Friday after Epiphany, January 8, 2021

John 5:5-13

Beloved: Who indeed is the victor over the world but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?  This is the one who came through water and Blood, Jesus Christ, not by water alone, but by water and Blood. The Spirit is the one who testifies, and the Spirit is truth. So there are three who testify, the Spirit, the water, and the Blood, and the three are of one accord. If we accept human testimony, the testimony of God is surely greater. Now the testimony of God is this, that he has testified on behalf of his Son. Whoever believes in the Son of God has this testimony within himself. Whoever does not believe God has made him a liar by not believing the testimony God has given about his Son. And this is the testimony: God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever possesses the Son has life; whoever does not possess the Son of God does not have life.  I write these things to you so that you may know that you have eternal life, you who believe in the name of the Son of God.

“Who indeed is the victor over the world but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?”  The First Reading for today’s Mass begins with a reiteration of a point made in yesterday’s First Reading: that steadfast faith in the invisible, such as in the divine Sonship of the Lord Jesus, in the grace that makes those who belong to him co-heirs of heaven, and in the promise of heaven after this life, makes us “conquerors” of the world that insists on the reality only of what is visible.  Now at the end of his epistle, St. John returns to his opening theme, the fact that the Son of God became man: “This is the one who came through water and Blood, Jesus Christ, not by water alone, but by water and Blood.”  This verse seems obscure, and it is — unless we understand that “water”, here, means “divinity”.  The “Blood” refers to Christ’s human nature.  John is speaking in terms his original hearers understood, and he is saying that the Son of God came to earth both in his divine nature and in a human nature which he assumed.  The division in the church to which he was writing existed because some of its members were teaching that God was not made man, he did not take on a human nature since the spirit and the physical are opposite extremes, in their view.  These people taught that God indeed came down, that is, “water” came down from heaven, but only took on the appearance of a man, or possessed a man in the same way an evil spirit might.  But in truth the Lord came both in “water” — his divinity — and “Blood” — a human nature.  This helps us to understand a passage from St. John’s Gospel in which he wrote that after the Lord had died, “one of the soldiers with a spear opened his side: and immediately there came out blood and water” (John 19, 34).  The pouring out of both water and Blood testifies to the reality of the Death of the Son of God.

“The Spirit is the one who testifies, and the Spirit is truth.”  The Holy Spirit testifies to this through the authentic teaching of the Apostles, who heard the Lord, spoke to him, touched him, and ate and drank with him, both before and after his Resurrection.  “So there are three who testify, the Spirit, the water, and the Blood, and the three are of one accord.”  John points to the testimony of the Holy Spirit through the Apostles; the divinity of Christ, which all acknowledge; and his physicality, which is evident from the Gospels.  In this regard, Tertullian, combatting the Gnostics in Northern Africa within a few years of John’s death, pointed emphatically to the circumstances of the Lord’s Birth and and his Death as proof.  “If we accept human testimony, the testimony of God is surely greater.”  For the Lord himself said to the skeptical Thomas after his Resurrection: “Put your finger in here and see my hands. And bring your hand and put it into my side. And be not faithless, but believing” (John 20, 27).  “Now the testimony of God is this, that he has testified on behalf of his Son.”  John is referring here to the two times he heard the Father say, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”  That is, at his Baptism and at his Transfiguration.  

“Whoever believes in the Son of God has this testimony within himself.”. John now speaks of the gift of faith.  This faith does not consist in wishful thinking or even in a conviction or belief, but consists of a supernatural virtue that enlivens the one who possesses it, and is a sign of the relationship that exists between the person who has it and in the One in whom he believes.  In fact, God dwells in us through faith: faith prepares a throne room in our hearts for him.  “Whoever does not believe God has made him a liar by not believing the testimony God has given about his Son.”  John equates disbelief in the Son as disbelief in God the Father.  In order to believe in God, we must believe in Christ as divine.  “And this is the testimony: God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.”  The Lord Jesus himself is our eternal life.  We recall that the Lord, at the Last Supper, revealed to the Apostles that, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father except by me” (John 14, 6), as well as that, “I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh” (John 6, 51-52).  We attain the life which God gives us through eating the Body and drinking the Blood of his Son.  “Whoever possesses the Son has life; whoever does not possess the Son of God does not have life.”  We possess the Son through our faith in him.  We cling to him as any branch is fastened to a vine (cf. John 15, 5).  Grace, which is the life of God, flows to those of us who are the branches of our Lord, who is the Vine.  

“I write these things to you so that you may know that you have eternal life, you who believe in the name of the Son of God.”  This verse echoes what John wrote earlier, in his Gospel: “These [things] are written, that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God: and that believing, you may have life in his name” (John 20, 31).  John, filled with the zeal for souls, has written his Gospel and this letter, and has spent his life preaching in order that the Lord should save souls through him.  Even beyond this, John wishes to share his love of the Lord Jesus so that others may share in the joy he feels.  He knows fully the truth of what the Lord had foretold years before: “These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and your joy may be complete” (John 15, 11).  John speaks now so that the Lord Jesus who has ascended into heaven and walks the earth no more, may speak through him.