Jebel Musa in the Sinai desert of Egypt is believed to be the biblical Mount Sinai, the mountain on which Moses received the tablets of God’s commandments. To this day pilgrims go up that mountain to pray, to meditate, and to feel God’s abiding presence. Penitent pilgrims used to climb the three thousand steps on foot, and those who had committed grave sins did it on their knees!
Present-day pilgrims leave their hotel rooms shortly after midnight and take a bus that drops them off at the Monastery of Santa Catherina in the area of Mount Horeb. From there they set off on a foot trail, carrying torches or lamps. Some opt to take the camels’ trail. Looking down at certain points of the trail, one sees a curling queue of flickering lights crawling up the mountain. The pilgrims arrive on top of Mount Sinai at break of dawn, when the first rays of the sun dispel the shadows on the folds and creases of the rolling lands. It is quite a sight—magnificent and sublime.
Mount Sinai and the tablets of stones are holy signs for the Jews. The mountain is a colossal reminder that they are a chosen people. It is where a loving God handed down the commandments—prescriptions to help them survive the ordeals of the Promised Land. Like Mount Sinai, the temple is a place where men and women experience the sacred. It is where they offer sacrifices and vows and prayers as prescribed by the Torah of Moses.
In today’s Gospel, when the Jews ask Jesus for a sign of his authority, he tells them to destroy the temple and he will raise it up in three days. On hearing this, many are confused. They ask themselves how a temple that took all of forty-six years to build could be rebuilt in three days. But Jesus is speaking of his own paschal sacrifice when he chooses to lay down his life for his friends (Jn 15:13). By this people will know how much God loves us.
Mount Sinai, the Torah (Law), and the temple all tell of the divine presence. But these are accessible mainly to priests. Now Jesus through his witnessing brings God nearer to us. Through Jesus’ ministry that embraces the outcast and the downtrodden, people see the sign-ificant ways and marvel-ous deeds of God. And so, “while he was in Jerusalem for the feast of Passover, many began to believe in his name when they saw the signs he was doing” (Jn 2:23).
In this period of intense preparation for the celebration of the paschal mystery, let the words of the apostle Paul remind us that Christ crucified is a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God (1 Cor 1:22, Second Reading). The crucifixion shows how death can make others live; how embracing suffering to follow God’s will leads to eternal joy!
Jesus is the power and the wisdom of God. The ways of Jesus are those of God. We feel the presence of God on the mountain, in the chapel, at the break of dawn. But more than these, Jesus’ presence speaks to us of a loving and caring God.