Tuesday in Holy Week

Isaiah 49:1-7, 1 Corinthians 1:18-31, John 12:20-36, Psalm 71:1-1, Tuesday in Holy Week 2020.

In the name of God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Breath. Amen.

A Light to enlighten the nations, *
    and the glory of your people Israel.
  

(Nunc Dimittis, Luke 2.32)

Jesus offers himself in full obedience to the Father, offering not his death only, but his full obedience, that of his whole life. And he offers himself to be 'lifted up' on the cross so as to draw all people to him, and thence to God. He is the light of the world, even on this darkest day. And in this hour, when all seems lost, all are found.

This, when the world sees only loss, is when God brings all to himself. 

Yes, it is a strange mystery. How can it be that one who is crucified, the ignominious fate of traitor thief and insurrectionary, tortured by soldiers and mocked while his very undergarment is gambled away, be the savior and the light of the world? And yet he is. He is. Even there, even then. 

And I think a key to the mystery is in that word obedience. In some theological terms what sets the Son apart in the Trinity is this trait: obediential efficacy. While the Father is creative and the Breath is conceptually efficacious, it is the Son who in perfect obedience leads the way for us to paradise: that is, to our right place in God.

Another theological term here is donative, self-giving, related to kenosis, self-emptying. It is in his giving that we receive... life.