B Sir, We Would See Jesus Dr. D. Jay Losher 22 March 2015 + United Christian Parish Jeremiah 31:31-34 + John 12:20-33 = Jesus and the Margins efore the fall of the Iron Curtain, a professor from one of our seminaries was invited to preach in an ancient cathedral in Eastern Europe. Such invitations were rare in those days, so the professor was quite excited about the prospect. The pulpit was high, mounted on a pillar with stairs leading around the pillar and up to the pulpit. As the preacher was ascending the stairs, preparing to mount the pulpit, it was discovered that there was a door at the top of the stairs, invisible from the ground. More a half door and there right where you could not miss it, carved in the dark wood were the words in Greek which the Greeks had used in our text today when they came seeking Jesus: Sir, we would see Jesus. Not just in that lone pulpit, but in every pulpit, a hearty reminder of the preacher s task: to show forth, to exhibit, to display Jesus to the congregation. ecause this portion of Scripture takes B place at the Passover, there were in Jerusalem many guests and visitors, gentile followers of Yahweh ~ god-fearers as they were known. They were devotees of the God of Abraham and Sarah who had come to celebrate the Passover but at the same time excluded from Judaic Temple worship on ritual and ethnic grounds. In that day it was exceedingly difficult if not impossible for foreigners no matter how faith-filled to be included in Judaism. 1
As we read, these god-fearers are those whom Jeremiah foresaw that Yahweh would write the covenant on their hearts and who had God s law within them. 1 These are those who were fulfilling Isaiah s prophecy: The nations shall come to your light and kings to the brightness of your rising. 2 Like moths to a flame, came the gentile believers to Phillip, then to Andrew, both Jews with Greek names, for Phillip and Andrew had both grown up in Galilee at the periphery, the margins where Greek was spoken along with Aramaic. So the Greeks came to those with whom they shared a bond and then addressed them in the common tongue: Sir, we would see Jesus. They came with the overly polite language and the self-deprecating demeanor of ones whose social status was low. While outside Israel these Greeks were persons of higher status, in Israel they were still non-persons. Yet compelled they were, and despite their politeness, insistent: Sir, we would see Jesus. hey asked no question with their lips, but Jesus must have read Ttheir hearts, for Jesus began to speak: The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. What? Is this on subject? In the Gospel of John Jesus often starts in an unexpected place and works his way back and around to the original question. The point is that the coming of the gentile believers is a sign that Jesus death is close. Jesus concludes (listen carefully): And I, when I am lifted up from the earth will draw all people to myself. Hear that? All people. Not just Jerusalemites ~ all people. Not just ethnic Jews ~ all people! Not just the few who struggle to keep the letter of the law ~ all people of every nations on whose hearts Yahweh has written the covenant spirit. Not just you and I and those we want to be here ~ but all people! 2
Sir, we would see Jesus. They had to come, they were compelled to come by the depth of their longing. Sir, we would see Jesus. he Greeks unspoken question: Are we, outsiders in Israel, are we Tyet in God s plan? Am I included in? What is God s plan for me? Am I permitted to live in God s great dream reality? Unspoken questions but palpable nonetheless. Jesus answered: All are drawn to God through Jesus. To use Paul s language: Jew and Greek Male and female Slave and free We could certainly add many other categories of excluded persons to Paul s list. One Episcopal Rector preaching today s text changes just a few letters from Greeks who come to see Jesus to entitle his sermon for today: Some Gays Come To Jesus. 3 God personally invites not just persons we think should be here, but all people! We humans are so into thinking we get to decide who is in and who is out. Yet as Richard Jensen has said so eloquently: "Whenever you want to draw lines in order to mark who is outside the kingdom and who is inside, always remember: Jesus is on the other side of the line! Jesus is always with the outsiders!" 4 u Nih was our cook in Indonesia. B She came asking, Sir, I would see Jesus ~ not to us, but to an outreach of the Javanese church, a Bible Study, an introduction to Christianity in her neighborhood. 3
Like those Greeks she came with unspoken questions. Her life was decent by Javanese standards but not happy. She was second wife to a philandering husband with many other wives and mistresses. They had a son whom her husband did not support. Indeed, when her husband did come around it was usually to ask for money rather than offer any form of support. The only time I ever saw her cry was when I insensitively asked her about her husband. Bu Nih was smart. I called her a cook, but she was more a chef. Nevertheless she was considered uneducated; she had no certificate to show. In the eyes of Javanese, Islamic society ~ as a woman, mother, second wife, she was nobody, effectively a non-person ~ just another of millions of uneducated Javanese peasant women. Her questions were the same as the Greeks : What is God s plan for me? Am I permitted to live in God s great dream reality? And in becoming a disciple of Jesus ~ it was a glorious day when she was baptized ~ she got a foretaste of living in God s realm. On that day she became somebody. She experienced God s love. She was treated as the child of God she actually is and always has been. Yes, Bu Nih would see Jesus ~ in the reflected glory of God in the lives of Javanese Christians. he World comes to us asking the very same question. In polyglot Tcacophony ~ Sir, we would see Jesus. Ma am, I would see Jesus. Hopefully and on raised tiptoes: Am I included in God s plan? Am I too invited in? Sir, I would see Jesus. Ma am, we would see Jesus. ~ a question not just 4
directed to Andrew and Phillip, but directed to every follower of the Way ~ to us, especially a question directed to us. How are we to answer? With a shrug of I don t know or I d rather not say or I don t really care to tell you because you re not my kind of people. Do we get to decide who sees Jesus through us and in us? he world would see Jesus!! in you! in me! For many of us that Treflection is unfortunately weak ~ our character clouded, only letting through a dim and vague reflection of the divine plan. We would see Jesus is a question for all children of God, all who walk Jesus path. We are all called to reflect God s covenant in the character of our lives ~ so that the nations all drawn to the light of Jesus rising will see it clearly through us. Not just the preacher s task, a task for every one of us: to show forth, to exhibit, to display Jesus to the world ~ our lives transparent to the Gospel, the covenant written inside us, God s purpose writ large all over us in transformed lives revealing Jesus. 1 Jeremiah 31:33 2 Isaiah 60:3 3 The Reverend Canon Dr. Scott Cowdell, Lectionary Homiletics 22 March 2015, pp. 59-60 4 Richard Jensen, Preaching Mark p. 61 5