The Lord is Glorified in Our Lives and in Our Good Works

Introduction
In strikingly parallel ways, both Paul and Christ speak of their mission they have carried out – Christ with absolute certainty, Paul, knowing his limitations, to the best of his abilities. Paul knows that trials are awaiting him, but led by the Holy Spirit who guided his life, he will go ahead, even when he does not know what is awaiting him. Jesus has given the best of himself to make the Father known to all. He prays that they may all be one.

1 Reading ACTS 20:17-27
From Miletus Paul had the presbyters
of the Church at Ephesus summoned.
When they came to him, he addressed them,
“You know how I lived among you
the whole time from the day I first came to the province of Asia.
I served the Lord with all humility
and with the tears and trials that came to me
because of the plots of the Jews,
and I did not at all shrink from telling you
what was for your benefit,
or from teaching you in public or in your homes.
I earnestly bore witness for both Jews and Greeks
to repentance before God and to faith in our Lord Jesus.
But now, compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem.
What will happen to me there I do not know,
except that in one city after another
the Holy Spirit has been warning me
that imprisonment and hardships await me.
Yet I consider life of no importance to me,
if only I may finish my course
and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus,
to bear witness to the Gospel of God’s grace.

“But now I know that none of you
to whom I preached the kingdom during my travels
will ever see my face again.
And so I solemnly declare to you this day
that I am not responsible for the blood of any of you,
for I did not shrink from proclaiming to you the entire plan of God.”

Responsorial Psalm 68:10-11, 20-21
R. (33a) Sing to God, O kingdoms of the earth.
or:
R. Alleluia.

A bountiful rain you showered down, O God, upon your inheritance;
you restored the land when it languished;
Your flock settled in it;
in your goodness, O God, you provided it for the needy.
R

Blessed day by day be the Lord,
who bears our burdens; God, who is our salvation.
God is a saving God for us;
the LORD, my Lord, controls the passageways of death.
R

Alleluia John 14:16
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
I will ask the Father
and he will give you another Advocate
to be with you always.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.

Gospel John 17:1-11a
Jesus raised his eyes to heaven and said,
“Father, the hour has come.
Give glory to your son, so that your son may glorify you,
just as you gave him authority over all people,
so that your son may give eternal life to all you gave him.
Now this is eternal life,
that they should know you, the only true God,
and the one whom you sent, Jesus Christ.
I glorified you on earth
by accomplishing the work that you gave me to do.
Now glorify me, Father, with you,
with the glory that I had with you before the world began.

“I revealed your name to those whom you gave me out of the world.
They belonged to you, and you gave them to me,
and they have kept your word.
Now they know that everything you gave me is from you,
because the words you gave to me I have given to them,
and they accepted them and truly understood that I came from you,
and they have believed that you sent me.
I pray for them.
I do not pray for the world but for the ones you have given me,
because they are yours, and everything of mine is yours
and everything of yours is mine,
and I have been glorified in them.
And now I will no longer be in the world,
but they are in the world, while I am coming to you.

Commentary:
Meister Eckhart comments on this, “It has been written that whenever our Lord raised up his eyes, he wished to perform a great work…. Thus, he instructs us that when we would pray, we should first descend in true downcast humility beneath all creatures. Only then should we ascend before the throne of wisdom, and as far as we have descended, so far shall we be granted what we have prayed for ‘He raised his eyes up from below’, from the true ground of profoundest humility. Just as the power of heaven never works so effectively, or in any element, as in the ground of earth, although it is the lowest (for here it has the greatest opportunity to work), so too God works most in a humble heart, for He has the greatest opportunity to work therein, and finds His like most therein. He thus teaches us to enter into the ground of true humility and true nakedness.”

John loved to play on the paradox of “raised up”: Jesus would be lifted up in shame on the cross, but that lifting up in shame is also a lifting up in glory (see February 26). Here, Eckhart uses it in another and a more general way. As he said, “The way down is the way up.” It is a lesson that we all have to learn again and again.

Blessing
With Jesus and like Paul, may we say with gratitude that we have carried out our task in life, the work God gave us to do, and may God forgive us where we failed. May Almighty God bless you, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen!