JOHN 9: 1-41

Jottings on John…Lent 4…Revised 2020

Are longish passages like this in the liturgy (as distinct from in studies) a ‘turn-off’ instead of the ‘switch on’ we hope they will be? David Lose, in a reflection on his former site ‘In the meantime’ , suggests reading only the Gospel that day; is this worth considering? 

Today’s passage centring on Jesus & Reuben (let’s give him a name & a face!) has me pondering Holy Spirit taking the initiative in the Lenten Gospels. Leading / driving (MK) Jesus into the wilderness to be tested. Next, leading Nicodemus to take it in secretly visiting Jesus by night. Then, leading Jesus to ask ‘Samara’ for a drink at Jacob’s well, giving Reuben his sight, & raising Lazarus. Jesus then sets in train the events of Palm Sunday, & lets the authorities take the initiative on the evening of Maundy Thursday, & in His being tried, condemned, & crucified on ‘Good’ Friday.

God takes back the initiative at Easter, but who’s taking the initiative in the events we’re hearing & preaching about today? Jesus, then ‘neighbours’, Reuben, some Pharisees, Reuben’s parents, Reuben again, who weathers abuse, & confesses faith in Jesus as Messiah. Pharisees try to re-take the initiative, but instead Jesus retakes the initiative that gives Reuben his physical & deep spiritual sight now. ‘Taking the initiative’ opens up a lot of preaching possibilities, does it not? 

Isn’t it odd that people who know Reuben well as a blind person, can’t - or won’t  - recognise him now he can see? Scene after scene builds up to make a real-life parable for us all. Are there people we know whom we define by their disabilities, short-comings, or perceived failure to meet some standard we set? Instead of seeing the possibilities of God taking the initiative in them & their - & our situations? 

Are our inner eyes wide open to the Deep Wisdom of God & initiatives God may want to take in our own lives, or, with His blessing, in someone else’s? Are we as aware, as Reuben becomes, that the Messianic age has come in Jesus? That that age isn’t something only to be looked forward to? Does that the raise the issue of letting God take the initiative in overcoming our human obsession with clocks & calendars. 

However we choose to preach this passage, how can we preach it as a matter of now rather than then! It is our story, in whatever form it takes, as well as Reuben’s?

Brian

Afterthought: In vv.25 onward, Reuben becomes feisty! That may not be a word we would often use of our living out Gospel, but may we need to re-think that? 

JOHN 4: 5-42

Jottings on John…Lent 3…New2020

Let’s call the woman of today’s passage ‘Samara’ . Everyone deserves a name if not a face! In v.11 Samara says to Jesus, “Whoa there! I’m the one with the bucket!” Jesus’ response is to tell her, “You may have the bucket, but I Am the water of eternal life”. 

How might we be able to convey Jesus’ & Samara’s open-ness to each other as being at the heart of Gospel? Is there an open-ness to each other in our congregation? If so, how are we going to build on that? If not, how may we help & encourage them to open up to each other as Jesus & Samara do?

The other Samaritans make an important contribution to our understanding of Gospel when they tell Samara, “Now we no longer believe Him through what you have told us, but we have heard Him for ourselves & believe!’ Does this suggest anything about 2nd-hand’ religion being 2nd class religion’? Or is there more to it than that?

When (v.28) Samara leaves her water pot behind, is this the equivalent of others who leave their nets, boats, families, tax booths…? Are there things, or even people, we may need to leave behind to become ‘first class’ disciples? 

In a world where religion is in many cases determined by physical geography, how can we help people become more interested in ‘spiritual’ geography? What can we learn from the way both Jesus & Samara cross their physical borders that might help us & others cross theirs? Do we first need to recognise such borders exist? And help others do the same?

Does the thought of having Our Lord Jesus Christ ‘springing up within us’ excite us or merely puzzle us? Do we need to go beyond simply having such thoughts, to real ‘tasting & seeing’ as Samara & her fellow Samaritans do here?

Does what Jesus says to Samara in v.23 mean that worshiping in St Thingamee’s or St. What’shername’s needs to become a matter of worshiping in Spirit & in Truth if that’s not already the case? 

