What a World

What a World

Sermon preached by the Rev. Lowell E. Grisham, Rector

St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Fayetteville, Arkansas

May 16, 2015; 7 Easter Sunday, Year B

Episcopal Revised Common Lectionary

John 17:6-19 – Looking up to heaven, Jesus prayed, "I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. Now they know that everything you have given me is from you; for the words that you gave to me I have given to them, and they have received them and know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me. I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them. And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one. While I was with them, I protected them in your name that you have given me. I guarded them, and not one of them was lost except the one destined to be lost, so that the scripture might be fulfilled. But now I am coming to you, and I speak these things in the world so that they may have my joy made complete in themselves. I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one. They do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sakes I sanctify myself, so that they also may be sanctified in truth."

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Sometimes when I read John's gospel, my mind just shuts off. It begins to sound a bit like the grownups in a Peanuts cartoon. Wa-wha-wah-waaa. Words, words—nice words. Going around in circles until I've lost track of any linear meaning. I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world… (T)hey do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world… I am not asking you to take them out of the world… As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. It takes some concentration to listen to John's words. Sometime they sing like a symphony for me; sometimes… well, I can be a poor listener or reader.

So I got stuck this week on a What-is-the-world?-merry-go round. In John, Jesus talks repeatedly about the "world." But I'm not sure what he means by that.

Everybody knows John 3:16. That's the verse reference that gets held up on a sign in the endzone during extra points. "God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life." And it goes on. "Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him."

So God loves the world. The Greek word is cosmos. When you read the word cosmos/world in John's gospel, it often seems to mean "the creation." God loves the cosmos that God created.

In other contexts in John, world seems to mean humankind. As in one of today's verses, when Jesus prays that the disciples may be one with Jesus and the Father, "so that the world may believe that you have sent me." So that humankind may believe that you have sent me.

And in some contexts, it is clear that "the world" is a negative word. "I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world." In his translation, The Message, Eugene Peterson renders these passages with adjectives like God-rejecting world, or godless world. "I gave them your word; The godless world hated them because of it."

Finally, there are places where John's gospel contrasts this world and another world, a godless cosmos and a God-filled cosmos. You get the sense that in Jesus and in the unity of Jesus and the Father and the rest of us, both worlds intersect—the cosmos is one. 

The Greek word cosmos seems to be a pretty flexible word.

God loves the cosmos/the world—the whole creation and all humanity, including godless humanity—and God gives the Son to the world that all might be saved, whole, one. Yet, in this ambiguous world, the results are pretty mixed.

Let's look at some of the characters in John's gospel who enact the drama of Jesus in the world. Some of them get it. Some of them don't. But many of the characters in John's gospel change and grow along the way.

There's Nicodemus. He's a scholar who is well placed politically. He's curious about Jesus, but comes to Jesus by night when no one can see them talking. "Nicky!" says Jesus, "you must be born from above, born again!" "Huh?" asks Nicodemus. "I'm a grown man. How can I re-enter my mother's womb?" Jesus lights up with loving fun, dancing almost teasingly around his friend. "Nicky, you unimaginative literalist. The Spirit blows where it will, you can't see it come or go. You must be born free like that." Nicodemus doesn't get it.

But later, when Jesus is attacked at the Festival of Booths, Nicodemus speaks out to stand up to Jesus' right as a Jew to a fair hearing. The authorities (the world) snap back at him. But when Jesus is dead, Nicodemus helps Joseph of Arimathea with the burial of this capital criminal. Nicodemus has caught on to something.

There's the woman at the well. She's a heretic Samaritan, and an outcast even among the outcasts. She's alone drawing water at noon, the hottest part of the day, when she won't risk an encounter with one of the other women doing their chores. In violation of every social and religious convention, Jesus speaks to her and asks her to draw water for him. They talk, and he offers her living water. She doesn't get it. But she listens long enough to decide he is a prophet. She listens longer, and thinks, maybe he is the Messiah. She went home and talked about it openly, no longer embarrassed or shamed that she was unlawfully living with her fifth husband. She's caught on to something.

There was a sick man who had been living on corporate welfare by the pool of Bethzatha for 38 years. "Do you want to be made well?" Jesus asks him. He doesn't answer the question. Instead he just makes excuses for why he's stuck there. He doesn't get it. Jesus says, "Stand up, take up your mat and walk." He does so at once. But it's a sabbath. Carrying your mat on the sabbath is strictly prohibited. He ignites a firestorm of religious debate. But the next thing you know, Jesus sees him worshipping in the temple. And John closes the passage with Jesus' answer to the sabbath-protectors, "My Father is still working, and I also am working.  The implication, the man who was sick for 38 years also goes out and finds some constructive work to do. Now he begins to get it.

One more character. Peter. Throughout John's gospel, Peter never gets it. And when the chips are down, when Jesus is arrested, he denies Jesus three times—a failure and betrayal not unlike that of Judas. After the resurrection, Jesus appears to Peter and asks him three times, "Peter, do you love me?" And three times Peter answers, "Yes, Lord. You know I love you." Three times Jesus empowers him, "Feed my lambs… Tend my sheep… Feed my sheep." Peter is healed and empowered. Even at that, Peter asks a dumb question about another, "What about him?" referring to the disciple that Jesus loved. "None of your business," Jesus answers. But Peter is beginning to get it.

We see Peter in the first reading today leading the church to pick a successor to Judas. One denier leading the church to replace another denier. Judas could have been there with them, continuing as one of the twelve. He just needed the humility to let Jesus heal and empower him too.

This world, this cosmos, is a messy, ambiguous place. Humanity is a messy, ambiguous mess. But God so loves this cosmos/this world/this humanity so much, that God gives the Son. The Son opens his arms to everything and everyone in this God-rejecting world, and gives us only love and healing. His purpose—that we may be one with the Father and share in their joy.

John's gospel comes down to this from Jesus:  "As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you, abide in my love… I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you." (15:9, 11-12) Wow! Those are WORDS! For me, they sound with power like a symphony.

And sometimes, I get it; or I get part of it, I, who am in the world.

We're all beginning to get it, aren't we?

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