“A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me, because I go to the Father…”
If we are blessed to avoid sudden death, one day we shall yet all lay a-dying. Over the years I have been with many of my parishioners in their last days and last hours of this mortal life and I have never had one request that I read from the works of Aristotle or Socrates or the Constitution. But I have frequently read from the Bible, the Psalter and the Book of Common Prayer and I have habitually recited passages from the Fourth Gospel – all to their comfort, the comfort of their loved ones and my own comfort. Today we open up one of those sections of Scripture that has brought comfort to the dying, the dispossessed and the bereaved. From today till Trinity all the Gospels are taken from what is call The Farewell Discourse. It begins in the 13th Chapter of John, verse 31:
“Therefore when Judas had gone out, Jesus said, Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him.”
The 18th Chapter of John, verse 1 marks the end of The Last Discourse:
“When Jesus had spoken these words, he went forth with his disciples over the brook, where was a garden, into the which he entered and his disciples. Judas also knew the place.”
These are well known scriptures – some meant to comfort the disciples, some meant to instruct, and the whole of Chapter 17 is Jesus’ prayer to the Father which both comforts and instructs. So remember this setting: Our Lord had celebrated his last Passover with his disciples, he has instituted the Holy Communion, Judas has left the well-lit room and entered the dark night deliberately to betray Jesus. At the beginning of the evening the disciples were happy because they were celebrating Passover with Jesus; but as soon as Judas left, Jesus’ tone changed. The disciples became confused and a deep pall of sadness fell over the room.
“A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me, because I go to the Father…”
The disciples responded like any of us would have: “What is he saying to us, A little while and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me…”
Our first impulse is probably to understand it this way: Soon Jesus will die and so they will not see him. But in a little while they will see him because he will rise from the dead. This is certainly true. This is exactly the experience that was upon them at that very moment. But I want to suggest that the Church has, rightly, taken these troubling words of our Lord as words of comfort that go beyond the immediate experience of the disciples.
“A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me, because I go to the Father…”
The disciples could not possibly understand what Jesus was talking about. It would have been futile for him to go to greater lengths to explain what he meant. They had no categories nor did they have any real life experiences to help them make sense of what Jesus was saying. But after his Resurrection and his Ascension and the pouring out of the Holy Spirit, the meaning lit up for the Church. These words point to our common destiny. Yes, these words do refer to his death and resurrection; and later on this promise brought consolation, reassurance and cheer to the Church. So this enigmatic saying is a reference to his death and resurrection, it is also a reference to the descent of the Holy Spirit and it also refers to the Last Day, the Last Hour, and the Second Coming of our Lord. Those disciples gathered around him in the Upper Room did see him after his Resurrection. With the gift of the Holy Spirit we do “see” Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar. But there is another “seeing” that is yet to be.
Before I go any further let me say something about the word “comfort.” The word “comfort” as it is used in the Book of Common Prayer and in the older translation of the Scriptures is, ironically, obsolete today. Today we shorten the word comfort to comfy. It commonly means ease or warmth, or to console or to cheer up. But when used in the BCP or the Bible it means to “instill courage” or “to bind with strength.” The Comfortable Words in the Mass are meant to make you stronger. The words of Christ in the Farewell Discourse over the years has given folk fortitude; in our hour of darkness these words are meant fortify us, to build us up.
“And ye now therefore have sorrow: but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you.”
But sorrow has not vanished from the human family. It has not vanished from my family or your family. Sorrow has not vanished from the life of the Church. No, our sorrow is not the hopeless, nihilistic grief of the world. But we still experience profound trouble and bereavement. And yet, Jesus has promised us a joy that will overwhelm any malignant power that comes against us. This is a future joy. It is our common destiny.
“I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you.”
Even in light of “seeing him” at his Resurrection, even in light of “seeing him” in the descent of the Holy Spirit and the gift of the Church and the Sacraments, there is an even greater “seeing” that will come. It will be the permanent and final presence of Christ. And as needful, glorious and wonderful as the Holy Communion is for us now, in that great “seeing,” when we behold the man, nothing will match his splendor! On that day he will wipe the tears from your eyes and you will know a joy that you cannot possibly understand today. This puts you in the very position of those disciples gathered around his Passover table on the night he was betrayed. This is a joy that surpasses our understanding. But it will be fully realized at our Lord’s Second Coming.
“Verily, verily, I say unto you, That ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice: and ye shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come: but as soon as she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world.”
This is what is sometimes referred to as the Messianic Travail. The solemnity, the heaviness in the room at that moment is appropriate. Though they hardly understood all he said, the tone of sorrow, trouble, and distress is fully understandable.
The image of the woman in birth pangs is a reference to the free-will suffering of the Good Shepherd for the life of the world – and more. The hour of Jesus’ glory was the Cross. The hour of the woman is the time of her delivery. The birth of a child brought a woman close to death. Childbearing in antiquity “did not have the benefits of modern means to reduce pain, and a mother’s pain became proverbial for great travail.” The woman’s hour, her birth pangs in the Old Testament and the New Testament came to be associated with the last hour of this world as the new world order of God’s kingdom would be realized in the God’s victory. It is Christ’s revelation that God’s victory is final with Jesus Cross and his victory will be visible with his resurrection and his second advent. Jesus’ choice of the woman in childbirth is intentional.
And don’t forget the first day of his resurrection. The risen Christ opened up Old Testament for the Emmaus disciples on the first day of his resurrection when he said:
“’O foolish men, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?’ And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.”
It is the parable of the woman in childbirth that would lead the disciples back to Genesis 3:14-16 where God declared that the woman will suffer birth pangs in childbearing, but he also promises that the woman will bring forth a child who would crush the head of the serpent, though the serpent bruise his heel.
Again in Isaiah 26:17:
“Like as a woman with child, who writhes and cries out in her pangs, when she is near her time, so were we because of thee, O Lord…”
“Thy dead shall live, their bodies shall rise. O dwellers in the dust, awake and sing for joy!”
“Come, my people, enter your chambers, and shut your doors behind you; hide yourselves for a little while until the wrath is past.”
The woman in childbirth points to the suffering Messiah, the victory of Christ over death and sin and the new order that God will bring upon the world with the second advent.
Later on St. John the Divine would see terrible things and record them in the Revelation:
“A great portent appeared in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun… she was with child and she cried out in her pangs of birth, in anguish for delivery. And another portent appeared in heaven; behold a great red dragon… stood before the woman who about to bear a child, that he might devour her child when she brought it forth…”
The child here is sometimes interpreted to be Jesus, and sometimes interpreted to be children of God. The woman is sometimes understood as the Blessed Virgin Mary and sometimes understood as Holy Mother Church. In any case the red dragon is destroyed and the Woman and Child are saved. So as you can see, our Lord’s use of image of the woman in childbirth is not merely an accurate image, it is loaded up from Genesis to Revelation with the suffering of the Messiah and the victory of God. And something else as well, just as the woman in childbirth gives birth as she enters her travail, so our Lord Jesus Christ, as he enters his travail upon the Cross gives birth to the people of God. Jesus’ disciples may be “born from above” because of the birth pangs of the Cross. And just as birth pangs are temporary and finally issue in a longer lasting joy; so we, the children of God, receive a joy that no one can take from us.