Anyone & Everyone everywhere should be able to ask for a drink of water & be able to get it

Brian

Afterthought: That Jesus & Samara become open to each other is itself a gift of God. Think of Adam & Eve in the Garden being open to God & each other before they choose to fall from Grace. How Godly are the choices we are making? Are they Life Giving? Or are we, too, falling, falling, falling? If the latter, let’s not try picking our-selves up, but pray God will open us up to God-self & each other.

JOHN 3:1-17

Jottings on John…Lent 2…Revised 2020

Nicodemus knows in his spiritual bones he doesn’t have the kind of relationship with God he discerns in Jesus. How do we see our own relationship with God? Have we yet reached N’s point of discerning that if anyone can help us, Jesus can?  As a leading Pharisee, N discerns sound doctrine, & obedience to it, isn’t enough by itself. He’s been led - by Holy Spirit - to come to a point, where doctrine isn’t enough. He needs a relationship with God he isn’t yet experiencing. Have we reached that point yet?

There are so many possible approaches to preaching this passage, but I’ll highlight just a couple of possibilities I see. Firstly, the incident of a bronze snake being lifted up on a pole is always stirring in Jesus’ psyche. It ‘burns’ there, & becomes more & more central to His understanding of His Messiahship; to His being a ‘greater than Moses’ & to His own eventual being ‘lifted up’ on the cross. How can we make that same understanding central to our own discipleship? Focussing neither on N, nor on Moses, but on Jesus? Bringing it into today, not leaving it back in the 1st C.? 

Is N’s approaching by night & being enlightened by Jesus, symbolic of one of JN’s great themes; the contrast between Light & Darkness? If so, & I believe it is, where do we see ourselves along the spectrum? If we’re only part way along, we haven’t reached the Light yet, have we? 

If N were to remain where he reaches on that first tentative visit by night, he won’t have reached the Light, either, will he? Yet we know from later in the Gospel, after Jesus has literally been lifted up, N champions His cause. He uses his position in society to go so far as approaching Pilate to seek Jesus’ body &, that being granted, helps inter Him. N is now ‘living in the Light’ & passing that Christ-Light to others. 

If we’re to live in the Christ Light, doesn’t it follow that we, too, will be passing that Light on to those around us living in darkness of all kinds?  

Brian 

Afterthought: Hildegard of Bingen somewhere says, ‘God stirs everything into quickness’. Today we hear Nicodemus being stirred by Holy Spirit into the ‘quick-ness’ of coming to Jesus, God the Son, that night. When the time is ripe God stirs! Have you & I yet reached the point of being so stirred that we come to the Light thrown on everything & everybody by Jesus? 

JOHN 1: 29-42

Jottings on John…Epiphany 2…New 2020

Time is important to JE. It’s also important for JB, Jesus Himself, & those who elect to follow Him, both then & now. Are we as conscious as we might be of God’s timing in our lives? Of whom we’re being called to be? Now! God’s time is always Now! 

As well as Timing, Space is highlighted here too. Our passage moves on not only in Time, but also in Space, from spot to spot. Where we are, & where we’re starting from also has a lot to do with our search. Some time ago, I discover great, great, grandparents of mine had been buried in the old Melbourne General Cemetery. The cemetery authorities kindly provide us with a detailed map, & armed with this, we confidently set out to find their grave as numbered on said map. After an hour or more of fruitless searching, we give up in disappointment. Days later we return, but this time enter by a different gate. In ten minutes, there’s our grave! Today’s passage about people, including Jesus Himself, going out to JB to be baptised reminds me of trying find that grave. What are we looking for? Are we starting from the right ‘gate’ as it were?

That Jesus asks “What are you looking for?” - not, ‘Who are you looking for?” - is another possible starting place for exploring our passage. So, what are we looking for in Jesus? I sometimes wonder whether we ourselves are looking for a great, great, countless greats, kind of grand-parent figure in God. And, by default, Jesus, too!

