5th
Sunday of Lent — 22 March 2015
St. Paul’s, Durant – 9:00 am
Jeremiah 31:31-34 | Psalm 51:1-13
| Hebrews 5:5-10 | John
12:20-33
“And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all
people to myself.”
I’m assuming that most of you are aware of some things
about the reading of Scripture: The
Gospels, and the rest of the New Testament, and the Bible as a whole. (The “as a whole” is important!) These are not simple newspaper articles. They require some sophistication. I don’t
mean you have to get all academic and scholarly with the Bible; it’s often
useful to do that, but sometimes it may also get in the way of hearing the Word
of God. What I am talking about is being
careful to read the text. Read
the text. And to be aware that the
Gospel narratives, particularly, were not written by CNN reporters who were
present onsite with cameras and sound recorders. The Gospels were written, in the form we have
them now, by Christians, followers of Jesus, some 35 to 65 years after the
events, based not only upon their communities’ authentic memories, but also
upon their own prayerful reflection on the meaning
of those memories of the events. I’m
assuming that Mother Alice and other clergy have discussed and taught and
preached about these kinds of things with you over the years.
One of the things you also will have noticed is that the
four Gospels are not four identical, or even similar, books; they are not like birds
on a wire. Well, the first three Gospels
are obviously related. Each is distinctive,
with material of its own, but obviously related. They can easily be compared, or looked at
side-by-side. Which in Greek is to say “synoptic.” But you know that, and the details are for
another time. The fourth Gospel, that
“according to John” (although the author nowhere names himself – or herself!)
covers a lot of the same material about the ministry of Jesus, but with a very
different perspective.
For instance: as we
all recall, most of the accounts of Jesus’ ministry in the first three Gospels
are brief straightforward stories.
(They’re not simple, and we keep discovering new dimensions in them all
our lives, but they are generally short and to the point.) Jesus tells a parable. Jesus heals someone who is sick or disabled. Jesus gives some short pithy instructions
about life. Jesus gives little pictures
of the Kingdom of
God
Okay, here’s what I think.
This is what I think, and you may disagree with me, and that’s all
right, and Mother Alice may disagree with me, and that would be all right. But I think that the Fourth Gospel is up to
something quite different from what we see in the first three Gospels. In the first three we see, basically, the
writing down of stories passed along in the “Jesus Tradition.” They may undergo some editing in the writing
down of the Gospels, particularly as the local communities’ circumstances
change over a generation or two – particularly after the fall of Jerusalem and
the destruction of the Temple by the Romans – but these are basically
traditional stories. The Fourth Gospel,
on the other hand, apparently knows all those traditional stories – I would say
from the tradition itself; I don’t see any indication that the author knows any
of the written Gospels. But the Fourth
Evangelist starts with one of the traditional stories, and then goes on to compose
a long discourse, placed in the mouth of Jesus, about what those stories and
events mean. And I’m certainly not saying his
interpretation is not right – but
it’s the result of his, and his community’s, reflections on the meaning of the stories of the Jesus tradition.
Okay, so finally now we come to the Gospel reading today. Jesus has just arrived in Jerusalem
(following the so-called “Triumphal Entry” that we will celebrate next Sunday)
and he’s in the Temple ,
and some “Greeks” approach him. In this
case, the Evangelist probably means people who were ethnically Gentiles – not
necessarily from Greece but
Greek-speaking – and may have been proselytes, that is, religious converts to
Judaism, which explains why they were in Jerusalem
for Passover. (A slightly different word
is used for Greek-speaking ethnic Jews who lived in the Diaspora outside of
Judea and Galilee .) Or perhaps these Greeks were “God-fearers,”
Gentiles drawn to the moral and theological power of Judaism but unwilling to
accept the full obligations of the Torah, the Jewish Law. They approach Philip (who, being from Bethsaida , a mixed
Gentile-Jewish town, probably speaks Greek, and he has a Greek name) and they
tell him that they “wish to see Jesus.”
Not just look at him, but meet him, talk with him. But also, in
the Fourth Gospel, “to see” often connotes “to believe in,” and I can’t help
but think the Evangelist has that in the back of his mind.
Anyway, we don’t know what happened with the Greeks after
that; the Evangelist apparently doesn’t really care about them; he moves right
on to the point he wants to make: Jesus
says, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.” All along throughout this Gospel Jesus has
been saying, “My hour has not yet come.”
But with the coming of the Gentiles – the “other sheep that do not
belong to this fold” but whom Jesus must now bring in [John 10:16] – with the
coming of the Gentiles the time for his
glorification – that is, his crucifixion and resurrection – has now arrived. (As the Pharisees had just said: “Look, the world has gone after him!” [John 12:19])
The Evangelist then goes on to draw on some sayings from
the Jesus tradition that we already know and have seen in the other Gospels,
though slightly differently phrased:
only if you give up your life will you gain your life; if you would follow me, deny yourself and
take up your cross. Following Jesus means
following Jesus where he goes, and where he goes is by way of Golgotha . And then, reflecting similar words which
Jesus prays in the Garden
of Gethsemane
And then the Evangelist shows us Jesus speaking in words
which we and the tradition have known, or should have known, all along: “Now is the judgment of this world; now the
ruler of this world will be driven out.”
Well, yes, of course! That’s exactly
what we all thought the victory parade into the city was about! God’s reign is being restored, the Romans are
about to be driven out, and the Messiah is to be crowned as King! But no:
Jesus goes on: “‘I,
when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.’ He said
this to indicate the kind of death he was to die.” Hoisted up from the earth on a Roman
cross. The judgment of this world, and
the fulfilling of God’s Kingdom, turns out to be very different from what we had
in mind.
The Gospel reading today I think in some ways foreshadows
the two Gospel readings for next Sunday, Palm Sunday. As you know, and perhaps anticipate with some
dread! next Sunday’s service is longer than usual, and involves a radical and
abrupt change in mood and tone, from the apparent triumph of the Entry into Jerusalem to the stark and
somber account of the Crucifixion. To
quote as I often do a colleague from many years ago [the Rev. Charles Peek], “It begins with a defeat that looks for all the world like a victory, and moves on to a victory that appears to everyone to be a defeat.” As we move toward the conclusion of Lent, through our Lord’s death (and ours) to his (and our) resurrection, may we renew our commitment to the good news of God’s Kingdom, a realm which is not about the love of power but the power of love. “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.”
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