Come and See

John 1:43-51

 January 15, 2017

Mark S. Bollwinkel

Have you seen the movie “Hidden Figures” (20^th Century Fox, 2016)?  It’s the story of a long forgotten aspect of our nation’s space program.  It focuses on the lives of three brilliant African American women in the early 1960’s; Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughn and Mary Jackson.  They were among the mathematicians and engineers who got the first astronauts into space.   Yet along with a number of other African American women at NASA their contribution has gone ignored for years.  

            The movie depicts the challenges and obstacles they had to overcome as women and as Blacks at a time when science was considered an exclusive male domain and African Americans were legally segregated from equal access to education, employment and even bathrooms.   

As reported in the media across the country one of the amazing things about this movie is how at the end of the film people applaud.  We are inspired by the personal perseverance, faith and courage of these three women.  We also applaud because their story illustrates one of those historical moments when the American dream takes a step forward; the dream that there is equality, justice and opportunity for all.  It’s one of those moments when we take a step closer to all that America can be. 

Thank you all for the greetings on my 65th birthday.  Birthdays are a time for reflection as is the MLK weekend. 

You’ll remember that on July 22, 1961 the San Francisco Giants beat the Cincinnati Reds in Cincinnati by the score of 8-3.  Giants scored five runs in first inning knocking Reds pitcher Ken Hunt out of the game with only one out; Willy Mays and Orlando Cepeda each had one RBI, 3rd baseman Jim Davenport had a 2 run home run in the sixth inning; only bright spot for the Reds was Frank Robinson's 2 run, home run in the bottom of the ninth against Giant's pitcher Jack Sanford who went the distance.   

I don’t remember much about the game.  There were 14,343 in attendance including 6 Bollwinkels.  But I'll never forget the tension at breakfast that morning. 

            My father’s favorite Aunt and Uncle lived in Cincinnati while we were living in Ft. Wayne, Indiana.  When the Giants would come to Cincinnati we would often drive down to Aunt Ruth and Uncle Elmer Senn’s home and take in a game.   

            During 1961 the City of Cincinnati ended the racial segregation of the public swimming pool at the Coney Island Public Park.  Up until then only White people could use the pool.   This was the focus of many demonstrations, protests and law suits over the years.  That day the newspaper reported that demonstrations by local African American leaders were going to be held at the swimming pool.  My parents and their relatives spoke in hushed tension, wondering if “there were going to be troubles”.  As a nine year old I didn’t really understand all that was going on but I clearly understood their fear that morning. 

            Years later I would learn that one of the protesters at Coney Island that morning would be the young African American wife of a local Methodist pastor.  She brought along with her, two kids in a stroller.  The church they served had a long history of opposition to racial segregation and was part of the “underground railroad” during and following the Civil War.    

That young mother would eventually be ordained a United Methodist pastor and commissioned the first African American women Bishop in our denomination, Leontine Kelly.   Her son John Current, in the stroller that day, is now my colleague and Pastor of the South San Francisco UMC.  His spouse, Rev. Staci Current is my boss as the Superintendent of the El Camino District.   

This is not a "look how far we've come” moment.  Although the legal segregation faced by those in the 1960’s has changed dramatically, I'm not sure how far we've come.  We still have a long way to go to deal with racism in our country.   

But the amazing and powerful lure of God’s intention to justice and equality is certainly an affirmation of how God works in the lives of ordinary people of faith; like a young pastor’s wife demanding equality for her children or a nine year old white boy becoming aware of the fearful suspicions of his own family.  

At the beginning of his ministry Jesus calls the twelve disciples.  The Fourth Gospel’s version of this call is significantly different than the other three.  Philip is named on each list but only John describes any words or behavior of this disciple.  Nathanael is only mentioned in John and is not listed as one of the twelve although he is very much part of the drama of discipleship.   

The call to follow is all that Philip needs to come to faith in Jesus as Messiah.  Upon meeting Nathanael, Philip announces that they have found “him about whom Moses…and the prophets wrote”.  Nathanael responds incredulously when Philip identifies Jesus’ hometown, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”  Commentators suggest this phrase may reflect ethnic and class prejudice. Philip doesn’t respond to the slur but simply responds by repeating Jesus’ words (: 39) “come and see”. 

The disciples become apostles and saints after the resurrection but at this first meeting with Jesus we find some pretty mediocre people.   Phillip, who is a hometown buddy of Andrew, will have a pathetic career as a disciple.  He is the one who tries to send the people away to find their own food in a nearby town at the miracle of the feeding of 5,000 (John 6:1-8).  When Jesus preaches, “I am the way the truth and the life…if you know me you know the Father”, it is Phillip who blurts out to Jesus, “Lord, show us the Father that is all we need” (John 14:8[NRSV]).  Phillip continually misses the point about Jesus.   

