The Fifth Sunday of Lent, March 20, 2021

John 12, 20–33

Some Greeks who had come to worship at the Passover Feast came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and asked him, “Sir, we would like to see Jesus.” Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. Jesus answered them, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Amen, amen, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will preserve it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there also will my servant be. The Father will honor whoever serves me. I am troubled now. Yet what should I say, ‘Father, save me from this hour’? But it was for this purpose that I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name.” Then a voice came from heaven, “I have glorified it and will glorify it again.” The crowd there heard it and said it was thunder; but others said, “An angel has spoken to him.” Jesus answered and said, “This voice did not come for my sake but for yours. Now is the time of judgment on this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out. And when I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to myself.” He said this indicating the kind of death he would die. 

“Some Greeks who had come to worship.”  These would have been Jews whose first language was Greek.  They may have come from Antioch, a Greek city with a large Jewish population, or they may have come from further afield.  Their eagerness to see Jesus tells us that they had heard of the Lord in their faraway home town and had long nourished a desire to see him for themselves.  This fact helps to explain the rest of this reading.  These Greek Jews found Philip, an Apostle from Bethsaida, a town on the coast of the Sea of Galilee in what is now the region of the Golan Heights.  Due to its location, bordering Greek-speaking Gentile territory, the Greek language would have been in common use among the inhabitants.  The Greek Jews who came to Jerusalem may have heard Philip speaking Greek and so, learning that he was a close follower of Jesus, they came to him and asked if he would point the Lord out to them.  We note that St. John writes that they wanted “to see” Jesus, not that they wanted to meet with him.  It was enough for them merely to see him.  After pointing him out to them, Philip went and told Andrew about this interesting and potentially important development: that these people from a far off land had heard of the Lord, a sign that his fame was spreading abroad and was not any longer confined to Israel and the country immediately around it.  If the Messiah was thus gaining international attention, he might be able to make alliances and procure arms for the coming war to throw out the Romans and establish the new kingdom  of Israel.  And probably very excited, Andrew went to tell his Master the news.

At first, the Lord seems to respond in the way his Apostles would have expected, with his own excitement: “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.”  For the Apostles, this “glory” was of the earthly kind.  Their hearts rose up in hearing these words.  But the Lord was speaking of a different kind of glory: “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit.”  He is speaking of his Death and Resurrection, which will initiate the conversion of the world.  He is saying that the interest of these Greek Jews is a sign, a premonition, even, of the efforts of the Apostles after he rises from the dead.  His glory is his Passion, Death, and Resurrection, which would be for the salvation of the world.

After speaking of the apostolic life, the Lord speaks of himself: “I am troubled now. Yet what should I say, ‘Father, save me from this hour’?”  He is troubled because of his full awareness of the suffering he will endure.  We see this graphically portrayed in the scene at the Garden of Gethsemane as recorded in Luke 22, 41-44.  Then, to answer his own question, he calls out his assent to his Father in heaven: “Father, glorify your name!”  That is, Let your will be done.  And the Father responds very physically, accepting his Son’s assent to his will: “I have glorified it and will glorify it again.”  The Lord Jesus clarifies that this exchange between him and his Father was meant to be a public one: “This voice did not come for my sake but for yours.”  It is his announcement to the world that he is prepared to die for the salvation of all, and of the Father’s acceptance of this Sacrifice.  This is not some secret deed, some hidden action, something only the initiated could learn about and understand.  The intention is stated and accepted, the arrest is made and an interrogation takes places in the presence of the Jewish leaders, the Victim is brought in broad daylight to Pilate, who condemns him, and finally the Sacrifice is consummated on Calvary.  This is history, not fable. 

The first result of the Lord’s Death: “Now is the time of judgment on this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out.”  And then, “When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to myself.”  That is, Greeks and Jews alike.  Let us also be drawn ever nearer to him who was lifted up for us.