Reflection on Today's Readings, Wednesday Week of Easter, Year B, April 14th, 2021
Texts: Acts 5:17-26; Ps. 34:2-9; John 3:16-21
The reflection, today, is about what motivates our action. Every time we want to act we need to ask ourselves what motivates us to act in that manner. If we often ask ourselves the motivation for our actions, we will see why some actions are not to be carried out. In today's reading, we are told that the action of the high priest and those with him were motivated by jealousy. Hence, it is said, "The high priest rose up and all who were with him, that is, the party of the Sadducees, and filled with jealousy they arrested the apostles and put them in the common prison." Jealousy begins when we begin to wish for ourselves the good of others. It becomes sin when we begin to think that the good enjoyed by the other person rightly belongs to us. Jealousy is being filled hatred for another whose good we desire. The problem, here, is not the desire, but the hatred. Everyone must understand that he /she has his/her own good. Everyone must develop theirself in the area they are good.
What were they jealous of the apostles? Certainly it was not their physiques or rhetoric. It was the grace of God in their lives that the high priest and the Sadducees were jealous of. They were jealous that the apostles were preaching the resurrection and that they were performing miracles in the name of Jesus Christ. Instead of them to believe the message of the apostles, they were fighting them. There is no point in being jealous of another person; we also have our own good that God has given us, let us make use of them. We do not also need to fight the truth when it is evident before us. We should not allow jealousy to take away from us the kingdom of God, the eternal life. The high priest and the Sadducees rejected eternal life because they were jealous of the apostles; they fought the message of eternal life.
In today's gospel reading, we are told that God was moved by love to give us His only-begotten Son. It is said, "God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life". Love should always be the motivation of our actions. Love seeks the salvation of the other. God gave us His only-begotten Son for our salvation because of love.
If we do not love, we cannot be witnesses to the resurrection. It is when our actions are moved by love that we will truly win eternal life. Love does not condemn but save. It is said, "For God sent the Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him." Love saves us and the person for whose sake we act. God is love. When we love, jealousy we have no place in us. Because the high priest and Sadducees do not love, they condemned the apostles.
Love is so imposing and convincing about its capacity to save that the rejection of it is self-condemnation. It is said, "he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God. And this is the judgement, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil." The high priest and the Sadducees were jealous because the truth of the message of the apostles was no longer deniable; the people were already aware that it was the message of salvation. Their message was imposing and convincing that its rejection is the rejection of salvation, the eternal life. This teaches us that wherever we see the truth, we should not fight it but accept it and live by it.
The message, today, is that love should be the reason for our actions all the time, not jealousy, hatred, or material gain.
Lord Jesus, help us to love without self interest and to be motivated by love in all we do or say; may we always enjoy Your protection and love. Amen.
Fr. Andrew Olowomuke
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