What Else is There to Say?
May 1, 2024
Fr. John Riccardo
Beloved, let us love one another, because love is of God; everyone who loves is begotten by God and knows God. Whoever is without love does not know God, for God is love. In this way the love of God was revealed to us: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might have life through him. In this is love: not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as expiation for our sins
1 John 4:7-10
Last week here, we reflected on how often various sayings of Jesus fail to shock us, when in fact they would have shocked everybody who heard Him. This week something similar is being said to us through John. We have, tragically, become accustomed to hearing something that was never said about any of the gods.
God … is … love.
The gods of the ancient world, whether Roman, Greek, Egyptian, Sumerian, or other, were to be appeased, kept happy, bargained with, and more – lest they become angry and wreak havoc on mere mortals who are nothing but their playthings. The thought that God might be love never entered the imaginations of the people in the ancient world.
And note well that what’s being revealed here is not that God is loving. God isn’t loving. You and I, at least once in a while, are loving. God is love. This is, well, extremely good news for us. And perhaps worth paying special attention to is the fact that the Greek text uses a word that usually is reserved for God the Father: ho theos. Now, this isn’t to say that the other members of the Trinity are not love, but it is to stress something that is worth emphasizing. Many people can fall prey to a poor understanding of the Persons of the Trinity, seeing the Father as harsh and angry and the Son as the One who has come to appease Him. This is not biblical in the least. And, again, what is being revealed here is that there is what we might call a hierarchy – a sacred order – of love within the Trinity, with the Father holding a unique place.
I think it’s safe to say that all of us have a distorted image of God. How could we not, after all, since we’re finite beings trying to grasp the infinite? It’s more than that, though. Many of us have a particularly distorted image of God the Father. This might be because our own earthly fathers were not all that we had hoped for or needed. Some of us had (and have) emotionally distant fathers, abusive fathers, absent fathers, and more. Even those of us who had great earthly fathers, like I did, still have a distorted image of the Father. And, of course, more insidiously, the root temptation of the enemy, his one play, is to constantly tempt us to think that God is not a good Father, not reliable and faithful, not to be trusted, and that we can be happier apart from Him. That was the lie in the Garden in Genesis 3, and it is the lie at the heart of every temptation we continue to wrestle with.
Jesus has come – among other things – to reveal the Father, to make Him known, to describe Him, if you will (cf. John 1:18). I often think that there’s a temptation among Christians to be overly Christ-o-centric. In other words, we can tend to focus all of our attention on Jesus, forgetting the Holy Spirit but perhaps even more forgetting the Father. Jesus though, is, constantly speaking about His Father. Over 190 times He speaks about Him in the Gospels. He says that He only does what He sees the Father do (cf. John 5:19); does not do His own will but the will of the Father (cf. John 6:38); does only what the Father commands Him to do (cf. John 14:31); and that to see Him is to see the Father (cf. John 14:9). As the Son points to the Father, so too does the Holy Spirit. He dwells within those who have been baptized and from inside our hearts cries out, “Abba, Father!” (cf. Rom 8:15-17; Gal 4:4-7).
All of this is so desperately important because we’re living at a time of extreme anxiety, fear, depression and despair, especially but not only in the younger generation. At the heart of that depression and anxiety is a crisis of identity. Who am I? Am I on my own here? Does anyone see me? Am I loved? Am I even lovable, especially after having done … whatever I’ve done. Do I matter? Is there a plan for my life or is life just grains of sand slipping through the hour-glass with no real purpose?
St. Augustine once wrote, “If nothing at all were said in the other pages of the scriptures, and this was the one and only thing that we heard from the voice of the Spirit of God, that God is love, we wouldn’t have to look for anything else.” Let us ask the Holy Spirit to help this truth sink ever deeper into our minds and hearts in the week ahead, and let us be intentional about opportunities to tell an anxious world that God is love.
ACTS XXIX Prayer Intentions
May 2024
For three missions in Vancouver, BC:
Rescue LIVE Revival
Presbyterate Retreat
Equipping Day for ordained and lay.
For the presbyterate retreat in the Diocese of Lincoln, NE.
For all bishops and priests throughout our country.
For all of our benefactors and prayer partners.
For protection upon Fr. John, our team, and all our families.