When you read a movie script, the scriptwriter will often insert the letters POV at strategic points in the dialogue. It stands for 'point of view,' the perspective of the actor or actress - a cue, if you would, for how the part should be acted. When I read through this section of John I find that there are at least three points of view for us to consider..
The first one is that of Phillip. Jesus is looking out over the crowd with him, and asks, "Where shall we fine enough bread for these people to eat?" Philip's point of view is focused on the crowd. He listens to Jesus' question and then goes into an analytical mode. He looks at the sea of faces and concludes by telling Jesus that it would take a years wages to buy enough food for them all. He's focused on the problem.
Andrew, who always seems to be hanging out with Philip in Jesus' presence, has a different point of view. His is focused on Jesus. Perhaps he listens to the exchange, and even senses what Jesus is doing - a test of some sort John tells us. He scurries among the crowd looking for resources, and the best he can come up with is a kid with a lunch box. He simply brings what he has found to Jesus and places it in his hands to see what he might do with it. This is faith.
Then there is Jesus' point of view. "Have the people sit down," he tells them. He takes the barley loaves - it's poor people's bread - and the fish, blesses it and tells his boys to start handing it out. John says, without commentary, that "everybody ate as much as they wanted."
My question is, "Who was this about?" Certainly not the crowd, and while it is about Jesus, it is about something he has in mind for the disciples. This is about discipleship, this is about ministry.
Ministry in Christ's name is always full of challenges. Depending on what part of the world one lives in, some have been and are momentous - others paltry and pointless. The issue is this - what is our point of view? Are we focused on the problem or are we focused on Christ?
For the disciples, they learned that day that Christ will use them and whatever they bring to him to meet the overwhelming needs of humanity, of persons. His followers need not be afraid of expending their resources to do so, because God always provides left overs - enough for each of the twelve who probably thought the food would run out before they got any for themselves.
I wonder if that was the test - the thing that Jesus already knew he was going to do? What's your point of view?
Forty Day Spiritual Adventure
Saturday, April 4, 2009
Day Thirteen - Jesus and Controversy - John 5:16-47
Christ is...controversial. He always has been and always will be. The heart of the controversy can be unearthed in this portion of John. It always relates to the claims of his relationship to God - the undeniable inference that Christ in his incarnation is God, in the flesh.
When I meet with couples who are struggling in their relationship to one another, I remind them that in marriage, a husband and wife are like a mirror to one another. I see my own behavior reflected back to me through my spouse. Rather than taking responsibility to change what I see there, I prefer to criticize, or in some cases, smash the mirror.
It seems to me that many of the contemporary objections to John's Gospel are analogous to the marriage experience. The objection to the gospel is the objection to the person whom we meet and see revealed there. We object to Christ's claims revealed in John, because if they are true, they make a claim on my life, on the world. Rather than take responsibility to respond in repentance and faith, I criticize, or in some cases, denounce the source of the claims. This portion of John is a catalog of Christ's claims to which John bears witness.
Christ is controversial because of the relationship he claims to have the the Father. When you and I call God, Our Father, as Jesus taught us, we are comforted. God is relational, personal to us. When Jesus calls God Father, he speaks to the truth of his own person. It makes him equal with God - the God through whom not one thing that exists has come into being.
Christ is controversial because of the honor he claims. The author Phyllis Tickle reminds us that there is much God Talk in our culture. However, we object to specificity when speaking of God. It follows from his relationship to God then, that whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father. The two are inseparable, and this is pretty specific.
Christ is controversial because he claims to have life in himself, just as God possesses. He becomes particularly egregious when he says that his voice will call the dead forth from their graves, and that he will be the judge of humanity.
Christ is controversial when he talks about his works. The so-called works that he does, he does not do on his own. It is out of his relationship with his Father, what the early church would call perichoresis, the mutual indwelling of the persons of the Trinity, that he does his works. And these works are testimony that Jesus comes from, has been sent from the Father.
Christ is controversial because he places a claim on the lives of those who hear him - a claim that is to be accepted or rejected. There is much more that needs to be said about what this means, but at another time. His claim is rooted in the witness of the Old Testament, going all the way back to Moses.
