I WILL LOVE HIM AND REVEAL MYSELF TO HIM

At 14,5-18; Ps 113B; Jn 14,21-26
30 APRIL

Love for the Lord is not only the most pure and uncontaminated obedience to his Word, but it is also from man a “study in the Holy Spirit” to give to our obedience soul, spirit, body, heart, desires and will at the highest of their possibilities. We find this law of “study” in Deuteronomy. First the Lord tells Moses that nothing must be added and nothing taken away from his Commandments and Statutes. Then Moses remembers all the Law of Sinai, indicating the modalities of “study” for its perfect obedience. Perfection is in love transformed into obedience and in the obedience that makes itself love. Love and obedience are one thing. Never two things can be made of them. Does not one want love without obedience today?

“Now, Israel, hear the statutes and decrees which I am teaching you to observe, that you may live, and may enter in and take possession of the land which the Lord, the God of your fathers, is giving you. In your observance of the commandments of the Lord, your God, which I enjoin upon you, you shall not add to what I command you nor subtract from it. Therefore, I teach you the statutes and decrees as the Lord, my God, has commanded me, that you may observe them in the land you are entering to occupy. Observe them carefully, for thus will you give evidence of your wisdom and intelligence to the nations, who will hear of all these statutes and say, ‘This great nation is truly a wise and intelligent people.’ Or what great nation has statutes and decrees that are as just as this whole law which I am setting before you today? (Cf. Dt 4,1-8). “These then are the commandments, the statutes and decrees which the Lord, your God, has ordered that you be taught to observe in the land into which you are crossing for conquest, so that you and your son and your grandson may fear the Lord, your God, and keep, throughout the days of your lives, all his statutes and commandments which I enjoin on you, and thus have long life. Hear then, Israel, and be careful to observe them, that you may grow and prosper the more, in keeping with the promise of the Lord, the God of your fathers, to give you a land flowing with milk and honey. “Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord alone! Therefore, you shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength. Take to heart these words which I enjoin on you today. Drill them into your children. Speak of them at home and abroad, whether you are busy or at rest. Bind them at your wrist as a sign and let them be as a pendant on your forehead. Write them on the doorposts of your houses and on your gates (Dt 6,1-8).

With Jesus both the modality of obedience and its substance change. The modality changes because it is not the man the one who must study how to observe the Law, but it is the Holy Spirit that guides every disciple of Jesus, in Jesus, in the full accomplishment of the Father’s will on Him. Without the Holy Spirit the perennial communion with the desire of the Father is lacking. The substance of the Law also changes. It is no longer a commandment to be observed, but letting a life to be lived. Christ is the life of the Father in the flesh. The Christian must be the life of Christ in his body. The Gospel reveals to us what is not the life of Christ in our body. But the life of Christ is infinitely beyond the Gospel just as the life of the Father in Christ is eternally beyond the Commandments.

Whoever has my commandments and observes them is the one who loves me. And whoever loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and reveal myself to him.” Judas, not the Iscariot, said to him, “Master, (then) what happened that you will reveal yourself to us and not to the world?” Jesus answered and said to him, “Whoever loves me will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our dwelling with him. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words; yet the word you hear is not mine but that of the Father who sent me. “I have told you this while I am with you. The Advocate, the holy Spirit that the Father will send in my name – he will teach you everything and remind you of all that (I) told you.

Every day the Spirit comes and transforms the life of the disciple into the life of Christ. The Spirit can do this only in those who dwell in the Word of Jesus, in those who live his Gospel and his Commandment. The Holy Spirit comes to those who live in the Word and little by little transforms them into the perfect life of Christ. This is the new essence and the new mode. But everything is the work of the Spirit who becomes the sole Creator of the life of Christ in the disciple.

Virgin Mary, Mother of the Redemption, Angels and Saints make us true life of Christ Jesus.