Do You Love Me? (Jn.21)

Love has to be a two-way street.  In this well-known saying the secret of the alchemy of love is expressed.  Love should not just be given; we should also learn to receive it.  Only through the interactive effect of both, giving and receiving, something new comes into being that neither of the two persons involved would have been able to achieve alone.  That is called alchemy: the beginning of a new creation.

Some people only want to receive love, and it is never enough.  Others can only give, so that you are buried under a superabundance, and there is no room left for you.  In the shadow of such people, endowed with a shining charisma, you may feel small and insignificant.

Christ gives a love that transcends all human ability to imagine it.  People who have experienced it themselves say: “His love knows exactly all I have done in my life, all I have done wrong—and in spite of that He loves me.  This is why Christ is called the teacher of human love.  But He not only bestows His love on us; He also asks each one of us:

“Do you love me more than the others?”

And when we, like Peter, are not capable of giving Him unconditional love, He asks more modestly: “Do you love me?”

And when we, like Peter, are also incapable of doing that, He finally asks: “Are you my friend?”

He does that for our sake, for in His love for the imperfect, even our deficient friendship is for Him an indispensable gift.

Love has to be a two-way street.  Can I give Him something?
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Commentary on the text in John 21: 15-18

In many versions of the Bible the text is not correctly translated.  It looks as if the Risen One asks Peter three times almost the same thing: Do you love me more than these?  Do you love me?  Do you love me? (RSV) Moreover, in this translation it looks as if Peter gives three times the same answer as the question he was asked: You know that I love you.

However, in the first question Christ speaks of the highest form of love (Greek agapē): Do you love me more than the others?  Peter, who is not capable of giving this unconditional love, replies three times: You know that I am your friend. (Greek phileō) (Madsen: you are dear to me)

The second time Christ no longer asks for love “more than the others,” but for unconditional love without comparison to the other disciples: Do you love me?  Again, Peter can give nothing other than philia, friendship.

The third time Christ, knowing that this is all Peter is capable of, asks him for friendship.  That is His unconditional love for the imperfect.

With these three questions Peter is, in a certain sense, set free from his three denials.  And to indicate the connection between these two events, John specifies: They saw a charcoal fire there (Greek anthrakia, the only two times this word occurs in the New Testament—Jn.18:18 and 21:9).

–Rev. Bastiaan Baan, Dec. 27, 2020

Be Mindful of the Breaks…

In the Apocalypse, which describes a world in downfall, there are sometimes sudden moments of calm.  A power that is stronger than all destruction brings the storm of annihilation to a standstill.  As a spectator, you have just a moment to catch your breath before the irrevocable demise of the outer world rushes on.  The course of events is literally stopped by a command from on high: “Do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees, until we have set our seal on the foreheads of those who serve our God.” (Rev.7:3)

In an apocalyptic world such as ours, time is compressed—events on the world stage take place at incredible speeds.  And not only on the grand stage—our own lives too are usually breathtaking.

And yet, when you develop a sense organ for the quality of the time, you discover that in the midst of all the rushing and stress life also creates brief breathing spaces.  The trick is to observe these moments consciously, to briefly step out of the maelstrom of time, and to catch your breath before life rushes on again.  At such moments you are, as the painter Picasso once expressed it, “secure in insecurity.”

What or who is it that bestows such moments on us?  Someone who was able to look behind the screen of time, behind the veil of the perishing earth, once expressed it with the words:

“Be mindful of the breaks, the brief moments destiny often unexpectedly bestows on you.  In the same way, the Coming One will also one day come.”  (Friedrich Doldinger)

 

–Rev. Bastiaan Baan, November 22, 2020

 

You Have the Name of Being Alive… (Rev. 3:1)

When we are tired after a busy workday and look back on what we have done, we are likely to feel the heavy burden of all the obligations we had to fulfill.  That is because our pace of life does not allow us to stand still.  We run from one obligation to the next.  And when we are not running, we get left behind by the facts.  Our hectic world cannot be compared with the time when daily life consisted of work and prayer: ora et labora.  When prayer started to disappear from daily life, the motto became: work and relax—in which relaxing usually means: do nothing, do not think, look for recreation.  In our time there is a new, grim perspective: work and burn out.  In a world that roars past at a breathtaking speed we run the risk of being driven on until we fall down.  How can we stand up in such a world?

Sooner or later we will be facing a moment when we realize: this is the last day of my life.  Would we then still think the same way about all the so-called obligations of our existence?

From the perspective of eternity, everything looks different.  Much of what on earth looks necessary becomes insignificant, or even less.  For the spiritual world we humans are like walking dead: “You have the name of being alive, and you are dead.”  For our narrow-minded, utilitarian thinking, to pray or to sit before an altar is a waste of time: we are doing nothing, producing nothing, earning nothing.

But for the spiritual world things are different.  In prayer, at the altar, our mortal existence is called to life.  There Christ invests our perishable being with the white robe of His pure life—that we bury not our eternal being for the sake of our temporal.

 

–Rev. Bastiaan Baan, November 1, 2020.

Looking for a Refuge  (Rev. 12)

A desert is usually a place of loneliness and hardship, a wilderness.  Rarely is there water, rarely a sign of life.  In early Christianity, the so-called desert fathers lived as monks in the desert for many years, sometimes for the rest of their life.  They had to fight a lonely battle with themselves.  The enemy—no robbers and looters, for there was nothing to rob or loot—was the army of demons they were confronted with.

Although in our time we don’t normally live in such lonely places, our cities often have the nature of deserts: a dead world, built up of stone.  In these modern deserts everyone is thrown back onto himself—in our time more than ever.  “Everyone for himself…” is the part of the old saying that we hear around us in every possible version.  Strangely enough the second part of the saying is usually lacking: “…and God for us all.”

There is no other way—we all have to find our own individual path through the desert.  But loneliness is not only inevitable; it is also necessary in order to form a strong, autonomous I.  Our desert is the world in which we live.  The dragon in our desert is the inhumanity with which we are confronted day in day out.  Is there a place of refuge, or do we only have to stand up until we fall?  Can we, like the woman in the desert, develop wings to flee to a safe place?

Our wings are made by the strength of our prayer.  Recently, a well known physician expressed this idea in everyday language with the words: “The most powerful medicine against depression is prayer: it lifts up the soul.”  Indeed, every true prayer, every real meditation, gives wings to the soul, so that we can find a spot where we can take shelter—a spot that was prepared for us by God.

This does not mean that it frees us from the opposing power, on the contrary.  But every true prayer brings us to a place where the Spirit assists us, helping us to remain upright in our lifelong struggle—lonely, but not alone.

 

–Rev. Bastiaan Baan, October 18, 2020