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Christ Himself told us that the things which He does are those things which He has seen in the Father: “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” (John 5:19).

Furthermore, Christ also tells us that He makes manifest to us everything that He has seen in the Father as a proof of His love for and trust towards us: “No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you” (John 15:15). It is not at all a coincidence or foreign to our understanding the fact that these words were relayed to us by John, the one who called himself, “the disciple whom Jesus loved” (cf. John 13:23, 19:26, 20:2, 21:7,20), “[the one] who had leaned on his breast at the supper” (John 21:20). This disciple distinguished himself among the other disciples through his desire to penetrate more deeply into the mystery of Christ, for which reason not only did he not leave Jesus’s side but, by leaning his head on the breast of the Savior, also showed us the way: to desire to enter into the Mystery of Christ’s heart, so much so that we always have our ear pressed against His heart. There is another passage in Holy Scripture which shows us how much John, the beloved disciple, desired this for himself – and not only for himself, but for all other people – namely in Revelation, where we see John overcome with deep sorrow on account of the fact that nobody could have access to the mysteries contained in the Book of Life: “And no one in heaven or on the earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll, or to look at it. So I wept much, because no one was found worthy to open and read the scroll, or to look at it. But one of the elders said to me, “Do not weep. Behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has prevailed to open the scroll and to loose its seven seals” (Revelation 5:3-5).

This attention which John showed us is of urgent necessity for us, for it is the attention which Christ Himself had towards the Father, the one which He places before us as a model and path. We discover, hidden among the verses of the Epistle to the Philippians, the same teaching, followed by the same exhortation from the Holy Apostle Paul: “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross” (Philippians 2:5-8).

It is as though St. Paul exhorts us to take up the work of Christ, as summarized in this Christological hymn from his Epistle to the Philippians. The Son came as a testimony of the love of the Father for us (John 3:16), which renders Christ as the incarnate love of the Father for us. The Son came to bring to us that which He saw in the Father, and the way in which He does this can be contained in a single word: obedience! Therefore, it is not wrong to say that the obedience of Christ is that which He understood from the love of the Father. It is at the same time the guarantee of the identification through love between Him and the Father: “And He who sent Me is with Me. The Father has not left Me alone, for I always do those things that please Him” (John 8:29). If we desire this love, between the Father and the Son, to also be in us, and to also have the living testimony of it within ourselves, there is no other way than obedience: “He who has My commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me. And he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and manifest Myself to him” (John 14:21). (To be continued)

Protos. Hristostom Ciuciu