We begin Holy Week with the Anointing at Bethany in John 12. This will be immediately followed by Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem. During the anointing, Jesus rebukes Judas. Could that have been the final resentment that sent Judas to the chief priests? Much is going on in this gospel passage.
Yet, I felt it better to look instead at today’s first reading from Isaiah 42. It is the first of the four Servant Songs of Isaiah that culminate in the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53. The Church has always seen these passages, so familiar to us from the Holy Week liturgy, as direct prophecies of Jesus, especially in his passion. 1Peter 2:24 is a direct quote from Isaiah 53:5, “By his wounds you have been healed.”
Jesus is most assuredly this suffering servant Isaiah prophesied. He is the one who is chosen, a concept shrouded in mystery. The Spirit of God delights in him; the Spirit of God rests on him. He is the one who will bring justice to all the nations and nothing can keep him from this. Yet he is utterly gentle, utterly tender. He will never give offense.
God is the one who sends him. “I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness.” These words refer to all of us.
As we follow Jesus through his passion this Holy Week, we are very conscious of his great suffering. Yet we are also very conscious of the great sufferings of so many throughout the world, especially in Gaza these days, and even of our own sufferings. Jesus has enabled us all to unite our sufferings with his for the salvation of the world if we would but seek to trust only in God as he did.
Then we would hear the Father tell us, as he told his Son on the cross, “New things I now declare; before they spring forth, I tell you of them!” Isaiah 42:9