Do not become ungodly! (HOMILY FOR FRIDAY OF THE 4TH WEEK OF LENT

Homily for Friday of the 4th week of Lent 

Wisdom 2:1a, 12-22; Ps.34; John 7:1-2, 10, 25-30

Do not become ungodly!

As Jesus’ passion drew nearer, those who would not belief in Him started to look for justifiable reason to reject Jesus as the Messiah, as well as get others reject Him. In doing this, they had to turn a blind eye to all the mighty works wrought by Jesus; in fact it was those mighty works that they aimed at contradicting by seeking out the slightest irregularity in Jesus. In today’s gospel, they juxtaposed his identity with the prophecy about him. The prophecy says that when the Christ comes, his origin will not be known. Now, because they knew about Jesus’ biological heritage, they thought that that was all about his origin. In their ignorance, they thought that Jesus did not fit into the prophecy.

But do they really know where Jesus came from? Did they know that they never knew what they taught they knew? Was it not on the basis of their ignorance that Jesus begged the Father to forgive them, while he was dying on the cross? For you and me today, how much can we really know about eternity? We know that there are four last things: death, judgment, hell and heaven; but we do not have a full knowledge of what the experience of them will be like. The little that is revealed to us is to guide us to live well and make the right decisions in our lives. If we begin to assume that the little we know is all that is to be known, we repeat the mistake of those whose pride of life prevented them from believing in Jesus.

Therefore, let us continue to make the best use of the much that has been revealed to us. Let us stop trying to put God to the test, to see if what He has said can come to pass. In the first reading, ungodly men strategized on how to deal with the righteous for acting righteously. They planned to condemn the godly and see if the God he so clings to will save him as he has boasted. Interestingly, the ungodly know that they are ungodly. They know that they ways run contrary to the much that has been revealed to us on how to live good lives. Rather than make the best of this revealed truth, they chose to intimidate those who were doing their best.

Amongst other things, the ungodly make two assumptions: first that God is not as powerful as the bible says of Him. If he (G0d) is, then they (the ungodly) will not be having their way so much in the world, especially against the righteous. Second, they assume that if at all God is powerful, the fullness of his power has been revealed to the world; that is, God cannot do more than he has already done. Therefore, they (the ungodly) can grow and surpass the power of God. Little wonder Ps.14:1 says: the fool has said in his heart, ‘there is no God’. Beloved, the Lord is close to the broken hearted. While we rest on this truth, let us ensure that we are not caught up in the assumptions of the ungodly.