Sunday Readings Commentary
Father Andrew Wadsworth offers a short commentary on this week's Sunday Lectionary readings.
To read the relevant Bible passage just click on the reference.
Before reading and reflecting on God's word you might like to use the following prayer:
O Lord,
who hast given us thy word
for a light to shine upon our path:
Grant us so to meditate upon that word
and follow its teaching,
that we may find in it the light that shineth
more and more unto the perfect day:
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Fourth Sunday of Easter
In those days: Paul and Barnabas went on from Perga and came to Antioch in Pisidia. And on the Sabbath day they went into the synagogue and sat down. Many Jews and devout converts to Judaism followed Paul and Barnabas, who, as they spoke with them, urged them to continue in the grace of God.
The next Sabbath almost the whole city gathered to hear the word of the Lord. But when the Jews saw the crowds, they were filled with jealousy and began to contradict what was spoken by Paul, reviling him. And Paul and Barnabas spoke out boldly, saying, ‘It was necessary that the word of God be spoken first to you. Since you thrust it aside and judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life, behold, we are turning to the Gentiles. For so the Lord has commanded us, saying, “I have made you a light for the Gentiles, that you may bring salvation to the ends of the earth.” ’ And when the Gentiles heard this, they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord, and as many as were appointed to eternal life believed. And the word of the Lord was spreading throughout the whole region. But the Jews incited the devout women of high standing and the leading men of the city, stirred up persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and drove them out of their district. But they shook off the dust from their feet against them and went to Iconium. And the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit.
As we watch the Christian message spreading to the ends of the earth, three times Paul is rejected by his own people, the Jews, and forced to turn to the gentiles: once here in Asia Minor, once in Greece and finally in Rome. Each time he does so with a biblical gesture, shaking the dust off his feet, shaking out his cloak, finally in Rome quoting the fulfilment of Isaiah. Was Luke anti-Semitic, then, to paint the picture with such crackling emphasis? Perhaps in God’s providence this Jewish rejection was the means by which the gospel reached beyond Judaism. If the Jews had accepted Jesus, would Christianity have remained merely a Jewish sect? In his letters Paul is bruised to the bone by the failure of his people to accept their promised Messiah, and their failure remains a mystery. The witness of the Jews as the suffering servant of the Lord continues in another direction, helped no little by Christian anti-Semitism. Paul attests that they will be converted in the end, but how they will finally be grafted into the vine-stock he cannot say: ‘How deep are the wisdom and knowledge of God’ (Romans 11.33).
I, John, looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands.
Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, ‘These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore they are before the throne of God, and serve him day and night in his temple; and he who sits on the throne will shelter them with his presence. They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.’
In his vision John sees the countless numbers of the redeemed as they will be gathered at the throne of the Lamb. Their palms are the palms of victory and their robes, curiously washed white in blood, are the sign of integrity and innocence. The Book of Revelation was written at a time, whether of bloody persecution or not, when the temptation was overwhelming to submit to the dominance of Rome. This was not only political but also religious, for the Lord Emperor was worshipped as a god. In every city there was an altar to Rome and Augustus. The greater the city, the greater the Temple. Worship of the Emperor and Rome set the whole tone for society. To join this worship was the only way to success and prosperity. Yet if Augustus is Lord, Christ cannot be Lord. Christians had to opt out, and many will have paid with their blood. The victory was not by arms but by endurance. Today also Christians must opt out of many aspects of society – and yet also vigorously opt in, to bring the Christian values as a leavening of society. We cannot stay comfortably huddled round the throne!
At that time: Jesus said, ‘My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.’
The figure of the Good Shepherd is the nearest approach to a parable in John’s gospel. It is so important that the Church puts it before us on the fourth Sunday of Easter in each of the three cycles of readings. Apart from its obvious sense of Jesus looking after his sheep – and silly, confused sheep at that – this image receives special sense from the figure of the shepherd in the Old Testament. God is the primary shepherd of Israel, who pastures his sheep in pastures green so that they fear no evil (Psalm 23). In Ezekiel 34 God promises to free Israel from the self-centred shepherds who keep the sheep for their own advantage, and to send them a true shepherd after his own heart, a second David, who will tend them as God himself would care for them. Thus, in putting before us each year in Eastertide, this proclamation that Jesus is the Good Shepherd, the Church is affirming the Risen Christ as the divine Shepherd who tends his flocks. Particularly in these verses we see the unity of the Risen Christ and the Father in shepherding the sheep, just as in the Book of Revelation we saw the unity of the Lord God and the Lamb, both revered on the one throne.