Signs

The Gospel reading for the fifth week of Lent, John 12.20-36, is equal parts frustrating and puzzling.

A retired doctor in our parish shared with a group of us how frustrated he was by the health care system’s introduction of an admissions clerk. In the past he would be able to contact specialist physicians directly to ensure that his patients received the care they needed immediately. In the bureaucratic system an admissions clerk would inform a general practitioner that their patient could see the required specialist in three months’ time. 

Similarly, we empathise with the Greeks who have travelled to Jerusalem for a Jewish festival with the hope of seeing Jesus. In all likelihood they have travelled a fair distance to see Jesus in Jerusalem.

As Greeks it is also likely that the festival, they are attending is unfamiliar and out of their comfort zone. We all know what that is like. Although I was brought up Methodist I was sent to an Anglican school. During school chapel one morning we were treated to a musical presentation. I started clapping to show my appreciation, only to be told by the Hindu boy sitting next to me that one does not clap in an Anglican Church. 

Instead of a direct line to the Lord, the Greeks seeking Jesus are referred first to one disciple and then another and when these disciples finally catch up with the Lord they are put on hold while Jesus offers a strange and puzzling sermon.

Why is there this convoluted path to Jesus for the poor Greeks who want Jesus? Why not just arrange a time to meet? In the Anglican Tradition, our understanding of membership is extremely wide. You merely need to walk past an Anglican church to be considered a member. In contrast, what is modelled here in John 12.20 is the early Johannine community where two witnesses recommended you for “church membership.” We still maintain overtones of this practice of two witnesses in our liturgies of confirmation, ordination and even in the reception of a new priest: two members are required to “present” a candidate for confirmation or ordination.

When the Greeks request Jesus, Jesus is looking beyond their request to the deeper need for all creation, for all people, to have close access to the Divine. The deeper need is for the distance between God and humans to not only be reduced, but to be entirely obliterated altogether. The deeper need is for the distance between God and humans to be so close that we find the best expression of our humanity in the womb of our divinity.

Remember that John’s Gospel is divided into two books. The first book from John 2-12 is the book of signs. The “signs” have been leading us to this point of unity between God and creation – the hour when God is glorified. The first sign, when Jesus’ hour had not yet come, was transforming water into wine at the wedding in Cana. The wedding was a “sign” of the marriage between heaven and earth, between the infinite divine and finite creation. The wine was a foretaste of the Eucharist where wine and God is blessed: Blessed are you Lord God king of the universe. Through your goodness we have this wine to offer. Fruit of the vine and the work of human hands, for us it will become the cup of salvation. The wine is an interweaving of a divine and human partnership. The final “sign” is raising Lazarus from the dead; we are being prepared for the way in which God’s glory will be revealed for all the cosmos to see, the Greeks who seek Jesus included.

God’s glory is so unexpected that we may miss its brilliance. God’s glory will not be a throne of power, but a cross of crucifixion: (verse 32) “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” God’s victory over “the powers” that make us less than human will not be through triumphant victory in battle, but through love, self-sacrificing love. God’s glory is love.

The ultimate portrayal of God’s glory will be revealed in the beginning pages of the second part of John’s Gospel. In chapter 13, Jesus will take off his outer garment and kneel and wash the feet of his disciples. He will explain the significance of the foot washing: “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.”

This is precisely how the glory of God continues to be revealed to the world. In every moment of loving each other, in every moment of being the love of God in the places of the world’s pain, we are at that moment being the glory of God.

This is the revolution that love brings about. In the power of the Holy Spirit, the bond of love, we are the Easter people, the new creation people, who flood the world with God’s glory as “the waters cover the sea”.

Thank you for being the glory of God. Thank you for being the love of God in the places of the world’s pain.

Sources: Wright, NT. 2017. The Royal Revolution: Fresh Perspectives on the Cross. University of St Andrews: Calvin College January Series.