“Go and take your place in the temple area,
and tell the people everything about this life.”  

These are the instructions (ACTS 5: 17-26) from the angel who has come in the night and frees the apostles from a locked prison cell that we hear in the account from the Acts of the Apostles today.  And that is just what the apostles do.  The apostles became incarcerated due to their persistence in preaching and talking about the Gospel message, but the prison cannot contain them.  When the guards go up to the locked cell to see it empty, they fear trying to take them by force again.

When someone is really free, there is nothing that can hold them back.  This is the truth that Jesus speaks of in the Gospel passage John 8: 32 “And you will know the truth, and the truth shall set you free.”  What exactly is this truth that even Pilate questions Jesus about prior to condemning him to death?  Could it be that very life spoken of by the angel freeing the apostles that the apostles are instructed to tell all the people about?  If so, what is the truth of or in this apparently ‘New Life,’ that evades imprisonment?

John’s Gospel today (JN 3: 16-21) presents the beautiful and mysterious scripture that seeks to describe the depth of a God Who is Love:

“God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son,
so that everyone who believes in him might not perish
but might have eternal life.”

Could the truth be this context of Love given by God in the life of his Son to this world?  If so, what is the content of this truth?  In this Love Gift, it is made clear that the Son coming into the world has nothing to do with condemnation, but everything to do with reconciliation, and ultimately the light of Truth.  If there is any content it seems to have nothing to do with counting, measuring or judging. Unfortunately, the reception of this great limitless Gift was, shall we say, less than appreciated:

“And this is the verdict,
that the light came into the world,
but people preferred darkness to light…
…Whoever lives the truth comes to the light,
so that his works may be clearly seen as done in God”

There doesn’t seem to be any hard and fast content to this truth that sets you free and that draws you out to others and invites them in.  Perhaps this is because there is no container for a God Who is Love.  Love is not Itself if it does not do what it is.  This is why, paradoxically, God’s Love in a sense had to be given to the world through the Incarnation in Creation and the Gift of His Son.  But, we don’t want to see this.  Perhaps it is too much for our sight.  We want to see a container of love and that is just what God cannot be!  Love is the container of all and if there are any contents of this Truth of Love, it lies within our recognition, response and engagement in the very gift itself.  There are no contents, unless we receive, which is true and full content-ment!

The truth is to live in the light, which is transparent and reveals all.  The prison doors of all that keeps us ‘locked up’ inside are forced open.  And we are drawn out towards the nature of this love’ which is to pass it on.  This is the life that the angel of freedom is telling the apostles they must share with EVERYONE.

Can we risk losing the darkness that we think protects us, but in fact blinds and imprisons us?  The cost is to receive Love – what John tells us today – in the Son, the Christ.  This is what it means to have eternal life.  There is no end to love, because it is stronger than death.  Love is the only thing powerful enough to contain everything because it is spacious enough to include everything and everyone.  It shimmers with the radiance that we call the truth of light, shining forth from life that gives of itself.  God…Love…flowing out and just waiting to be received and shared.

May we truly learn to live the Truth that brings us to light, which means we receive the Loving eyes of God Who sees us as we are and invites us to Live together in the content freedom of God’s very Life!!

Peace

Thomas

(originally published April 27, 2017)