From the Daily Lectionary for Monday in the Second Week after Christmas
John 14:6-14
Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”
Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves. Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it.”
In the prologue of John’s Gospel the writer makes a stunning claim: that the light of the world, the profound meaning of existence, the ordering principle of the universe, is embodied in the humanity of Jesus. But not only Jesus. The light Jesus bears to the world, the writer says, is the light of humankind. In other words, the mystery of the Incarnation is not only about Jesus, the Word made flesh, it implies us as well.
That is to say that as Jesus was sent by God, so too are we sent. John is speaking of the human capacity to love. It is love that gives order and meaning to an otherwise random unfolding of reality. It is love that ascribes beauty and purpose to life on earth. Jesus tells his disciples that they will do greater works than he. That is why our practice as Christians is perhaps more important than belief alone. The theological underpinnings of belief are speculative, evolving, but the practice of mercy and compassion and empathy is the bedrock of the faith. The writer proclaims that to know Jesus is to know God, which means that knowledge of God is found in the practice of God, which is the practice of love. We come to know God in feeding the hungry, in welcoming the stranger, in raising up the dead of our world, the bringing of dignity where there is shame. There is divine knowledge in our practice of love.
Throughout the tradition there has been an error in doctrine. The church has said that we can’t know God fully, that God is distant and “wholly other;” but John is arguing to the contrary. John is saying that in our practice of the faith, loving our neighbor as ourselves, we indeed can experience God in God’s fullness. To be in love is to be in God. That is what Jesus embodies. Jesus is the shining example of who we are truly when we come into our own. It is not just that we see God in the person of Jesus. God sees us in the person of Jesus.
Our lives are given as a light to the world’s darkness. We are to take on the sins of the world and bring God’s saving help to the world’s broken. Such sacrifice is the stuff of God, “full of grace and truth.” We gather as the church because there is strength in numbers. We gather to engender a critical mass of love for the world’s sake. Archbishop William Temple said it best: “The Church is the only society that exists for those outside its doors.”
The more we give ourselves away, the more we become the church… and in becoming the church, we will know the fullness of God.
A Prayer for the Unity of the Church (BCP p. 255)
O God, whose blessed Son before his passion prayed for his disciples that that they might be one, as you and he are one: Grant that your Church, being bound together in love and obedience to you, may be united in one body by the one Spirit, that the world may believe in him whom you have sent. Your Son Jesus Christ our Savior; who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
