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"Come And See Jesus"
Lent 5 March 29, 2009 John 12:20-33 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ! Can’t you just picture the scene? John the Baptist standing with two of his disciples. Seeing Jesus walk by, he says: “Look, here is the Lamb of God.” His disciples, upon hearing this, followed Jesus. Jesus asks them what they are looking for, and they ask him where he is staying. Jesus responds with: “Come and see.” An invitation to discipleship, if ever there was one. One of those two disciples is Andrew, who then goes and gets his brother Simon, named Peter, by Jesus. The next day, Jesus sees Philip and says to him: “Follow me.” Another invitation to discipleship. And Philip, seeing his friend Nathanael under a tree, tells him that “We have found him about whom Moses in the law, and also the prophets wrote, Jesus son of Joseph from Nazareth.” Nathanael responds with “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Philip replies “Come and see.” Now fast-forward three years. It’s the festival of Passover and some Greeks see Philip. Now we don’t know that they were actually Greek, or that they even spoke Greek. They could have just as easily been called Gentiles, or even foreigners. They came to worship in the “Court of Gentiles” which Jesus has cleared of money-changers, cows and sheep, and those who sell doves. I suppose calling them “Greeks” is a polite way of saying “people who are not like us. Oh sure, they worship our God, but they haven’t become Jewish, they haven’t taken that final step yet, and they might not.” They approach Philip and say to him: “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” You would think that Philip would immediately take them to Jesus, but instead he goes to Andrew, and the two of them tell Jesus. And Jesus does the unexpected. He tells them that “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly,” Jesus says, “I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” It’s as though the request of the Greeks has changed the parameters, suddenly the hour, which up to this point had been in the future, has come. And we hear nothing more about the Greeks who had wished to see Jesus. But Jesus, referring to himself as a grain of wheat, knowing he will be lifted up on a cross, knowing that his death and resurrection will generate a plentiful harvest, continues: “Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.” Now here it’s tempting to look at this as an absolute but you need to know that “hate” as it is used here is a Semitic idiom, and that it means to love less, or to prefer something else more. What Jesus is saying has a direct bearing on your life – to love money, stuff, power, more than God is to “hate” God. If you love life more than you love God, then you will lose your life. Remember what we are commanded? We are to love God with heart and soul and all our might, we are to love our neighbors as ourselves, in other words we are to love the abundant life we have in Christ Jesus, and hate the abundant life of “stuff.” If we serve Jesus then we are to follow him, we are to die, in our case to die to self, to die to our love of life other than that which is lived in Christ. We are to put others, their needs, ahead of ourselves and our wants. “Self” must be displaced by another, our focus is to be on Christ. Now you know that when someone walks into our narthex, into our sanctuary, for whatever reason, perhaps to hear fine preaching, good music, participate in worship, enjoy fellowship, what is really happening is that they/he/she want to see Jesus. If you’re having coffee with someone down the street, or talking to your neighbor, or with someone you work with, and they ask about this church, services, times, they are asking to see Jesus. All around us are people who want to see Jesus! Which brings me to the question: do people see Jesus in us? Do people see Jesus in you? Do they see the healer who brought sight, hearing, mobility to those in need? Do they see the servant who washed the feet of his disciples? Do they see the Jesus who said to Martha of her sister, “Mary has chosen the better part which will not be taken away from her?” Do they see the Jesus who asked the Samaritan woman for water, and gave her living water? When people look at you, do they see you sitting at Jesus’ feet? Do they know that you have let Jesus heal you? Do you partake in his body and blood? Do you stand or kneel at the foot of the cross? Brothers and sisters, we need to see Jesus that others may see him in us. AMEN. Rev. Bruce Hannem, Associate Pastor Lutheran Church of the Cross, Nisswa, Minnesota |
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