In the Gospel reading, in the days leading up to His death, Jesus realizes the hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. It appears He's not answering the request from some Greeks who want to see Him, an element to the story that has some manner of humor to it, yet is another example of how Jesus looks beyond the circumstances at hand to a greater truth, in this case, His purpose for coming to Eaerth. He then expresses that He is troubled by what is soon to take place. But then He acknowledges that it is for this purpose that He has come to this hour to experience suffering and death, which will give way to New Life, so that the Father may be glorified. Indeed, God worked in the midst of the Son's sufferings, as Hebrews writes, so that He would become the Source of Salvation and Eternal Life for all.
As people of faith joined with Christ in baptism, we share in the death of Christ so we may enter into His New Life.
So throughout our lives, especially in Lent, we are called to experience death to what is not leading us closer to God, and so rise into new Life, restored to living in accordance with the purpose that God created us. That is the great value of the New Covenant. The Old Covenant, written on tablets of stone, was unable to penetrate beyond the exterior into the interior of our beings and our hearts. The New Covenant, effected in Christ, penetrates deep to transform us inwardly, so that death may lead to new life. And it happens because, through Christ, God has forgiven our sins so we can live fully in this new life. With new hearts oriented toward God, our lives become a matter of various instances of dying, which is not the end of the story, because we also experience moments of Resurrection.
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