Thursday of the Second Week of Easter
Obedience is a word that carries a lot of baggage with it. Especially in our culture today, there is a certain resistance to being obedient or subservient to those is authority. Understandably, there are certain situations in which power and obedience to authority is abused, and I think that fear of abuse or misuse of such power is legitimate. Unfortunately, it seems to have resulted in a negative connotation for obedience even to God. I did not study Latin in school, so it was only more recently that I learned that the word ‘obedience’ comes from the Latin word obaudire, meaning “to listen, to hear.” This sheds a different light on the word, especially with regard to our call to obedience to God.
Today’s readings in this second week of Easter have something to say about our being called to obedience to God and Jesus. In the first reading (Acts 5: 27-33), Peter and the other disciples have been brought before the Jewish Council for continuing to preach in Jesus’ name after having just escaped prison for the same charges. They had been ordered to stop teaching in Jesus’ name but continued, explaining “we must obey God rather than men.” They had clearly made the choice to disobey the authority of the Sanhedrin and to obey, “to listen to” God.
In the gospel passage (John 3: 31-36), we hear about God the Father’s relationship to the Son and the call to obedience to Jesus for eternal life. “The Father loves the Son and has given everything over to him. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever disobeys the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains upon him.”
We are given a choice. For the early disciples the choice seems to have been very clear and one that came from their love for Jesus and their joy in the resurrection. They were strengthened by the Holy Spirit in their desire to preach the good news despite the human orders to the contrary.
We are called to obedience, which means we are called to prayerful listening to the voice of God, to the call of Jesus in our hearts, through the Word and Sacraments, and often through one another. Rather than something to resist or be fearful of, let us ask the Holy Spirit to attune the ears of our heart and mind to influence the choices we make each day for “He does not ration his gift of the Spirit.”(John 3: 34b) Let us pray for the kind of loving and joyful obedience that the first disciples modeled for us as in today’s reading.
- Eileen Miller