Life with HIM

March 30, 2025 – Fourth Sunday of Lent, Laetare Sunday

Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/033025-YearC.cfm

We hear Jesus proclaims to us, “God so loved the world that he gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal life.” This is to remind us of God’s deep love for us to the point of sacrificing His son, so that we might believe in Him so as we may share sacred lives with Him. Meaning, God suffered a lot for our Faith at the price of His son. He wants us to heed and do those challenging words of believing again & anew in His Son, so that God could always love and forgive us  again & anew. And above all, He challenges us now & always to do this, (why?)… because God wants to share His eternal life with us, His beloved children. God wants us to have Life with Him.

Consider Judas & Peter, as to how and why the sin of Judas is more serious than Peter’s. We come to realize that Judas’ is more serious than Peter’s sin, because Judas did not give the Lord the chance to love and forgive him again & anew, instead he ended his life by killing himself. Yes, Judas repented but he did not believe anymore. Peter on the other hand, yes, have hidden himself… but repented & stayed on until the Lord’s resurrection and got the chance to be forgiven and loved again & anew by the Lord. Peter repented & still believes in God despite what happened. In other words, Judas’ sin is more serious compared to Peter’s because Judas, by committing suicide, did not give the Lord the opportunity, the chance to forgive and love him again. Both may have repented but unlike Judas, Peter believes and remains to have faith in Jesus’ resurrection, in effect, made him experience life – life eternal with God.

So also if & when we still believe despite of what happened to us, we could share in God eternal life through the Lord’s resurrection.

A story also once told that in God’s kingdom when everyone lives blissfully in the everlasting life, Peter finds Jesus standing near the heavenly gate. He goes near Jesus, and said, “Well, everyone is looking for you. How come you are here near the gate?” The Lord replied, “Actually, I’m waiting for someone. I’m waiting for my dear Judas to hopefully come back…. The Lord is thus still & always waiting for our coming home in repentance & faith.

Remember then that God loves us not because and after we have repented and we are forgiven, but rather God forgives us because we are loved beforehand and eternally. As Paul would say of our Lord: “His death is death to sin once for all, his life is life for God. So also, You must consider yourself dead to sin & alive for God in Jesus Christ.”

Like the Father in the Prodigal Son in our gospel today, the Lord Jesus is always waiting for us so that He could always love and forgive us again & anew. So, at this time, as we prepare ourselves to celebrate Easter, by our repentance & faith, like Peter & the prodigal son, let us give God now through Jesus a chance to forgive and love as again and anew, so that we experience eternal life with Him.

With Our Mother of Perpetual Help, may the fruits of our honest repentance, righteous attitude & deeper faith in the Lord be upon us, & so for us to experience & celebrate Easter, as our foretaste of eternal life with God, now & always

So Help us God. So May it be. Amen.