Nathanael is academic and pious.   Which is why he is sitting under the fig tree, where Rabbis’ traditionally held their classes on the Torah.  Jesus sees this and Nathanael gets all excited that Jesus’ knowledge of him is miraculous.  Jesus discounts his confession because faith born solely on the miraculous is superficial and unacceptable.  He says to Nathanael, in effect, “If you think that is a big deal, you ain’t seen nothing yet!”            Nathanael is like us ordinary Christians who love to read about religion and love to come to church but are holding out on real faith until God gives us a miracle. 

Nathanael doesn’t make it into the final 12 but will be there at the end of the story (John 21:2).  We can only guess what happens to Nathanael between his call and the appearance of the risen Lord on the Sea of Galilee.  He is part of the disciple crew hauling in an unexpected catch of fish following Jesus’ instructions to cast their nets into deeper water.  He will eat a communion of breakfast with Jesus on the shore.  In that fellowship he, too, will know that his redeemer lives.  He, too, will know what good can come out of Nazareth. 

The disciples were a motley crew, not much superstar material there; just ordinary, normal, average people, with the same fears and doubts and inhibitions as you and me.  How can it be then, that this group will literally change the course of Western Civilization?  How is it that such mediocre people as the disciples will be the first to offer the world a new relationship to God that thousands of their peers will accept and in so doing will change the face of history?   

Dr. King’s leadership took him from Montgomery to Selma to the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC, filled with a vision of how things could be, empowered with God’s spirit demanding a restoration of justice and peace in human society.   How could a young, Black preacher in the South, at times frightened, unsure, an all-too mortal man find the vision and the courage to confront centuries of racist hatred and institutions in America?   

At the heart of the human condition God can be found.  Even in our limitations, failings and fear, God is with us.  Is it so ironic then, that God uses human beings to change the world? 

People like Phillip and Nathaniel, Rosa Parks, Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughn and Mary Jackson….or Melvin G. Talbert, one of the college students locked up in the Birmingham, Alabama jail in 1963 along with Dr. King who would become the presiding Bishop of our United Methodist Conference for 12 years…or an all too human, young and brilliant Baptist preacher Martin Luther King, Jr. 

What they have in common is not that they ended up famous and successful disciples of Jesus, which is incidental.   What they have in common is the journey of faith.   Each is given gifts and graces.   Each is given challenges to overcome, weaknesses to confront.   Each is given a certain time and place in which to be faithful. 

Including you and me. 

The best way to follow Jesus is to “come and see”, to go and live with him.  It is in sharing our lives with this Jesus and bringing along our average, ordinary doubts, anger and dreams that we are transformed from people paralyzed by our humanity to those who move ahead because of it.

 Amen.

In the Beginning… 

John 1:1-5, 14 

January 1, 2017 

Mark S. Bollwinkel 

             

Bret Harte’s, “The Luck of Roaring Camp” (Harvard Classics Shelf Fiction 1917), tells of Roaring Camp, the meanest and toughest mining camp in California during the Gold Rush.   Murder and theft were common.  It was a place inhabited exclusively by men, with one exception.  Her name was Cherokee Sal and she died while giving birth to a baby girl.

Without a mother to care for the child, these rough men were suddenly thrust into the awkward role of providing for the needs of the little girl.  They began by placing her in a box with some old rags.  But that didn’t seem right, so they sent one of the men 80 miles over the mountains to buy a rosewood cradle.   Another man traveled all the way to Sacramento to purchase some silk and lace blankets which they used to make the baby comfortable and warm.

Seeing the beautiful cradle with the new blankets made the men realize just how dirty the floor of the cabin was, so they scrubbed the floor on their hands and knees until it was clean.   Then they noticed the dirty walls and windows of the cabin.  So they washed the walls, windows and ceiling and put up curtains.  The change in the baby’s surroundings was amazing.   But not just in the cabin.  The men, who had been used to loud, angry talk and occasional fighting, had to give up their bad habits because the little girl could not get her sleep in the ruckus.

When the good weather came, they would take the little girl in her cradle and set her by the entrance to the mine so that they would see her when they came up the shaft.   Somebody noticed how dirty things were so they planted flowers and made a nice garden there.  It was all quite lovely.  The miners would bring the little girl shiny stones they happened to find in the mine.