As you read through this Gospel, do you 'hear' what John's witness to Jesus really is? Do you want to criticize the mirror? Or with countless persons through the centuries, will you find the life that he has come to give?
When I meet with couples who are struggling in their relationship to one another, I remind them that in marriage, a husband and wife are like a mirror to one another. I see my own behavior reflected back to me through my spouse. Rather than taking responsibility to change what I see there, I prefer to criticize, or in some cases, smash the mirror.
It seems to me that many of the contemporary objections to John's Gospel are analogous to the marriage experience. The objection to the gospel is the objection to the person whom we meet and see revealed there. We object to Christ's claims revealed in John, because if they are true, they make a claim on my life, on the world. Rather than take responsibility to respond in repentance and faith, I criticize, or in some cases, denounce the source of the claims. This portion of John is a catalog of Christ's claims to which John bears witness.
Christ is controversial because of the relationship he claims to have the the Father. When you and I call God, Our Father, as Jesus taught us, we are comforted. God is relational, personal to us. When Jesus calls God Father, he speaks to the truth of his own person. It makes him equal with God - the God through whom not one thing that exists has come into being.
Christ is controversial because of the honor he claims. The author Phyllis Tickle reminds us that there is much God Talk in our culture. However, we object to specificity when speaking of God. It follows from his relationship to God then, that whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father. The two are inseparable, and this is pretty specific.
Christ is controversial because he claims to have life in himself, just as God possesses. He becomes particularly egregious when he says that his voice will call the dead forth from their graves, and that he will be the judge of humanity.
Christ is controversial when he talks about his works. The so-called works that he does, he does not do on his own. It is out of his relationship with his Father, what the early church would call perichoresis, the mutual indwelling of the persons of the Trinity, that he does his works. And these works are testimony that Jesus comes from, has been sent from the Father.
Christ is controversial because he places a claim on the lives of those who hear him - a claim that is to be accepted or rejected. There is much more that needs to be said about what this means, but at another time. His claim is rooted in the witness of the Old Testament, going all the way back to Moses.
As you read through this Gospel, do you 'hear' what John's witness to Jesus really is? Do you want to criticize the mirror? Or with countless persons through the centuries, will you find the life that he has come to give?
Thursday, April 2, 2009
Day Twelve - Jesus Heals a Lame Man - John 5:1-15
For many years, some scholars refused to believe this story because they claimed that the place, Bethesda, was in invention of John. He made it up they said, to represent the five books of Moses that Jesus came to fulfill. But in 1956, a team of archaeologists unearthed a rectangular pool with a portico on each side and a fifth one dividing the pool into two separate compartments. It's very close by an old crusader church, St. Anne's, just inside the walls of Jerusalem near Stephens gate. I've stood there many times looking down some thirty feet or so into the spring-fed, brackish water that still fills the pool. You have to use your imagination to see what Jesus saw - a great number of disabled people lying there - the blind, the lame, the paralyzed.
It doesn't take much imagination to see people with any kind of disability - physical or otherwise - continue to live a life limited through belief in myths, in falsehood. The people lying there believed angels stirred the waters, and that the first one in was healed - no award for second place. It is amazing what people today will accept as truth.
It doesn't take much imagination to see people bound up in misfortune, captive to excuses and self-pity. Most of us don't have to look further than the mirror.
Jesus question is profound. "Do you want to get well?"
The answer is not always as obvious as we might think. We become so accustomed, so comfortable with our patterns of brokeness that we have adapted to and call our life. We prefer our excuses, self-pity to the challenge of stepping up to the responsibility for change, working through our limitations.
Isn't that why seeing someone who has overcome true physical disabilities rise above their limitations is such an inspiring experience - like the Special Olympics? Hats off to organizations who work with wounded vets and those with physical and mental handicaps to help them realize and live into their abilities!
When you start feeling sorry for yourself, look around! Listen to Jesus call, "Pick up your mat and walk." It is clear that the issues for this man whom Jesus confronted were deeper than his observable physical limitations. There is a relationship between sin as a power to be confronted in our lives, and those things that keep us immobilized.
Lent is a time for looking deeply within ourselves. What are the deeper issues that the living God wants to address in our lives? What is really keeping us in bondage, from living the life that we were created to find? Can you imagine Jesus speaking to you?
