The Final Stretch

Preparing to following Jesus to death and resurrection

04/13/2025

John 11:45-56 Many of the Jews who had come to Mary and seen what Jesus had done began to believe in him. But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. So the chief priests and the Pharisees convened the Sanhedrin and said, “What are we going to do? This man is performing many signs. If we leave him alone, all will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our land and our nation.” But one of them, Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said to them, “You know nothing, nor do you consider that it is better for you that one man should die instead of the people, so that the whole nation may not perish.” He did not say this on his own, but since he was high priest for that year, he prophesied that Jesus was going to die for the nation, and not only for the nation, but also to gather into one the dispersed children of God. So from that day on they planned to kill him.

Today we stand on the threshold of the last week of Lent, also known as Holy Week. Or, in horseracing, it would be called “the final stretch.” And so now is not the time to slack off but rather to raise our game another notch, like thoroughbred and jockey who give it their all as they come around the final bend of the track. So let me ask you: how are you doing on your Lenten sacrifices?

Maybe you planned on giving up alcohol or social media, or video games, or sacrificing time by an extra Mass during the week, or giving up treasure by helping the poor more. If you have been giving in (rather than giving up) to these temptations, now would be a good time to buckle down and at least finish strong. I love to encourage people by saying: “It’s never too late to hit the reset button on our faith”, and that goes for Lent, too.

Here is a thought to help you finish strong this last week of Lent: whenever we give up something for God, he always gives us something far greater in return. God is never out-done in generosity. For example, in return from my Lenten sacrifices this year – and I’m not going to tell you what they were because that silence is part of the sacrifice – I have dedicated time to teaching Pope St. John Paul II’s Theology of the Body, and I have fallen in love with this teaching.

In other words, a new love has expelled my old loves for those Lenten sacrifices. And our hearts – what we love – is really what needs to change every Lent. If we can trust Jesus enough to let go of the old loves – our attachments to worldly pleasures, thrills, and reputation – Jesus will fill our hearts to overflowing with a new love, namely, an infinite love for him.

In the gospel today, Jesus invites the Jewish leaders to finish strong in their last week of Lent, too. That is, our Lord asks them to give up something their sinful hearts are attached to in order to give them in exchange something infinitely greater and more glorious, namely, himself. What was the sacrifice – the inordinate love – of the chief priests and Pharisees?

They themselves confess it but do not see it as sinful: “If we leave him alone, all will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our land and our nation.” In other words, the Jews were too attached to the land and their ethnic identity to see their own Messiah when he came. Could we not say that in many ways the Jews today are still overly attached to their land and nation?

But I do not just want to pick on the Jews this morning, I want to pick on everybody! That is, the Jews in Jesus’ day are only Exhibit A of what we all deal with in various other ways. Just like the Jews, we, too, are afraid that Jesus will ask too great a sacrifice from us, an attachment our hearts really do not want to relinquish. But also like the Jews, we forget Jesus will give us something far greater and more glorious than our sacrifices, namely, himself.

You see, what is really at the heart of Lent is actually our hearts. We all find ourselves attached to people or possessions or personal attributes more than we are attached to Jesus, just like the Jews were excessively attached to their land and nation. And that inordinate love is what we must crucify every Lent. Why? Well, because if we do not crucify our sins, we will end up crucifying our Lord again, just like the Jews did.

And by the way, I learned this by studying John Paul II’s Theology of the Body, namely, not only Lent but all of life is about the heart-work of learning to love the Lord more than we love other persons, places, or things. Why is the heart work so critical? Because our hearts are the only things in the universe that Jesus does not already possess. Everything else already belongs to him. And we can either freely give Jesus our hearts, or we can withhold it from him. That is the purpose of Lent and of life.

Praised be Jesus Christ!