometimes lack the patience or the imagination to always see the love doesn’t
change the fact that the love is always there.
John’s Gospel sees the whole Universe being designed and held together by God’s love. Not
just the particles and the stars but also the stuff of life, the living bio sphere of planet earth, the
human soul, the human community, the human body it is all designed and held together by God’s
love.
When we forsake or forget or break away from the divine pattern of love then the Universe starts
to fall apart, to die and wither.
In John’s Gospel the universe has lost the love and it is collapsing into the way of death, of
violence, of hate and denigration. Even the Bible is turned into something profane.
Jesus is the love of God restoring the universe, bringing things back to life.
When we live in the pattern of divine love, in the pattern of the way of Jesus, of the Cross, then
we become part of the Universe being pulled back together again.
The Gospel lesson today shows us a glimpse of the divine intimacy and love between Jesus and
God, between the Son and the Father. When we believe in Jesus, when we follow the way of
Jesus, then we connect to the crazy love that creates and sustains all that is.
As we approach the passion and death of Jesus that is Holy Week we approach the cross that is
the pattern of divine love, of sacrifice, and we pattern our lives after this crazy love that holds the
Universe together.
We are drawn to the one who is lifted up.
The Bible really is for lovers.