He was not simply a fast runner

27th December 2017

Feast of St John the Evangelist, 

1 Jn 1:1-4; Jn 20:1-8


If in the synoptic gospels, that is in the gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke we find it natural to associate ourselves with St Peter, who no matter how hard he tries, he never manages to get it right, in the gospel of John we find it natural to associate ourselves with that character whom we find mentioned as "the disciple whom Jesus loved," or "the other disciple". Almost all the scholars agree that this character refers to the author himself of the gospel, John the author of the fourth Gospel.

When we are in love we do crazy things. There is an old joke which tells the story of a young cub scout who is in love with a girl. He tells her that he loves her so much that he is ready to do everything for her. He says that he is ready to dive into the sea to save her even if there are dangerous sharks, he will cross a river even though there might be alligators, and he will even wrestle a lion in the jungle to free her if needs be. She is obviously impressed by how much he loves her and therefore asks him to meet the next day at 4pm in the park. "We he tells her, tomorrow at 4pm there is my favourite kids programme on TV. Can we meet up any other time?"

Unfortunately our relationship with Christ can be a bit similar to the love of this young boy for his little girlfriend. We promise him so many things but when it comes to make concrete actions, our love turns our to be lacking. The disciple whom Jesus loved, however, seemed to internalise this love so much that there was no difference between what he said and how he acted. The way he acted mirrored exactly what he said.

We have a perfect example in today's gospel. "The other disciple," we read, meaning the "disciple Jesus loved, "ran faster than Peter and arrived at the tomb first." Why this detail? Some think that the reason behind this is simply that John was more in shape than Peter (he was younger after all) and therefore could run faster. Joking apart, the real reason is obvious: John was taken up with this enthusiasm fueled by his love for Jesus. That is the love that we must have for Jesus. And we can have this love for Jesus only if we are the "disciples that Jesus loved," that is, only insofar as we first accept this love coming from Jesus himself.

This love for John was tangible and concrete, such that he could talk about it to his own community: "what we have seen with our eyes [...] and touched with our hands [...] what we have seen and heard we proclaim to you" (1 Jn 1-4). John is here speaking of the incarnation of God's love. This is what Christmas is all about, the concreteness of God's love for us.

Do I feel the same enthusiasm, the same hurry in my own spiritual journey to meet the Lord in my life?

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