Fifth Sunday of Lent 2021

 

‘The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt—a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the Lord’, for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord; for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.’

Jeremiah 31:31-34

 

‘Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, ‘Sir, we wish to see Jesus.’ Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. Jesus answered them, ‘The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly, 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. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honour.

‘Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say—“Father, save me from this hour”? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name.’ Then a voice came from heaven, ‘I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.’ The crowd standing there heard it and said that it was thunder. Others said, ‘An angel has spoken to him.’ Jesus answered, ‘This voice has come for your sake, not for mine. Now is the judgement of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out. And 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.’

John 12:20-33

Question: do you long for people to know God? to come into a relationship with Jesus?

Perhaps you do, but you just don’t know how that might happen. After all, most of our neighbours have better things to do with their Sunday mornings than to gather in this place. Or maybe you don’t. Maybe it has never crossed your mind that you should. After all, faith is a very personal thing; God might not be everyone’s thing, and even for those who do believe in a god or gods, Jesus might not be their cup of tea, or salvation. Or perhaps you yourself are still searching, longing for more of God, of Jesus, in your life? After all, the world we knew has been violently shaken of late, from Brexit to Coronavirus to BLM to the storming of the US Capitol, calling into question all manner of beliefs and assumptions about how we order our world.

In our Gospel reading we meet some Greeks, who had come to the Passover festival in Jerusalem. To the memorial of the triumph of the Jewish god over the gods of ancient Egypt. On the surface, nothing to do with Greeks. But here they were, spiritual seekers, for whom the values and answers to life’s big questions they were raised within no longer satisfied, no longer scratched where they itched. So here they are, in Jerusalem, quite likely somewhat overwhelmed by the crowds of pilgrims.

And somewhere in that crowd, they happen to meet Philip. They discover that they have something in common: he has a Greek name. Perhaps he has a Greek parent, or his parents admired Greek culture; we don’t know. But there is a connection, perhaps a pre-existing connection. And they ask him a question: ‘Sir, we wish to see Jesus.’

‘Sir, we wish to see Jesus.’ It seems strangely polite, very formal. Dear Sir or Madam, I am writing to request…

That word ‘sir.’ The Greek is kyrie, Lord. Lord, we wish to see Jesus. Lord is the title by which Jesus himself is addressed. Lord, we wish to see Jesus. That word ‘see.’ The Greek word conveys the sense, we wish to experience for ourselves.

In other words, when they see Philip, they see Jesus…and want to experience Jesus for themselves.

When they see Philip, they see Jesus…and want to experience Jesus for themselves.

Question: what aspect of Jesus do people see in you; in me? and, how do we bring them to experience that for themselves?

Perhaps people see Jesus, when they see me, in how I walk into the unknown or scary future, unafraid. In how we carry ourselves in the light of that diagnosis, or unwelcome change in circumstance. Perhaps they see Jesus in my commitment to justice, for the most marginalised, ignored, silenced. Perhaps they see Jesus in the way I bring good news, not naïve optimism but encouragement, counter to the seeming addiction to bad news. Perhaps they see Jesus in my being a loving presence in their lives. Perhaps they see Jesus in the way I invest what I have learned in the lives of others.

For any one of us, they won’t see all there is to see of Jesus in us alone—that takes a community, a church. And some people will see nothing of Jesus in me, with which they connect, but might see something in you. Again, it takes a community: that is why Philip went to Andrew, and Andrew and Philip went to Jesus. But there will be someone, or some several people, who see something of Jesus in my life, and in your life, at the very time and place they themselves are going through some moment of crisis and opportunity.

And if we have any longing to see that happen, or if we want to grow that longing, whether for the very first time or because we knew it in the past but it has grown cold, if we long to see people move from seeing Jesus in us to experiencing Jesus for themselves, we do well to join with Jesus’ own prayer, ‘Father, glorify your name,’ Father, glorify your name in and through my life today, in and through my trials and sufferings.

Father, glorify your name, in whatever hour you have brought me to. That is a soul-troubling prayer: one that stirs us where our hearts have grown cold, towards God, towards our neighbour; where our minds have turned inward; where our strength has run dry. ‘Father, glorify your name’ is a prayer that will always be answered, ‘I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.’

How do we bring those people into that personal experience of Jesus for themselves? First and fore-most by connecting them to other followers and friends of Jesus, both those we know personally and the stories of our sisters and brothers down the centuries and around the globe. Introducing friends to friends. We do not need to wait until we think we have all the answers to life’s questions, or have triumphed over our sufferings. God has chosen to glorify his name and draw people to Jesus through simple, trusting, faithfulness.

But don’t assume that personal experience of Jesus will look the same, for them, as it has done for you. Philip had three years of being one of Jesus’ disciples in Galilee and Judea that the Greeks who arrive days before his death, burial, and resurrection would never have. Theirs would be, instead, a man dying an unimaginable death, and a Pentecost experience of the Holy Spirit poured out. Even Philip and Andrew’s relationship with Jesus would look entirely different to what they had known and loved, just days from then. As we emerge from the tomb of coronavirus lockdown, God’s intention is that everything is transformed, not superficially, not simply business-as-usual on-site but now also available on-line, but as fundamental a transformation as the grain that dies in order to bear much fruit.

That is where Jesus is heading, whether we come along or not. But there are Greeks wishing to see Jesus. Will you pray for them? Father, glorify your name.