John 1:43-51 January 18, 2015 SHINING ON FOR JESUS The Gospel of John, which this morning s Gospel reading is taken from, opens in majestic and glorious fashion. In the beginning was the Word... the Word was light... in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness. Those poetic words of John s prologue, which were read on Christmas Eve, refer, of course, to Jesus. Jesus was the Word who was with God in the beginning and became flesh. Jesus was the light. In Jesus was light, and in Jesus was life, and Jesus life was the light of all people. Jesus, who was the light sent by God, shines in the darkness. I don t know if you caught what John was doing. In the opening words of his Gospel, you can hear an echo of a much earlier biblical text: the creation story in the book of Genesis. Did you notice that? When God the Creator got creation going, what was the first thing God did? God said, Let there be light. And there was light light shining in the dark void that existed before God made the universe. Do you see what John was doing when he began his Gospel with similar words to the creation story? John was claiming that Jesus is the light of the world. So, in Jesus, it s like the first chapter of Genesis all over again. It s as if God was at it once more, making something out of nothing and renewing the good creation that humankind had so botched up with its sin. A light shining in the darkness. That s what Jesus was. That s why Jesus was sent by God. And, by the way, that s what the Epiphany season is all about. Epiphany is the time when the Christian church reflects on how the light of Christ shines into all the world. And what was the very first thing Mr. Light Shining in the Dark did to get his mission going? He called a group of ordinary people to be his disciples. All four of the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, begin the story of Jesus ministry in the same way: with Jesus calling his disciples. This morning s Gospel reading is John s account of Jesus calling his disciples. That s what John considered to be the first outbreak of light into the darkness. Okay, now here s a question for us to consider well, actually, it s a series of questions. And the first question is, if Jesus is the light of the world, the beginning of God s renewed creation, why did he begin his
begin his ministry by recruiting a bunch of ordinary people to shine with him? Why didn t he just go ahead and shine by himself? Why didn t he just immediately start recreating? After all, he had the power to do that. A snap of the finger and, Bada-bing! Bada-boom! There, it s done, God. I didn t want to waste my time and your time training a group of incompetent, not overly bright human beings who might end up failing in the end anyhow, when it s so much quicker and easier to just do it myself. But that s not what Jesus did. It seems that, whatever Jesus Christ wanted to do for the world, he didn t want to do it alone. So he chose a group of twelve regular, everyday people (people like you and people like me) to do it with him. Jesus chose not to save the world all by himself. Instead, he called other people to assist him with that task. That conclusion I just made has huge ramifications for us, by the way. You see, some of you think you got out of bed on this cold January morning and came to church because you decided to, because you chose to come here and worship. Well, the implication of this morning s Gospel reading is that you didn t choose to come here. Rather, you were invited, you were summoned, you were called here. Some of you may be thinking right now, Me? Called? Invited? Really? Why? Why in the world did Jesus decide to call me? The answer, quite simply, is that s just the way Jesus does business. All of us here are Christians, not because we decided or chose to be one, but because of an invitation; because of a calling we received. We may not even remember that call, but it happened, at some time and some place in our lives. Jesus called us. And Jesus did so because he doesn t work alone. Which is why all four Gospels begin the story of Jesus earthly ministry with the calling of his disciples to work with him. And there s something else in this morning s Gospel reading to ponder. Did you notice how, after Andrew was called by Jesus, the first thing he did was rush out, find his brother Simon (eventually to be renamed Peter by Jesus), and proclaim, We have found the Messiah! Jesus also found Philip and called him, and Philip immediately rushed out to look for Nathaniel. When Philip invited Nathaniel to join him in following Jesus, Nathaniel asked cynically, Jesus the Nazarene? Can anything good come out of a hick town like Nazareth? And Philip replied, Come with me and see for yourself. Do you see how Philip, not Jesus, called Nathaniel to discipleship? Although all four Gospels record Jesus calling of his disciples, only in John s Gospel do we get this account of some of Jesus disciples being 2
called by other disciples. Which leads me to this obvious conclusion: sometimes Jesus himself directly calls people to follow him; and sometimes people who have already been called by Jesus are the ones who call other people to follow Jesus. Maybe some of you sitting out there in the pews are here this morning because the risen Christ appeared directly to you and dramatically, personally, called you. If so, praise God! In my experience, not many become disciples of Jesus that way. But it does happen, and I sort of envy people who ve had such a powerful, intimate and direct summons from the Lord. But I suspect that most of you are here this morning because another disciple a Philip or an Andrew in your life somehow, in some way, called or invited you to follow Jesus. For the majority of you, chances are that there was somebody maybe a family member, a friend, a minister or a Sunday School teacher who either told you the story or lived the story of Jesus in