Reason For Your Hope
SIXTH SUNDAY OF EASTER
Theme: Communion, Commandments, Creation
Today is the Sixth Sunday of Easter. We are nearing the end of the Easter season, and our readings for today instill in us the spirit in which we are about to live as children of God. Let us focus this Sunday’s meditation on the Advocate that the Lord is about to give to us as a sign that He will always be with us. As children of God, we must trust the Advocate, who will guide us to the green pastures that the Lord was talking about last Sunday. Let us consider three themes to reflect upon in the Advocate: Communion, Commandment, and Creation.
The first theme is that communion with the Holy Spirit makes us one with the Church, which is Christ as our Head and the faithful as the mystical body of Christ. On the first reading, St. Peter says, "Always be ready to give an explanation to anyone who asks you for a reason for your hope." This implies that we must be people of hope and that we are ready to give our reasons for hope. This requires prayer and discovery; in prayer, we are about to discover the motive of faith life. In prayer, let us allow the spirit to move us and inspire us to seek and know the reason for our hope. Our hope is based on God the Father’s providential love. In prayer, we can experience His provincial love; in our daily experiences in life, with the people we meet, we can see and feel the providential love of God. Knowing the providential love of God, we are able to commune with God, and this communion pertains first of all to God’s Trinitarian life, His presence, and being one with God.
The second theme is the commandment that has been given to us. In the gospel, we read, "Whoever has my commandments and observes them is the one who loves me." The first thing that we can learn from what Jesus said is that obedience is an act of love. As humans, weak and prideful as we are, being obedient is very hard. We don’t want to be like a robot who is always a follower. We want to do it in our own way, not others' way, not even God's way. But then again, we realize that in obedience, we found unity. When we are doing things our own way, sometimes it can lead us astray; we stumble and get lost. Yet obedience can also be a way to deceive. We sometimes hear someone in authority asking you to do bad and immoral things that can hurt others, which is wrong. We must keep in mind that obedience must be decisive; you must know what to do and not do. In relation to our hope, we obey God’s commands because we hope for something that others don’t have: hope for salvation. That is why we need the Holy Spirit, who will help us live and defend our faith and ultimately live in union with God.
The third theme is the new creation. The moment we are baptized, the Holy Spirit makes us a new creation. Being born again as a child of God, we become a part of God's family. Before we were baptized, we were orphans, but at the moment we were baptized, we lived and revealed our identity before God and the whole world: that you and I are with God and we are of God. He will not leave us orphans because He gives us His Spirit, who is always renewing our identity and mission to live in the world. After all our journeys, we come to an end. As we faithfully follow the will of God, we hope for heaven, which is the state of perfect friendship that fulfills our deepest needs and desires as social beings. This is the goal of the Holy Spirit: He sanctifies us and leads us to the way to heaven if and only if we cooperate with His movements and His grace.
As we nourish the joy of the Easter season, let us immerse ourselves in the grace and inspiration of the Holy Spirit, who gives us the grace to keep in communion with the Church, helps us to follow the commands of the Lord, and keeps the creation ever new and living. Let us say with David in the Psalm, "Let all the earth cry out to God with joy."
