When people get us riled up, even, and perhaps especially when they’re right, we tend to look for ways to write them off. One way we can do that is to comment on where they are from. We reason that nothing good can come from someone from that neighborhood, that city, that side of the tracks.
The people of Jerusalem see Jesus walking about openly, and they look down on him. “But we know where he is from.” Kind of like, we know where he was born, so why should we think he is the promised Messiah? Jesus sets them right: he is “from” God the Father, who sent him into the world. That’s his true home, and because that’s his true home, he can offer the Father’s forgiveness, the Father’s mercy, the Father’s love.
The people’s attempt to write Jesus off because they knew where he was from was their attempt to deal with the change of life he called people to. Yes, he offered the Father’s love and mercy, but he also called them to change their lives, to live the right way, so they could live forever in the kingdom. That’s real love and mercy there: calling people back to the way that leads to heaven. But people don’t like to change, so they scoff at where he’s from.
In our first reading today, a group of wicked people do the same kind of thing. They say, “Let us beset the just one, because he is obnoxious to us, he sets himself against our doings, Reproaches us for transgressions of the law and charges us with violations of our training.” They don’t like that the “just one” professes to be a child of God. But he is. In fact, even though this is the Old Testament and the book of Wisdom didn’t specifically speak of Jesus, it is, in fact, talking about Jesus. Jesus is the just one, the Son of God, who calls us to turn around from what we are doing and turn toward the way that leads to heaven, that leads to life.
So that’s what our readings are calling us to do today. It’s a great message for Lent, because Lent is about repentance, about “turning around” and walking in the way that leads to eternal life. We all want to end up in heaven. Lent, and today’s readings, show us the way to get there: we just have to follow Jesus, and do what he tells us, even if what he asks us to do isn’t easy.