Word of Life

February 2010

 

I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture (Jn 10: 9).

Jesus presents himself as the one who fulfils the divine promises and the expectations of a people whose history is marked by its covenant, which has never been cancelled, with its God.

The idea of the gate is both like and explained clearly by another image that Jesus used: ‘I am the way … no one comes to the Father except through me’ (see Jn 14: 6). Therefore he is truly a path and an open gate leading to the Father, to God himself.

I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture (Jn 10: 9).

What does this Word of Life mean, practically speaking?

There are many things that can be drawn out from other Gospel passages related to these words in John’s gospel. But from among them let’s choose the one about the ‘narrow gate’ we must strive to go through (see Mt 7: 13) to enter into life.

Why choose this one? Because it seems that perhaps it is the closest to the truth Jesus tells us about himself, the one that best throws light on how to live it.

When did Jesus become the gate, flung wide, completely open to the Trinity? In the very moment the gate of heaven seemed shut to him, he became the gate to heaven for all of us.

Jesus forsaken on the cross (see Mk 15: 34 and Mt 27: 46) is the gate through which the perfect exchange between God and humankind takes place. In making himself nothing, Jesus unites the children to the Father. He is that emptiness, the space in the gateway, where human beings come into contact with God and God comes into contact with human beings.

So he is at the same time the narrow gate and the gate flung wide, and we can experience this.

I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture (Jn 10: 9).

In his forsakenness on the cross, Jesus became our access to the Father.

His part has been done. But to have the good that comes from so much grace, we must, each one, do our small part, which means to go up to that gate and pass through it. How?

When we are taken aback by disappointment, damaged by trauma or a misfortune coming out of the blue or an illness that makes no sense, we can always remember the suffering of Jesus. He, in taking on himself all these trials and a thousand others too, is the personification of them all.

Yes, he is present in everything that speaks of suffering. Every suffering of ours bears his name.

So let’s try, then, to recognise Jesus in every hardship, life’s tough situations, in all the darkness, our personal tragedies and those of others, in the sufferings of humanity around us. They are all him, because he has made them his. It’s enough to say to him, with faith, ‘You, Lord, are my only good’ (see Psalm 16 (15): 2). It’s enough to do something practical to lessen ‘his’ sufferings in the poor and the sorrowful, so as to go through the gate and find beyond it a joy never experienced before, a new fullness of life.

 

Chiara Lubich

First published in full as the Word of Life for April 1999

 

                                                                                                 

 

This commentary on a sentence from Scripture suggests ways of
putting the gospel into practice in our daily life

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