It doesn't take much imagination to see people with any kind of disability - physical or otherwise - continue to live a life limited through belief in myths, in falsehood. The people lying there believed angels stirred the waters, and that the first one in was healed - no award for second place. It is amazing what people today will accept as truth.
It doesn't take much imagination to see people bound up in misfortune, captive to excuses and self-pity. Most of us don't have to look further than the mirror.
Jesus question is profound. "Do you want to get well?"
The answer is not always as obvious as we might think. We become so accustomed, so comfortable with our patterns of brokeness that we have adapted to and call our life. We prefer our excuses, self-pity to the challenge of stepping up to the responsibility for change, working through our limitations.
Isn't that why seeing someone who has overcome true physical disabilities rise above their limitations is such an inspiring experience - like the Special Olympics? Hats off to organizations who work with wounded vets and those with physical and mental handicaps to help them realize and live into their abilities!
When you start feeling sorry for yourself, look around! Listen to Jesus call, "Pick up your mat and walk." It is clear that the issues for this man whom Jesus confronted were deeper than his observable physical limitations. There is a relationship between sin as a power to be confronted in our lives, and those things that keep us immobilized.
Lent is a time for looking deeply within ourselves. What are the deeper issues that the living God wants to address in our lives? What is really keeping us in bondage, from living the life that we were created to find? Can you imagine Jesus speaking to you?
Day Eleven - Jesus and the Official's Son - John 4:43-54
Desperate...that's the word that describes the royal official in Cana. He is desperate enough to turn to Jesus. Word had gotten around about what had happened at the wedding a few weeks earlier - Jesus turning the water into wine. In a small town, you can't stub your toe and not have ten people know about it! Just think how the news must have spread about Jesus' first miracle - his first sign.
We get desperate when we face a crisis of some kind. Our child is acting out, out of control and we don't know how to connect. I've just received a diagnosis of cancer and may not have long to live. My marriage is coming apart at the seams. Just when I thought I was financially secure, the stock market crashes. The secrets that I've tried to conceal have been exposed. The pain of a hurtful or abusive event is overwhelming. My battle with addiction is robbing my life with its lies and false promises, and now it has me nailed to my habits.
Jesus can seem so indifferent at first. It seems so out of character. Why? Because Jesus knows our humanity well - he's faced everything that confronts us, yet without the sin. He knows we want a miracle worker who can give us a sign - a quick fix. We don't really want what God has to offer - a transformational relationship. We want a 'deal.' It's the vending machine God of our dreams. Put in your fifty bucks, out pops God, and your crisis is resolved. Then, we go on living just as we had before, grateful that God has rescued us. God can now disappear until the next crisis when he's needed again.
"Sir," the man cries in desperation, "come down before my child dies."
Jesus doesn't turn into some theatrical healer with flair and dramatic gestures. He simply announces that the man's son will live. The man accepts Jesus at his word and returns home. As his servants greet him with the news that the boy is well, he makes the connection between the time of his son's healing and Jesus saying the boy would live. The man and his entire household put their trust in him. This is the response that Christ longs for - that he deserves.
In this Lenten journey, is there a place of desperation in your life? Are you looking for God to be the source of a quick fix or are you longing for a real, life changing relationship?
Jesus' Word posseses the same creative power that brought creation into being. His creative Word has the power to redeem, to restore, to heal. He will speak that Word to people who are desperate enough to truly believe - and that Word is enough.
We get desperate when we face a crisis of some kind. Our child is acting out, out of control and we don't know how to connect. I've just received a diagnosis of cancer and may not have long to live. My marriage is coming apart at the seams. Just when I thought I was financially secure, the stock market crashes. The secrets that I've tried to conceal have been exposed. The pain of a hurtful or abusive event is overwhelming. My battle with addiction is robbing my life with its lies and false promises, and now it has me nailed to my habits.
Jesus can seem so indifferent at first. It seems so out of character. Why? Because Jesus knows our humanity well - he's faced everything that confronts us, yet without the sin. He knows we want a miracle worker who can give us a sign - a quick fix. We don't really want what God has to offer - a transformational relationship. We want a 'deal.' It's the vending machine God of our dreams. Put in your fifty bucks, out pops God, and your crisis is resolved. Then, we go on living just as we had before, grateful that God has rescued us. God can now disappear until the next crisis when he's needed again.