your presence in such a way that you indirectly heard Christ summoning you, and eventually you were led to come and see for yourself. So I encourage you to keep your eyes peeled, your ears open and your hearts receptive to those around you, because Jesus not only works through other people, he also works through people to call other people. Maybe you re sitting next to one of them right now. Or you work with one at the office. Or you live under the same roof with one. And maybe, through them, Jesus is calling to you. When I researched and did some reflecting in preparation for this sermon, I asked myself at one point, where did Jesus call to me come from? Was there some pivotal event, or a person or persons in my life, whom Jesus used in calling me to follow him? It was a difficult question to answer, but in the end I managed to identify a few key people and events that were crucial in my faith development. The first was the way I was raised in the Christian faith. When I was young, being brought up a Roman Catholic profoundly shaped me. In my home, going to church every Sunday or sometimes on a Saturday evening was mandatory. My siblings and I had to go to Mass, whether we wanted to or not. My brothers and sisters constantly complained about it, but for some reason I grew to enjoy going to Mass. I liked listening to sermons, and I was awed as I heard the service spoken in Latin, back in the days before the rules were changed and it was spoken only in English (yes, I m that old!). To me, the Latin language seemed to come directly from heaven; it was like the 3
dialect angels spoke as they scurried around doing God s work. To be honest, I didn t understand much that the priest was saying; but the mere sound of the Latin language gave me goose bumps because of the mystery of it and the sacredness it seemed to exude, and it drew me very close to God. There was also a priest I admired and loved. Father Gaffey was his name. He was young; he had longish hair that freaked some of the older people out (they were shocked that he was allowed to have a Beatle haircut, as they called it); and he used to end the Mass by flashing a peace sign (yes, I m that old!). Father Gaffey was the only approachable priest I knew as a kid, and he made it cool to be a Christian and love God. In that sense, he had a tremendous and profound impact on my faith formation as I was growing up. I ll share one more thing that happened to me that, when I look back on it, I can identify as Jesus calling me. I was maybe ten or eleven years old, and I was sitting at the dinner table with the rest of my family. I don t remember what we had to eat, but since I loved my mother s meatloaf, I ll say we were having meatloaf for dinner. I was conversing with my father about something again, I don t recall what exactly what we were talking about when he asked me a question that seemed to come out of left field. My father asked me, Have you ever thought about becoming a priest? I was stunned. I said, No, I ve never thought about that. And we went back to eating our meatloaf or whatever it was we were eating. I m sure my father hardly gave another thought to the question he had asked me, and if you asked him about it today I doubt he d even remember asking it; but that question stayed with me. I reflected on it every once in a while. And it caused me to ask myself, What did Dad see in me that could possibly move him to ask me such a question? Have you ever thought about becoming a priest? Well, almost half a century later, I m not a priest; but I do a lot of the same things a priest does. So, in hindsight, I believe Jesus may have been calling me to the parish ministry through my father, because way back then it started to open my mind and made me receptive to the idea of becoming a minister. Have you ever heard a call from Jesus the way I did, through something another person said to you or did with you or asked you? And, just as importantly, have you ever been the instrument or conduit through which Jesus called another person? If you attended the 11 p.m. Christmas Eve service a few weeks ago, you no doubt remember when, near the end of the service, we turned down the lights and began to light our candles. And you remember how, at first, 4
the sanctuary was eerily dim. But then the light gradually spread and grew brighter as each person lit the candle of the person seated next to them. And in a little while, as we finished singing Silent Night, the entire sanctuary was awash in a warm glow. To me that s a kind of a parable about the way Jesus, the Light of the World, strives to illuminate one person at a time until all of us lesser lights shine together. The end goal, of course, is for the whole world to ultimately be filled with Christ s light. But all of us lesser lights depend on two things in order to be able to shine. First, we need Jesus, the Light of the World, to come to us, directly or indirectly, so he can light the flame of God s love in our lives. And second, we need those of us on whose lives has Jesus shined to be willing to share that light of Christ s love with others, so that they can also shine for Christ in the world. My dear friends, I don t really know your personal faith journeys, or the things that happened in your lives that moved you to respond to Jesus call by saying, Yes, Lord, I will follow you. But here you are. Somehow, for some reason, we re all disciples of Christ. Jesus, the Light of the world, has shined his light on us, probably through another person whose life Jesus once shined on. And now you and I are called to shine on others in the name of Jesus. I pray that we, and our church, will find ways to shine brightly, brilliantly, and radiantly to help illuminate the darkness in this world with the love of Christ. Like that wonderful children s song says: This little light of mine, I m gonna let it shine. Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine! Amen. 5