Homily: Am I on the right path?

 

Here's my homily for May 3, the Fifth Sunday of the Easter season. (If a video doesn't appear above, click here!)  My reflection is based on today's gospel and the text of my homily follows below. Note: towards the end of my homily I refer to Becket, a young boy who received Communion for the first time this morning.) 

 

So we're at the Last Supper - and Jesus says to his closest friends:
        “I'm leaving you. I'm gonna go away for a while
            - so I can prepare a place for you -
                a place where we can all be together.
        And don't worry, you know how to get there.”

 

Thomas, the doubter, says,

    “Lord, we have no idea where you're going. 

    How could we possibly know how to get there?

 

Jesus says,

“Thomas, I *AM* the way.”

 

And then Thomas says… 

 

Oh, wait! Thomas doesn't say anything!

 

Thomas keeps his mouth shut - possibly because Thomas thinks Jesus hasn't really answered his question. And he's hesitant to push it, to ask again.

 

Thomas was looking for directions, maybe even a map. But Jesus' response seems to beg the question. Maybe it's a riddle.  

                “Show me the way. Oh, I am the way!”

 

Well, the more important question for you and me this morning is this: Do you and I know the way? The way to the place Jesus has prepared for us in his father's house. Can you and I puzzle out the riddle - and how Jesus could be “the way?”

 

I'm not exaggerating here when I tell you that the directions to the place where Jesus has made something ready for us in heaven are the most critically important directions you and I could possibly ever receive, or understand, and follow.

 

The only way we can solve the riddle, the only way we can understand how Jesus IS the way, is to know who Jesus IS. Or better yet, and more simply: To. Know. Jesus.

 

To know Jesus is to find the map that leads to the place waiting for us in the Father's house. And we will know that Jesus is our way IF the road we're on is filled - as was his - with ups and downs, twists and turns, joys and sorrows, potholes and detours.

 

We'll know that Jesus is our way IF the road we're on, like his, is a path with its share of hardship, suffering, and sacrifice.

 

We'll know that we're on the way of Jesus, IF it seems like, if it feels like the way of the Cross. Because that is the way of Jesus.

 

We'll know that Jesus is our way IF, like Jesus, we're not always sure where the road is heading. If, like Jesus, we need to, from time to time, pull over to the side: to rest, to reflect, to pray, to ask for the Father, “Where are you taking me? Where am I going?”

 

We'll know that Jesus is our way IF, like Jesus, we keep meeting

   - poor people who need our help,

   - hungry people, who cry for a place at our table,

   - sick people who need our company and our care,

   - sidelined people who need to be included,

   - difficult people who need our understanding,

   - strangers who need to be welcomed,

   - annoying people who need our patience,

   - persecuted people who need our defense,

   - and hurtful people who need our forgiveness.

 

But - and this is a big but…   

BUT, 

    if the road I'm on works to keep me

      from just those people,

   if the path I'm traveling protects me

      from even meeting such people,

   then there's a good chance

      that I've gone the wrong way,

      that I've taken a shortcut or a wrong turn,

      that I’m traveling in the wrong direction,

      that I’m lost…

A good chance that I'm not heading home

   to the Father's house.

A good chance at Jesus isn't the truth in my life.

A good chance that Jesus isn't my way.

 

That's why it's so important for us

   to gather here every Sunday, 

   to hear the truth of Jesus in the scriptures

      and the directions he offers us

         for keeping on the right path.

 

We gather here to celebrate his life in the Eucharist,

   to be nourished by his life in communion,

      (as Becket will be the first time this morning)

   to be nourished by his life in Communion

      so that we can be strengthened to reach out

            to those people we meet along the way Jesus IS.

 

We gather together to check the compass in our souls,

   to ensure we're walking in the footsteps of Jesus,

following Jesus, who is our way, home to the Father,

   to the place the Lord has readied for us in the kingdom.

 

So, the riddle is solved.

 

We DO know where Jesus was heading when he told his friends at the Last Supper that he was leaving them for a while.

 

We know that he has returned - he rose from the dead - and he wants to take us home with him, to where he is, with his Father.

 

And we know the way that leads there.

 

We know that Jesus, himself,

   Jesus, is the way.

 

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