"Sir," the man cries in desperation, "come down before my child dies."
Jesus doesn't turn into some theatrical healer with flair and dramatic gestures. He simply announces that the man's son will live. The man accepts Jesus at his word and returns home. As his servants greet him with the news that the boy is well, he makes the connection between the time of his son's healing and Jesus saying the boy would live. The man and his entire household put their trust in him. This is the response that Christ longs for - that he deserves.
In this Lenten journey, is there a place of desperation in your life? Are you looking for God to be the source of a quick fix or are you longing for a real, life changing relationship?
Jesus' Word posseses the same creative power that brought creation into being. His creative Word has the power to redeem, to restore, to heal. He will speak that Word to people who are desperate enough to truly believe - and that Word is enough.
Day Ten - Jesus and the Woman at the Well - John 4:1-42
The word 'missional' is in vogue among church thinkers and leaders today. It is giving the contemporary church a new vision for ministry - getting the people who are the church outside the walls in ministry and service. Rather than inventing new ways to get people into our buildings, it is getting the church out of the building and into the streets. In his scandalous encounter with a Samaritan woman, Jesus becomes the model of what it means to be 'missional.'
The 'hot core' of Jesus' passion was seeking out people who were lost to God - the sick who needed the doctor. That's why he spent as little time as possible with the self-satisfied religious people of his day - it always turned into an argument over trivialities! Instead, we find him going places that no self-respecting rabbi would go - like Samaria.
Jesus engaged people at the most basic human level - thirst. The physical need became a metaphor for the deepest longings of the soul. He knows the ways that we try and assuage our soul thirst, numb our pain. Augustine had it right - our souls are restless until we find our rest in God. This woman's restlessness had led her from man to man and bed to bed. What was it about Jesus that made it so easy to open up and be honest about her life, tell him her story?
Jesus leads her to see that her deepest longing is for God - to become a worshipper of God, in spirit and in truth. And he wants her to know that God's deepest longing is for people like her. Jesus told her that God is seeking out people just like her who will engage in worship - the soul-satisfying act of engaging, connecting with the living God. Why is it that we don't connect the relationship between worship and missional living, between worship and soul-satisfaction?
The disciples who had been in town looking for a good deli returned. They were shocked to find Jesus with this woman. They were apparently not quite ready to begin advertising their seminars in missional living. Why is it that we struggle with getting out of the building, getting out of our comfort zones?
"Open your eyes and look at the fields," Jesus tells us. "They are ripe for harvest." Isn't this the missional mandate? It means being alive to the opportunities that come our way every day to engage people who are living with a soul-thirst. It means listening and accepting unconditionally. At some point, it means connecting their story to their deepest longings that only the living God is the answer to. It means having God's heart for those he is seeking whom we encounter each day.
It seems that the church is in a 'recovery' of its own these days. We are recovering the most basic sense of why God has created us, called us to be the body of Christ. The greatest impact in the lives of other seekers is an authentic story of being found by God - this woman got the attention of the whole town. When is the last time there was a story like this in one of our churches? If we are not missional, then what on earth are we?
The 'hot core' of Jesus' passion was seeking out people who were lost to God - the sick who needed the doctor. That's why he spent as little time as possible with the self-satisfied religious people of his day - it always turned into an argument over trivialities! Instead, we find him going places that no self-respecting rabbi would go - like Samaria.
Jesus engaged people at the most basic human level - thirst. The physical need became a metaphor for the deepest longings of the soul. He knows the ways that we try and assuage our soul thirst, numb our pain. Augustine had it right - our souls are restless until we find our rest in God. This woman's restlessness had led her from man to man and bed to bed. What was it about Jesus that made it so easy to open up and be honest about her life, tell him her story?
Jesus leads her to see that her deepest longing is for God - to become a worshipper of God, in spirit and in truth. And he wants her to know that God's deepest longing is for people like her. Jesus told her that God is seeking out people just like her who will engage in worship - the soul-satisfying act of engaging, connecting with the living God. Why is it that we don't connect the relationship between worship and missional living, between worship and soul-satisfaction?
