In going through the Gospel of John, I emphasized the idea of Salvation as a mission. Jesus set it into motion, we continue it. As He was sent by the Father, so are we sent by Him. To enable us to carry out this mission faithfully (that is: in the same way He did, with the same spirit, the same love, the same understanding), He promised to send us the Holy Spirit.

This is the last segment of my study on the gospel of John. As the apostle draws close to the end of his narrative he again reminds us that he was an eyewitness to all these events. But more than that, he tells us, as he has told us in diverse ways throughout his gospel, that what he has presented to us is more than enough for the reader to accept it as Truth and believe on Jesus the Messiah.

The day the Universe changed: What happened on Resurrection Sunday cannot be described any other way. Paul tries to explain it to us when He calls Jesus the second Adam. And he does a good job by pointing out the overwhelming difference between the gift of eternal life, that the second Adam brought us, compared to the legacy of wholesale death the first Adam left behind. But even so, I think we don’t always grasp the magnitude of that contrast.

By this time, we are used to the difference between John’s narrative and the other (synoptic) gospels. That difference continues to the crucifixion, where he omits details well attested by the others and instead adds eyewitness testimony as one who saw it all, as it were, from the front row.

We normally think of Jesus’ apprehension and trial as being all about Him. Sure, they were the means for the culmination of His mission. But we can do nothing about it. Jesus submitted Himself to the will of the Father and everything happened as planned. It is unchangeable. What is changeable, in the midst of it all, is us. How do we choose to respond to it?

Holy Week having passed not so long ago, the story of the Passion is still fresh in our minds. Depending on which gospel you read it from, you get different details; so that all the narratives can be woven together into a coherent whole in a Combined Gospel. We continue with John’s eyewitness testimony.