A Latin spiritual journey with discerning hearts, from ashes to glory.

Day 29

The Father's Work of Mercy.

A reading from the Holy Gospel according to John, chapter 5, verses 17 through 30.

Jesus answered them,

My father is still working, and I also am working.

For this reason, the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him,

because he was not only breaking the Sabbath, but was also calling God his own father, thereby making himself equal to God.

Jesus said to them, very truly I tell you, the son can do nothing on his own, but only what he

sees the father doing.

For whatever the father does, the son does likewise.

The father loves the son and shows him all that he himself is doing.

Indeed, just as the father raises the dead and gives them life,

so also the son gives life to whomever he wishes. I can do

nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just, because I seek to do not my own

will, but the will of him who sent me.

As we continue through the Gospel of John,

Jesus now shifts the attention from physical healing to a deeper mystery,

the relationship between the son and the father.

He speaks openly of divine intimacy, of love and obedience, of authority and life. My father is still working, and I also am working. What work is this? It is the work of mercy, the work of healing,

the work of calling the debt to life. So much of Lent is a return to that core relationship.

Are we living in the Father's love? Are we cooperating with His mercy? We do not live this life

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