The disciples who had been in town looking for a good deli returned. They were shocked to find Jesus with this woman. They were apparently not quite ready to begin advertising their seminars in missional living. Why is it that we struggle with getting out of the building, getting out of our comfort zones?
"Open your eyes and look at the fields," Jesus tells us. "They are ripe for harvest." Isn't this the missional mandate? It means being alive to the opportunities that come our way every day to engage people who are living with a soul-thirst. It means listening and accepting unconditionally. At some point, it means connecting their story to their deepest longings that only the living God is the answer to. It means having God's heart for those he is seeking whom we encounter each day.
It seems that the church is in a 'recovery' of its own these days. We are recovering the most basic sense of why God has created us, called us to be the body of Christ. The greatest impact in the lives of other seekers is an authentic story of being found by God - this woman got the attention of the whole town. When is the last time there was a story like this in one of our churches? If we are not missional, then what on earth are we?
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Day Nine - Jesus and John the Baptist John 3:22-36
There have been many famous 'duos' in history. Some have been the invention of great writers, some have been entertainers, a few have been sports heros and others great competitors. But there are two names that are eternally linked in the great unfolding of God's story in scripture - Jesus and John the Baptist.
How did John become so clear about his role in God's purposes? Families can have a great influence in the spiritual formation of their children. No doubt, John's parents had a profound role in shaping his understanding of who he was and what he had been sent to do. How many times did he hear the remarkable story that surrounded the news of his conception! "Your mom was how old when you were born?" "Honest, your dad couldn't talk the whole time?" And when he could speak, Zachariah was clear about God's purpose for his son. Luke reminded us of his words. "And you my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High, for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him."
How did he keep from succumbing to the predictable jealousy that his disciples felt toward Jesus? They called Jesus, "that man who was with you on the other side of the Jordan." John was clear in his own mind just who "that man" was. He is the one who comes from heaven. He is the one who speaks the words of God for God and gives the Spirit without limit. This was the Son, in whose hands the father has placed everything. He is the one who must increase.
Above all, John was clear about what was at stake in the gift of the Son - eternal life. His view of what mattered was just as radical as his dress and his calling. The issue was not about observing the law or having the right view of baptism or anything else that religious people think is important! It was about one thing - trusting the Son.
Do we get how outlandish that must have seemed to his hearers? It still seems that outlandish today - until God's Spirit gives you eyes to see. As you take this Lenten journey, reading through John, you'll be struck again and again just how clear the issue of faith really is. It is all about Jesus! And John made that clear!
How did John become so clear about his role in God's purposes? Families can have a great influence in the spiritual formation of their children. No doubt, John's parents had a profound role in shaping his understanding of who he was and what he had been sent to do. How many times did he hear the remarkable story that surrounded the news of his conception! "Your mom was how old when you were born?" "Honest, your dad couldn't talk the whole time?" And when he could speak, Zachariah was clear about God's purpose for his son. Luke reminded us of his words. "And you my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High, for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him."
How did he keep from succumbing to the predictable jealousy that his disciples felt toward Jesus? They called Jesus, "that man who was with you on the other side of the Jordan." John was clear in his own mind just who "that man" was. He is the one who comes from heaven. He is the one who speaks the words of God for God and gives the Spirit without limit. This was the Son, in whose hands the father has placed everything. He is the one who must increase.
Above all, John was clear about what was at stake in the gift of the Son - eternal life. His view of what mattered was just as radical as his dress and his calling. The issue was not about observing the law or having the right view of baptism or anything else that religious people think is important! It was about one thing - trusting the Son.
Do we get how outlandish that must have seemed to his hearers? It still seems that outlandish today - until God's Spirit gives you eyes to see. As you take this Lenten journey, reading through John, you'll be struck again and again just how clear the issue of faith really is. It is all about Jesus! And John made that clear!
Day Eight - Jesus and Nicodemus - John 3:1-21
Words sometimes lose their meaning. There is a great hymn with a line that says, "Here I raise mine ebenezer." I'm sure that generations have sung those words, never quite sure what they are raising, but singing about it anyway. It's actually quite a good word - a Hebrew term that means, "God is my helper or my rescuer." The problem is that the original meaning and the contemporary use of the word have become separated.
