Light Dawning

Jesus’ farewell discourse is nearing its end. The direction and momentum of the Gospel story will soon change. So as these last verses draw threads of the conversation together, a strange symmetry comes into view. The opening part of the discourse was full of the disciples’ questions–“Why? How? Show us! Why?”–and in the course of chapter 16, too, the disciples’ questions are featured on several occasions. Yet now light seems to be dawning. To start with, to “None of you asks me” (5), they are silent, even bemused. Later, some of them start to ask each other about Jesus’ words (17); they are quizzical, questing, and not just quiet. Finally, “Now you are speaking clearly…” (29,30); here, at last, is a surer faith.

Yet even this may not be all that Jesus meant when he spoke of a coming time of plainer and more direct speech (25). Like so much in John’s Gospel (2:22; 12:16), that kind of clarity may only be fully given beyond the cross and resurrection. For when Jesus goes back to the Father, the Paraclete will come as a guide to the truth that Jesus has shared (7,13). That era will bring a new morning of understanding; yet even in the upper room the coming dawn is starting to light the disciples’ mental landscape.

For so long, and in so many ways, Jesus has been difficult to understand. Even his closest friends have found him elusive and enigmatic. Yet like God’s Word that does not return to heaven until it has done its work (Isa. 55:10,11), Jesus, too, goes back to the Father with his work complete. He has revealed the Father through his own faithfulness. He has finished the task he was given to do (17:4; 19:30).

What events have brought new mornings of understanding for you? Do you see anything of your own journey in the questing and questions of Jesus’ disciples?