Highly regarded Benedictine, Sr. Joan Chittister, sums up what she believes we’re looking for, or should be, like this: ‘a way to live calmly in the middle of chaos …a way to live productively in an arena of waste…a way that empowers us to live lovingly in a whirlwind of individualism…a way that empowers us to live gently in a world full of violence’. I’ve mislaid the actual reference, but tracking it down will undoubtedly prove worthwhile! 

Brian

Afterthought: If we’re looking for a way of life in Christ, never mind Jordan’s bank! What better place to start than rediscovering our own Baptism! Grow into it. Let it really happen to us & in us. Check the date of our baptism & begin celebrating that day as never before. If we don’t know that date, set about discovering it by checking likely (& even unlikely) sources.

JOHN 1: 1-5, 9-14, 16-18

Jottings on John…Christmas…Revised 2019

Genesis, the first book of the Hebrew Scriptures launches with its magnificently imaginative & evocative story of a Creation told into being by YHWH God: ‘In the beginning God created the heavens & the earth..…’ Is it simply a co-incidence that the writer of John also chooses to start with ‘In the beginning…’ & a magnificently & imaginative, evocatively poetic, expression of how the New Creation comes into being? Can any account of Creation improve on that of the Genesis tale-teller? Any account of how the New Creation comes into being improve on JE’s? For me, it’s always JE when it comes to Christmas Gospel & Christmas preaching! 

I omit vv.6-8 because they’re an interruption - who dared to do this we don’t know - to JE’s original hymn. A distraction that destroys its integrity. They belong, with v.15, after the hymn where JB properly makes his entrance after v.18. Let’s not interrupt JE’s mind-blowing, spirit-expanding verses! Interrupting the flow of the Gospel like that might represent our inserting of ourselves between God & God’s purposes.

But has JE’s Hymn to the Word with its deep, meaningful, imaginative, & creative take on the Christmas event become too hard to preach? Compared with stables, mangers, & other MT & LK trimmings? Some Christmases ago, I’m sitting near another priest I know at a Midnight Mass. The ‘sermon’ turns out to be a kind of watered-down ‘kids’ talk’. This at one of the biggest, largely adult, congregations of the year. After the Dismissal, as we’re leaving, my colleague turns & whispers to me, “He sure dumbed that down, didn’t he?!” Christmas is never to be dumbed down!

The Word who speaks Creation into being in the beginning now speaks the possibility of a new & restored us into being in Jesus. God’s Divine Word in the Person of Jesus  is God’s ‘new beginning’ for us. Jesus doesn’t just speak God’s language to us, He is God speaking to us today. In response, are we living lives recognisably ‘speaking’ God’s language, God’s ‘Word’ for others, today?

Brian

Afterthought: However else JE wants us to respond to his magnificent poem, he wants us to glorify God as Jesus does in His Person. If our Christmas worship, including a sermon on this passage, gives glory to God, JE, John the Poet, has achieved what he sets out to do! Not simply back in his day, but now in ours.

JN 16: 12-15 

Jottings on John…Trinity Sunday…Revised 2019 

Despite being the proud wearer of a T shirt emblazoned with ‘Heretic - In Good Company’ (the gift of a theologian son!) I have nothing at all against the Trinity! Can you hear God sighing with relief from wherever you are?! Seriously, though, what-ever we do, let’s not shirk preaching the Trinity today. More, when we preach ‘The Trinity’, let’s preach the Holy Three as a Relationship, not as a Doctrine.

Doctrine, of course, has its place, but rarely, I suggest, from the pulpit. Preach the Holy Three as Doctrine & we lose the Energy inherent in Them & between Them. We’ll also lose the congregation, too, I suspect. As my granddaughter is wont to say when I’m nearing dangerous ground, “Don’t go there Grandad!” (Or you’ll spoil the relationship!)

So, how to preach the Holy Trinity as the the most Lively, Life-giving, Energy-filled- Relationship from before the beginning of time? As relevant & necessary today as ‘It’ has ever been!