That's how I feel about the term 'born again' that we find in Jesus' encounter with Nicodemus. I like to think of Nicodemus as a religious seeker - one whose religious experience left him longing for more. There are a lot of those in our world today. Jesus had clearly captured his attention and impressed him. Nicodemus attributed everything that he witnessed Jesus doing to the presence of God in his life - no small recognition for a Jewish leader.
What fascinates me is the way people have taken the term 'born again' and fashioned it to mean whatever they want it to mean. In our world, it can be used to refer to a type of person, usually in the pejorative - "a born again type!" Or it can be used to infer identification with a particular political philosophy or stance on a moral issue - President Jimmy Carter who self-identified as being 'born again.' It can be used by religious people like a lion enclosure in the bush - a thorny word, a sharp fence meant to separate, keep people out who don't belong to their sort of group. Again, a separation of meaning and usage.
The reality that Jesus is describing in using the term is something we all long for. It describes an authentic work of God in the soul of a person that creates the reality of spiritual life. What Jesus was saying to Nicodemus is that the reign and rule of God - the Kingdom that's breaking into the world in the person of Jesus - cannot be perceived with understanding or experienced as transformational apart from a work of God's Spirit from outside ourselves - literally, 'from above.'
I almost never use the term 'ebenezer' and I rarely use the words 'born again.' I heartily believe in the reality of both. The problem though is bigger than just words that have lost meaning. Jesus told Nicodemus that the problem was really believing, trusting.
God's love expressed in Jesus, the giving of his Son in order save the world - to redeem and restore it to God's intended creation purposes - is like a bright light shining in human experience. Jesus knew us well when he reminded us that we are resistant to the light. We'd just as soon not be exposed.
The season of Lent is a focused, intentional time when we welcome the light that has come into the world to shine in our hearts, our souls. It may expose disordered desires, painful hurts and numbing wounds, places of resistance and rebellion, or indifference and self-satisfaction. But like Nicodemus, exposure to Jesus may become the beginning of longing for more. And perhaps, in an authentic way, those old words might connect with spiritual reality and the life of God, from above, might begin in a new way.
That's how I feel about the term 'born again' that we find in Jesus' encounter with Nicodemus. I like to think of Nicodemus as a religious seeker - one whose religious experience left him longing for more. There are a lot of those in our world today. Jesus had clearly captured his attention and impressed him. Nicodemus attributed everything that he witnessed Jesus doing to the presence of God in his life - no small recognition for a Jewish leader.
What fascinates me is the way people have taken the term 'born again' and fashioned it to mean whatever they want it to mean. In our world, it can be used to refer to a type of person, usually in the pejorative - "a born again type!" Or it can be used to infer identification with a particular political philosophy or stance on a moral issue - President Jimmy Carter who self-identified as being 'born again.' It can be used by religious people like a lion enclosure in the bush - a thorny word, a sharp fence meant to separate, keep people out who don't belong to their sort of group. Again, a separation of meaning and usage.
The reality that Jesus is describing in using the term is something we all long for. It describes an authentic work of God in the soul of a person that creates the reality of spiritual life. What Jesus was saying to Nicodemus is that the reign and rule of God - the Kingdom that's breaking into the world in the person of Jesus - cannot be perceived with understanding or experienced as transformational apart from a work of God's Spirit from outside ourselves - literally, 'from above.'
I almost never use the term 'ebenezer' and I rarely use the words 'born again.' I heartily believe in the reality of both. The problem though is bigger than just words that have lost meaning. Jesus told Nicodemus that the problem was really believing, trusting.
God's love expressed in Jesus, the giving of his Son in order save the world - to redeem and restore it to God's intended creation purposes - is like a bright light shining in human experience. Jesus knew us well when he reminded us that we are resistant to the light. We'd just as soon not be exposed.
The season of Lent is a focused, intentional time when we welcome the light that has come into the world to shine in our hearts, our souls. It may expose disordered desires, painful hurts and numbing wounds, places of resistance and rebellion, or indifference and self-satisfaction. But like Nicodemus, exposure to Jesus may become the beginning of longing for more. And perhaps, in an authentic way, those old words might connect with spiritual reality and the life of God, from above, might begin in a new way.
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