Readings:
Isaiah 65:17-21; Psalm 30; John 4:43-54

Thus says the Lord: Now I create new heavens and a new earth, and the past will not be remembered… Be glad and rejoice forever and ever for what I am creating, because I now create Jerusalem ‘Joy’ and her people ‘Gladness’. I shall rejoice over Jerusalem and exult in my people.
Isaiah 65:17-19

Jesus went again to Cana in Galilee… Now there was a court official there whose son was ill at Capernaum and, hearing that Jesus had arrived in Galilee from Judaea, he went and asked him to come and cure his son as he was at the point of death… ‘Go home,’ said Jesus, ‘your son will live.’ The man believed what Jesus had said and started on his way; and while he was still on the journey back his servants met him with the news that his boy was alive. He asked them when the boy had begun to recover. ‘The fever left him yesterday’, they said, ‘at the seventh hour’. The father realised that this was exactly the time when Jesus had said, ‘Your son will live’; and he and all his household believed. This was the second sign given by Jesus..
John 4:46, 47, 50-54

This miracle is performed at the request of a court official, probably a pagan, on behalf of his son. The official trusts Jesus, and at the moment he does so, his son recovers, and later the whole household comes to believe. The miracle is a sign of Jesus’ power over sickness and death, a power which he exercises on request, here at the request of a pagan. Jesus demands faith of the official, but not of his son, whom he cures at his father’s request. The official’s faith affects his whole household.

We read the Gospels in order to put us in touch with God now. The value of imaginative contemplation, imagining the scene is happening now and that we are not simply spectators, but active participants in it, is in imagination’s power to put us in touch with the reality in which we live.

The God who held Jesus in being, and who healed people through him, is the God now holding you and me in being. God wants our health and healing even more than we do. If we assent to this truth with our heads only, we are unlikely to experience healing. If we can imagine Jesus before us, as in this scene, and present ourselves and our needs to him, we are more likely to break through to the reality of God’s healing powers enveloping us. Trust opens us to these healing powers. That is why Jesus keeps on saying ‘Your faith has saved you, go in peace.’

In this miracle, the healing comes to the son through the intercession of the father. We pray for our own healing, but we should also pray for the gift of healing. We think of healing as a very rare and spectacular kind of gift, granted to a few chosen people. While it is true that some people have remarkable and rare kinds of healing gift, every Christian must be called to be a healer in some way, for the life of Christ is a healing life. Being a good listener, being patient, tolerant, having a sense of humour, being efficient, being interested, being willing to waste time with people, these are just a few of the many ways we can be healers to one another.

Our own struggles towards inner peace and harmony are never a purely private concern, although they may seem to be so. In life we are all exposed to destructive forces and we can react to them in different ways. We can absorb them, intensify the destructiveness in our own inner heart and send them out with more destructive power than before, or we can absorb the violence, as Jesus did, transform it within and return it in the form of forgiveness, blessing, and kindness. An inner act of pure love is more effective and creative than any amount of external activity. When the final judgment comes, I am sure we shall all be surprised when we discover who the real heroes and heroines of the world have been, who sustained it and saved it from destruction. They will probably be very obscure, unknown people of healing hearts, who absorbed bitterness, violence, and disillusionment, but transformed them in their hearts and generated a spirit of forgiveness, gentleness and hope.

Prayer
Lord, deepen our trust in the healing power of your Spirit working within us and through us, absorbing the violence and hatred and transforming it into mercy and love towards ourselves and towards others. We ask you this through Jesus Christ, our Lord.
Amen

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