I once saw a banner proclaiming what the Trinity is & what ‘It’ isn’t. It consisted of a shield with 'ribbons' linking the Persons of the Trinity (One in each corner) with the words: ‘The Father is not the Son; The Son is not the Spirit; &, The Spirit is not the Father. Then, running from each corner to the word 'GOD' in the centre, other ribbons proclaimed ‘The Father is God; the Son is God; the Spirit is God’.  It represented, or tried to, pictorially, a doctrine of God seemingly flowing between deepest mystery & the obvious.

Today’s Gospel proclaims God’s ‘In-house’ relationships quite clearly if we’ll explore it. There is still, though, much that Jesus would like to share with us: 'I still have a lot to tell you but you can't cope with it yet’ [v.12]. Despite long theological exploration - or, could it be, because of it? - are we still in that 'yet' stage? Do we know the Holy Three as Personally as God knows us? Person to person? What are our own personal Relationships like? Are we at one within ourself, as the Holy Three are One?

Or, are we conflicted within? In which case we’re also more likely to be conflicted without, too, aren’t we? What are Relationships like within our congregation? Those in our wider community? Whatever these relationships are, & in all of these cases, how do we need to act to bring them up to a Godly  standard? A Trinity-like standard? How, & what should we be praying to bring any & all of these relationships up to the standard the Holy Three expect of us & need from us? Dare I ask if we’re bringing our good intentions down to earth? As well as God does - Father, Son, & Spirit?

Brian

Afterthought: God is God, not doctrine about God! God limited to any descriptive terms we've come up with can’t really be God. Even in terms we can 'prove' are Biblical! God always lives outside the Book. Any book! Not least our Bible!

JN 14: 8-17 

Jottings on John…Pentecost…New 2019

At sermon time, why not re-read the opening of the Acts passage, dramatically, as: ‘Suddenly from heaven there comes the sound like the rush of violent wind! It breaks through the roof of the church & fills the entire place! Tongues like fire come down & distribute themselves & sit on each one of us! And we are all filled with Holy Spirit & begin to speak in other languages as the Spirit makes it possible.’

When it comes to the ‘other languages’ I have no problem with re-interpreting the speaking in tongues bit in the light of today’s needs, rather than those of the first spreaders of the Gospel. The language that matters most of all today is that of Love. In short supply in most lands, & in religions of all stripes. Resist any temptation to bog down in fruitless theological dissection of ‘tongues’. To do that would be yet another distraction from that One Language we all need to learn to speak. And we’re all capable of ‘speaking’ when the Spirit empowers us; the language of God’s love. 

Going further, when we reach the Greeting of Peace, & the President says, ‘We are the Body of Christ’ let’s shout back, ‘His Spirit is with us!’ And respond to ‘The Peace of the Lord be always with you’ with an almighty, ‘And also with you!’ Then share that peace with those nearby, looking them straight in the eye with our ‘Peace be with you’ & holding that gaze till they look us straight in the eye, too, with their ‘And also with you!’ A good way to share the Peace, today & every day!

In the Gospel, Philip hovers on the brink of a great discovery: that Jesus really is the human face of God. But he doesn't quite get there. Not even after Jesus explains it to him so simply as to say, "Look at me, Phil; if you see me you see God". Pentecost is our annual celebration of the Spirit of Jesus being God’s Living Reminder that Love is the One Language that speaks across all barriers & boundaries. God’s new creation depends not on speaking in tongues - in any sense - but on people being able to look at us & see God looking back at them in us! As Phil didn’t quite get!

Holy Spirit isn’t a doctrine. Any more than Jesus is. Or the Father! Pentecost is all about God making God-self present & knowable in the Spirit of Jesus the Christ. Putting it another way, Holy Spirit brings us together in ourselves & in each other as God is All Together! All Together One. Pentecost, like Resurrection, needs to be a personal, on-going, & unifying experience if God is to be real for us, & if we're to be real to God & for each other.

 Brian 

Afterthought: In the beginning the Spirit of God sweeps over the waters unifying what God is calling into being step by step, ‘day’ by ‘day’. The Spirit of Love is still at work sweeping over us & unifying us as a New Creation.