6th Monday of Easter
11 May 2026
So that you may not fall away
In the Gospel today, Jesus says something very honest to the apostles: “I have told you this so that you may not fall away.” That line reveals something important about the Christian life. Jesus knows falling away is possible. He knows discouragement is possible. He knows fear, confusion, and pressure can shake even those who have walked closely with Him. And so, in the Farewell Discourse, He is preparing the apostles not simply for success, but for perseverance.
Remember the setting. We are still in the Upper Room on the night before the Passion. Jesus has washed their feet. He has instituted the Eucharist. He has promised the Holy Spirit. And now, as the Cross approaches, His words become increasingly direct: “They will expel you from the synagogues… everyone who kills you will think he is offering worship to God.”
Jesus is not hiding the cost of discipleship.
But notice what He is doing. He is telling them beforehand, “So that you may not fall away.” In other words, when suffering comes, they are not to interpret it as proof that Jesus abandoned them. They are to remember that He already told them this would happen. The trial itself becomes confirmation that they are still walking the path He laid out before them.
Now hold that alongside the first reading. Paul and his companions arrive at Philippi. They go outside the city gates to the river, where people gathered for prayer, and they begin speaking to the women assembled there. And then we hear about Lydia: “The Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what Paul was saying.”
That phrase is striking. Paul speaks, but it is the Lord who opens the heart. The Gospel is not merely information being transmitted. God Himself is acting interiorly.
And notice the result. Lydia is baptized, along with her household, and immediately her life changes. She urges Paul and his companions to stay with her. Her home becomes a place of welcome and hospitality for the Church. The Gospel takes root not abstractly, but concretely… in a household, in relationships, in the life of a community.
That is important because the Ascension of Christ is approaching. Throughout the readings last and this week, we can feel the movement building toward it. Jesus is preparing the apostles for a new mode of His presence. He will no longer remain visibly with them in the same way. Instead, the Church will live by the power of the Holy Spirit.
And that transition creates a real temptation: to fall away when Christ is no longer physically seen.
That is why Jesus speaks so much about the Advocate in these chapters. “When the Advocate comes… he will testify to me. And you also testify.” The Holy Spirit is not replacing Christ; He is making Christ present and active in the life of the Church after the Ascension.
The temptation to fall away rarely begins with open rejection. More often it begins with discouragement, confusion, disappointment, or exhaustion. We encounter suffering, opposition, unanswered prayers, scandals, struggles within ourselves, and we begin to wonder whether remaining faithful is worth it.
Jesus knows that temptation.
And instead of pretending it won’t happen, He prepares His disciples for it. He tells them the truth ahead of time so they can endure when the trial arrives. And then He gives them what they need to remain faithful: the Holy Spirit, the life of the Church, the sacraments, the communion of believers.
Look again at Lydia. The Lord opens her heart, but her faith immediately becomes ecclesial and sacramental. Baptism. Hospitality. Communion. Her conversion is not isolated spirituality. She is incorporated into the life of the Church.
That’s how Christians persevere.
Not alone.
But through the grace of the Holy Spirit working through the Church Christ established.
And this becomes the question for us today: when difficulty comes, what keeps us from falling away? Is our faith rooted only in emotion or circumstance? Or is it rooted in the deeper life Christ has given through His Church, His Word, His sacraments, and His Spirit?
Because Jesus is preparing His disciples for His Ascension, but He is not abandoning them. In fact, He is preparing them to become stronger than they were before, because now His life will dwell within them through the Holy Spirit.
And that same promise remains for us.
Christ knows the temptation to fall away.
And He has already given us what we need to remain.