But, that was not all.  When some of the men would pick the baby up to hold her, they realized just how dirty they were.  It wasn’t long that the general store was sold out of soap and shaving gear.  

That baby, suggested Bret Harte, changed everything. 

Of course at Christmas we celebrate the baby born in Bethlehem that changed everything, too.   Jesus’ life, teachings and his death have inspired miraculous changes of love in the world ever since.   Maybe you know such change in your life…I sure do.

How to understand who this Jesus was, and is, has been a central challenge for our faith.

A student came to me and asked me to explain to her the difference between Christianity and Judaism.  She is in love with a student who is Jewish.  They are both law students, thinking about marriage. How will they deal with the difficult differences?   I told her that I had known people who marry lawyers and go on to have happy marriages, despite the difficulties!  Just kidding.  The differences that trouble her are between two related but disparate faiths. Well, we discussed rituals, festivals, beliefs. Then she asked a fundamental question. “When it comes down to it, what is the one thing that makes Christians, Christian?”  The answer is not potluck dinners, WWJD bracelets or pushy preachers. The thing that makes us who we are is who Jesus is.   Jesus Christ is Christianity. (William Willimon, “Who do you say that I am?” August 22, 1999, Duke Chapel Web Site, chapel.duke.edu.)

            The four New Testament gospels were written to four very different communities answering this essential question, “Who is Jesus?”   Although they agree on the message of his teachings, and the importance of his life, death and resurrection, each gospel describes the answer to the question in significantly unique ways.

            In Mark, Jesus appears in his late 20’s to be baptized in the river Jordon by John the Baptist, at which time God “adopts” him as his beloved son.

            In Luke and Matthew, we hear the Christmas stories of angels, shepherds, mangers and wise men proclaiming that Emmanuel has been born of a virgin to fulfill the Old Testament prophecies of the new Messiah.

            In John, our scripture lesson this morning, we hear something entirely different.   “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God…and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us…full of grace and truth.”

            The Bible begins in the book of Genesis, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.  All was darkness and void….and God said let there be light…” (:1,3)   God speaks creation into order.  That “word”, to the theologian and author of John’s gospel, is Jesus Christ.   Jesus is the incarnation of the divine life force of all creation, in existence before the universe began, the spirit of light and life “made flesh to dwell among us” that we might finally come to know the true nature of God.

            In the original language the word “dwell among us” can be translated “tabernacled among us”.   Remember your Sunday school lessons about the tabernacle of the Hebrew people as Moses led them through the 40 years of wilderness wandering between their escape from slavery in Egypt and their entrance to the Promised Land (Exodus 12:31-f)?   The tabernacle was the elaborate tent and altar in which the presence of God traveled with the children of Israel.  When they struck camp and settled in a new place or went into battle against an enemy, God was right there with them.  If they had problems they wanted to bring to God, if they had sins they needed forgiven, if they had joys they wished to celebrate, the faithful could go into the mystery and majesty of the tabernacle and be with God.

            Well, for the writer of John’s gospel, in Jesus God’s intimacy and presence with us is restored, in fact it can now dwell directly in our hearts (John 3:16, 11:25-26).  So profound is John’s theology about the pre-existent Christ that scholars now suggest that the church has viewed Matthew, Mark and Luke through the “lenses” of the fourth gospel (Elaine Pagels, Beyond Belief, Random House, 2003).              

            So, who is Jesus for you?  Historical sage and martyr?  Fulfillment of prophecy?   Esoteric spirit, the light and life of creation itself?  Combination of all three?

            As we begin a new year, your own answer to that question would make a fine resolution.   For two millennia, millions of folks just like us have found meaning and purpose in life seeking the same.

Speaking of his own Christian faith, rock star Bono once said: 

“I find solace in places I never could have imagined ... the quiet sprinkling of my child’s head in baptism, a gospel choir drunk on the Holy Spirit in Memphis or the back of a cathedral in Rome watching the first cinematographers play with light and color in stained-glass stories of the Passion.  I am still amazed at how big, how enormous a love and mystery God is — and how small are the minds that attempt to corral this life force into rules and taboos, cults and sects” (Good News, July-August 2002, p. 40). 

            As for Jesus himself he suggests that if we want to know who he is all we need do is follow him (Mark 1:18).  All we need do is receive in faith the symbols of his body and blood in the sacrament of Holy Communion (I Corinthians 11:23-26).

            If we really want to know this Jesus, all we need do is prepare a place for God’s love in our lives…as if we were dirty, rough miners in Roaring Camp, lives transformed by the birth of a baby.

           

Amen.