Reflection for May 18, Thursday of the Sixth Week of Easter: John 16:16-20

Gospel: John 16:16-20

(Jesus said to his disciples) “A little while and you will no longer see me, and again a little while later and you will see me.” So some of his disciples said to one another, “What does this mean that he is saying to us, ‘A little while and you will not see me, and again a little while and you will see me,’ and ‘Because I am going to the Father’?” 

So they said, “What is this ‘little while’ of which he speaks? We do not know what he means.” Jesus knew that they wanted to ask him, so he said to them, “Are you discussing with one another what I said, ‘A little while and you will not see me, and again a little while and you will see me’? Amen, amen, I say to you, you will weep and mourn, while the world rejoices; you will grieve, but your grief will become joy.”

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Reflection:

It’s always heartbreaking when somebody permanently say goodbye to us most especially if they’re very close to us. Tears will flow like a stream and our life will never be the same anymore because a deep void has been created by that person who left us.

Jesus is mysteriously saying His goodbye to the disciples and they could not understand it. They were puzzled and somewhat melancholy. But then Jesus is also saying to them that you will be seeing me soon after also.  

Unlike the permanent goodbye of a friend or relative, Jesus’ goodbye is temporary. He comes back to us the moment we sought Him back again. Actually it’s not Jesus who leaves us; it’s us (by way of our sinfulness) who run away from HIM. This occurs when we purposely forget HIM to embrace sin.

But why do we embrace sin knowing that it will only give us nothing but problems? Perhaps we think that we could escape the consequence of our sins. But it has been proven time and again that we always pay for our sinfulness whomever we are. It may take time but certainly we will pay, there’s no free ride in this world most especially in matters of sin. – Marino J. Dasmarinas