I want to draw your attention to three aspects of today’s Gospel reading. First: how terrifying it is to hear that this man was in extreme need for 38 years, broken by physical illness, shattered, and that not a single person was found to help him… And what happened to this man is happening now to millions of other people: because we are cold-hearted, because we do not care that others are starving, suffering from illness, in spiritual despair, searching and unable to find their way in life, ultimately unable to find the Living God – because we are so cold, millions of people remain in darkness and cold, in loneliness and horror.
The second aspect of today’s Gospel relates precisely to this: who among us can say that when they desired something, dreamed of something, strove for something, and stood next to another person who was in the same need, but for longer, in the same need, but greater – who among us sacrificed themselves, stepped aside, and said: you go first, you be the first, I will wait… In response to such an act, the Lord could grant a person (each of us, if we could only act this way) such spiritual peace, such light, that would make unnecessary the things we so desperately pursue.
And finally, Christ says to this man: Look, beware, do not sin again, or something worse may happen to you than what you have endured… Sin, of course, is expressed in words, thoughts, actions, and choices; but at its core, sin is a separation from God, because God is, as it were, the key to our wholeness, our integrity. If we detach ourselves from Him, we lose the very possibility of being whole. And we detach ourselves every time we treat another person in a way that the Savior Christ would not. He showed us what it means to be a true human – whole, bearing within oneself Divine peace and Divine glory. He showed us the way; He warned us that what we have not done for any of our neighbors, we have not done for Him; and conversely, if we have done something for our neighbor, we have done it for Him, because when something good is done for a beloved person, the beloved never forgets it.
Let us reflect on what we have just read, on those hints of understanding that I have tried to bring to your awareness. Take them into your consciousness, your heart, your will, and let them blossom into living, creative actions. Amen.
митрополит Антоній Сурожський
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