Fr. Michael Williams

If we are in possession of something precious, we would only entrust that precious possession to someone we could totally trust.

Jesus entirely entrusted His life to the Father right throughout His earthly pilgrimage. Even in the dark and painful moment of His crucifixion he prayed, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit”. Jesus’ whole life and death was one of entrustment to His Father in Heaven. He knew that God is reliable, and not fickle, unlike human beings. The Father would bring Jesus through death into the New Day of Resurrection life.

Jesus is fully aware that His followers will need the Father’s care and protection, because whilst in the world Jesus needed it. The full force of humanity’s rebellion and sin was thrown at Jesus, culminating in the crucifixion. But God brought Him through that, into the Glorious Day of the Resurrection; the Day of Light. God’s light overcame the world’s darkness, but not without a struggle.

With this in mind, it is no surprise, that towards the end of His earthly mission, Jesus entrusts His disciples, to the care of His Heavenly Father. Jesus prays, “Holy Father, keep those you have given me true to your name”. Jesus knew He was in safe hands with the Father, so He confidently places His disciples (His friends) into the hands of the Father.

Jesus’ prayer to the Father today has three petitions. Firstly, “[To] keep those you have given me true to your name”. Which is related to that third petition, “consecrate them in the truth”. Many people today question the concept of truth. Can we know truth? The answer is that we can know the truth. Truth however ‘is not determined by a majority vote’, as Pope Benedict once said, but it is revealed through Christ, the revelation of God’s truth and love.

Because Jesus has said, “I am the way, the truth and the life”. Jesus leads us to the truth, which is Himself. It is important to remember that the Church, which is the Body of Christ- according to Scripture, contains the truth about the God who “is love”; about faith; and about morals. We know that to be true to God’s name, and His truth, demands sacrifice for us, just as it did for Jesus, and His first disciples. But to depart from the truth is to drift into falsehood, and fall pray to the deceit of “the evil one”, whom Jesus describes as “the Father of lies”.

To accept the love and truth that comes from God is challenged by the world and its spirit. When St John is speaking of the world here, he is talking about that element of the world, that ‘has rebelled against God; has chosen darkness rather than light, and has organised itself to oppose the Creator’ (T. Wright). That is why Jesus says of His followers, who are faithful to truth: “the world hated them”. We often see this hatred for Jesus and His Church, “the bulwark of truth”, manifested through groups and individuals who don’t want to accept the challenging truth that Christ invites us to share in, but which will ultimately lead us to “share the Lord’s joy”. Its important to remember the Lord invites us to accept the truth, but He would never force us, because “God is love”, and love invites, it doesn’t force. The gospel today speaks of the one “who chose to be lost”. God gives all of us a choice. And Jesus, the Son of God, prays to the Father that we make the right choices based on love and truth.