The God Who Gives Life

by Bill Love

“Get a life!”

Where? How? We all want to know. Young and old, we are knocking ourselves out to get a life. Teenagers and college people have enormous pressures on them. They seem in a terrible rush even though they have most of their lives ahead of them. Yuppies are so busy planning their work and working their plan that they have little time to laugh and relax. Those in mid-life are frantic. It’s not pleasant to stand on a dock with no boat in sight and fear that we’re not early. Too many in retirement have the nagging feeling they have crossed the goal line without the ball.

In his gospel John tells us we don’t “get a life.” Life came to us. We don’t find the logic of it all; the Word or logic of life from the beginning “became flesh and dwelt among us.” Most would not believe, John said. To those who would believe, the Word gave the power to become sons and daughters of God. He gave the same kind of power a baby has to come forth from the womb. Belief allows insemination which produces life.

Believe what? What proofs are there that Jesus was the Word, the logic, the meaning of life?

John tells of seven “signs,” incidents in Jesus’ life which should give us a hint. He turned water into wine at a wedding feast, cured an official’s son at Cana and a paralytic at Bethzatha. He fed thousands with a few loaves and fishes, walked on the water, and cured a blind man in Jerusalem. Most spectacular of all, he raised Lazarus from the dead. These signs should invoke belief and produce life. It didn’t happen. Not until a final sign do we see someone falling on his knees, confessing that the Word had come to give life. When he saw the scars, Thomas said, “My Lord and my God!” The crucified had been raised! The risen had, indeed, suffered! If we can look at the cross and the open tomb and believe, we can receive him into our hearts. We can’t get a life. But we can receive it.