Click here to read the Sunday readings from the USCCB website. 

The Gospel we just heard has had me a little confused for the last week.  It starts off by saying some Greeks approached Philip “and asked him, “Sir, we would like to see Jesus.””

And then when Philip and Andrew go to tell that to Jesus, “Jesus answered them, 

“The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Amen, amen, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit.”

This “answer” from Jesus just didn’t make any sense. Yet, I knew it was important.  Every word of scripture is important and has some relevance to it, and that is especially true for John when you consider that he says at the end of his Gospel, “But there are also many things that Jesus did; if every one of them were written down, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.” (John 21:25)

From that we should know every story, every sentence, every word has been carefully selected, “written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.” (John 20:31)

So, enter my confusion, what does this mean, how does this answer from Jesus relate to the initial question that the Greeks ask?  

Well, I looked in the commentary of my bible and it says, about verse 24, the one that says “unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit.” The notes in the NAB says, “This verse implies that through his death Jesus will be accessible to all.”

This is understandable on a number of levels.  First, have you ever met the Pope?  I never have either.  But wherever the Pope goes, he is mobbed by people, everyone comes out to see him, but rarely does everyone who wants to talk to him actually get to talk to him, right?

So everyone wanted to talk to Jesus at this point too, three years into his ministry, performing miracles all over the place, but I imagine it was overwhelming, there was no way He could humanly spend time with everyone, but if his human nature was put to death, then He could be with everyone divinely, and He does that through His priests, He does that through being present in the Eucharist.

Jesus is accessible to everyone in the world in this way.  He is always present in the Catholic Church in the tabernacle.  He gives us His body and blood in the Eucharist at every Mass.  He gives us forgiveness through the priest acting in Persona Christi.  

Jesus is present for all of the big events in our Catholic life, Baptisms, Confirmations, Weddings, and even in the bad times, when we are sick or on our deathbed, when the priest anoints in His name.  Jesus is there in a way that he couldn’t have been humanly, He thought of a way to be there for us divinely. 

And on top of that, Jesus told us after the Resurrection but before the Ascension, that He had to go, but that He would send the Holy Spirit, the Advocate, to be with us and to guide us.  In these ways He fulfills His promise to be with us always.

This is the new covenant that was spoken about in the first reading, this is God’s promise to us, that He will always be there for us, and that we will be saved through Jesus.

So that is one sense that Jesus is present to us.  But I wasn’t quite satisfied by that as far as an answer to my original question… the Greeks want to see Jesus now.

Well I came across a story, and it starts with that verse, “Sir, we would like to see Jesus.” (JOHN 12:21)

AN ORPHAN BOY WAS LIVING IN PARIS AT THE END OF WORLD WAR II. All alone, he had to scrounge around the city as best he could to find food, clothes and shelter. Most everyone was experiencing desperation. 

Years before, he had heard someone talk about God and even Jesus. But with the hell on earth that the war had brought into his life, he had long since lost what little faith he had. 

One cold morning, he stopped outside the window of a small bakery. His stomach ached from the smell of the fresh bread. He was so absorbed in the moment outside the bakery window that he didn't realize an American soldier had come up and was watching him. 

He hardly noticed it when the G.I. walked past him into the store. He did, however, notice the large bag the baker was filling for the G.I. with rolls, breads and pastries. And the boy could hardly breathe when the soldier exited the shop, knelt down and handed him the bag. 

He looked at the G.I. with astonishment and gratefulness. Finally, he asked the question that was running through his mind: “Mister, are you Jesus?" 

People today still long to see Jesus. And this is the second sense, and sometimes the more immediate sense for people who wouldn’t dare to darken the doors of a Catholic Church: We are to be Jesus to others. 

So this finally made sense to me.  Jesus was telling them He was out of time, He couldn’t have an audience with the Greeks now because His time had come for His humanity to be put to death, but that they would see Him through the Apostles, through them at that moment. But that also means others with see Jesus through His faithful followers, His disciples, through us for the rest of time. 

In order to do that, we have to also die to ourselves, we need to let go of the control that we seek, we need to surrender to the will of the Father, we need to look not to be served, but to serve others in need.

If we are constantly worried about our own lives, our own comfort, our own control, we won’t be able to see where we can serve others.

As St. Teresa of Calcutta counseled: do small acts of kindness with great love. This is what the world waits to see. We will show them Jesus by our love.