WHO LOVES HIS LIFE WILL LOSE IT

V SUNDAY OF LENT - John 12:20-33

As we approach the Holy Week, the passages of the Gospel of John that we read on Sundays present Jesus facing his incoming death. In doing that, he assumes it and gives it a meaning.

This Sunday’s gospel starts with a request from some of the Greeks that had arrived in Jerusalem to worship at the Passover festival. They went to Philip and told him: “Sir, we should like to see Jesus.” It is a request for a personal encounter with Jesus. In the end, true worship can be done only in Jesus and through Jesus. Philip went to Andrew and then both of them went to Jesus. The encounter with Jesus is mediated through the community, and it is the community that leads us to Jesus.

To the Greeks, who wished to see him, Jesus speaks of his destiny, presenting the hour of his death as the hour of his glorification. When he is lifted up from the earth, then he will attract all people to him, meaning that it is on the cross that he will be glorified.

It's like the seed cast upon the ground. Alone, abandoned, hidden in darkness, pressed all over, it experiences the agony of darkness, feeling distressed by a lost hope. However, the one who buried it under the ground did so in the certainty of a new life, with its fullness manifested in the many fruits that will produce. Without this experience of death, it will remain fruitless and alone forever. That would be the true death, with a temporary and futureless life coming to an end. Life is to be shared, spent for the sake of others. If we behave like proud and arrogant lords of life, we separate ourselves from others and remain far away from them. Whenever we turn ourselves into the centre of the world, putting everything at our service, we are on the path that leads to an aimless life, a life without purpose and destiny. As we try to save our lives from death, we end up losing life. It was not so with Jesus. Even though disturbed, Jesus walked into this hour of darkness and death with determination, in total fidelity to the love of the Father, knowing that it is by losing life that one finds it and by dying that one lives forever. Doing so, Jesus will glorify the Father and he was also glorified. If we follow him, we will share his victory over the prince of this world and will share his glory as well.