As the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself, and has given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man

 Then Jesus answered and said to them, "Most assuredly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do; for whatever He does, the Son also does in like manner.  For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself does; and He will show Him greater works than these, that you may marvel.  For as the Father raises the dead and gives life to them, even so the Son gives life to whom He will.  For the Father judges no one, but has committed all judgment to the Son, that all should honor the Son just as they honor the Father.  He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him.  Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life.

"Most assuredly, I say to you, the hour is coming, and now is, then the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God; and those who hear will live.  For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself, and has given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man.  Do not marvel at this; for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear His voice and come forth -- those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation."

- John 5:19-29

Yesterday we read that there was a feast of the Jews (this is the Feast of Weeks, or the Jewish Pentecost - a celebration of the giving of the Law), and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.  Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, which is called in Hebrew, Bethesda, having five porches.  In these lay a great multitude of sick people, blind, lame, paralyzed, waiting for the moving of the water.  For an angel went down at a certain time into the pool and stirred up the water; then whoever stepped in first, after the stirring of the water, was made well of whatever disease he had.  Now a certain man was there who had an infirmity thirty-eight years.  When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he already had been in that condition a long time, He said to him, "Do you want to be made well?"  The sick man answered Him, "Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; but while I am coming, another steps down before me."  Jesus said to him, "Rise, take up your bed and walk."  And immediately the man was made well, took up his bed, and walked.   And that day was the Sabbath.  The Jews therefore said to him who was cured, "It is the Sabbath; it is not lawful for you to carry your bed."  He answered them, "He who made me well said to him, 'Take up your bed and walk.'"  Then they asked him, "Who is the Man who said to you, 'Take up your bed and walk'?"  But the one who was healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had withdrawn, a multitude being in that place.  Afterward Jesus found him in the temple, and said to him, "See, you have been made well.  Sin no more, lest a worse thing come upon you."   The man departed and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well.  For this reason the Jews persecuted Jesus, and sought to kill Him, because He had done these things on the Sabbath.  But Jesus answered them, "My Father has been working until now, and I have been working."   Therefore the Jews sought all the more to kill Him, because He not only broke the Sabbath, but also said that God was His Father, making Himself equal with God. 

Then Jesus answered and said to them, "Most assuredly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do; for whatever He does, the Son also does in like manner.  For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself does; and He will show Him greater works than these, that you may marvel.  For as the Father raises the dead and gives life to them, even so the Son gives life to whom He will.  For the Father judges no one, but has committed all judgment to the Son, that all should honor the Son just as they honor the Father.  He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him.  Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life."  Jesus does not deny His equality to the Father, but rather amplifies and affirms what He has just said (in yesterday's reading, above) in saying, "My Father has been working until now, and I have been working."  That the Son can do nothing of Himself tells us that His every act and word is in complete unity with the Father and the Holy Spirit.  My study bible tells us that this discourse reveals that the Father and the Son are completely united in nature, will, and action.  Therefore, the Son fully shares the divine attributes of both giving life and executing judgment.  The judgment of Christ is based both on faith and works, as we discern from Jesus' words in today's reading.

"Most assuredly, I say to you, the hour is coming, and now is, then the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God; and those who hear will live.  For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself, and has given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man.  Do not marvel at this; for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear His voice and come forth -- those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation."  My study bible tells us that the dead here refers both to the spiritually dead, who will find life in Christ, as to the physically dead, who will rise in the general resurrection.  The fact of this resurrection is confirmed in the raising of Lazarus (John 11:38-44) before Jesus goes to His own death.

John the Evangelist is also known as John the Theologian.  In today's reading, we see some of the reasons why.  What is affirmed and understood, or perhaps hinted at, through the actions recorded in what are called the synoptic Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, is clearly explained here.    Jesus affirms boldly the reality that is the relationship of Father and Son.  The power of the Father has been given to the Son in giving life itself, and in Judgment.  It is explicitly understood here that faith in the Son must also convey faith in the Father.  The two are so linked as to be inseparable.  Later on in John's Gospel, Jesus will say, "He who sees Me sees Him who sent Me" (12:45).  Jesus' mission into the world is not simply to tell the world about the Son.  Rather it is to build faith in the Father, in the One who has sent Him, because we come to know the Son.   We cannot know the One without coming to know the Other.  We cannot reject the One without rejecting the Other.  This powerful expression and experience of communion will go through the whole Church, will be taught and extended as well to the Holy Spirit, will exist through the communion of saints.  Jesus gives us a picture of this communion in other Gospels as well, such as when He teaches, "Take heed that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I say to you that in heaven their angels always see the face of My Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 18:10).   In that context, He's speaking to the disciples about the lost sheep they must gather, and about the "little ones" and their treatment.  But He's also clearly expressing the communion we come to understand in the theology John explicitly records for us.  Jesus' words give us the understanding and depth to come to know His mission more truly as one which brings us not only communion with the Father, but a communion also through the Holy Spirit and through those who are related by faith, so to speak.  Jesus speaks of life and death -- the power of life and resurrection, and the power of Judgment.  These things run so deeply in tune with our faith and choices in life (both faith and works, as Jesus addresses above) as to confer identity in ways that the "worldly" cannot, even to the point of subsuming relations of kinship.  In Luke's Gospel, Jesus hints at Judgment when He says, "I came to send fire on the earth" (12:49).  He extends this to our deepest relationships when He finishes this passage by saying, "For from now on five in one house will be divided: three against two, and two against three.  Father will be divided against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law" (see Luke 12:49-53).   We may take this passage to mean that we are merely divided by ideas or faith in certain concepts, but Jesus does not speak of such light things as communion; He's teaching about something much deeper than that.  St. Paul gets more explicit when he writes that "the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart" (Hebrews 4:12).  That which unites Father and Son (and Spirit), unites a communion of all the saints, which confers upon us adoption, which even (in the words of St. Paul) pierces the division of soul and spirit, extends more deeply than anything else we know.  It confers an identity more solid and impenetrable than our very DNA can give us.  This union of faith is powerful enough that Jesus can say at Peter's confession, "I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it" (Matthew 16:18).  We are mistaken if we think that this statement is only about Peter, and not about the bond of faith in each of us.  That which even the gates of Hades cannot penetrate is more solid than anything we know, unbreakable, a bond that surpasses all others.  In this we must pause to think about what our faith really does for us, means for us, and how deeply the bond goes in us to the Son and the Father.  We must take Jesus' words to heart, and understand how deeply they penetrate the reality of who we truly are.