the more i know you

the more i want to

The Holy Gospel according to St. John the first chapter!

There’s an episode of Seinfeld, where George is at a meeting. And as his character is want to do, he’s obliviously eating an conspicuous amount of shrimp that’s been set out. One coworker though, notices; and calls George out in front of everyone.

 
“Hey George,” he says. “The ocean called. They’re running out of shrimp.”

And everyone has a good laugh at poor George’s expense… 

In the next scene, George is driving home, fuming about what happened. But then, it dawns on him! He thinks he’s comes up with what he should have said. He blurts out, to no one but himself, “why didn’t I say that.” 

Why did I say that…

…And I suspect we’ve all had similar experiences. Later on, when we look back on some situation; we wonder why we didn’t say something else.

…Do you think Andrew and the other disciple ever felt that way?

When they looked back. After they saw just who Jesus was. 

Do you think they ever kicked themselves, when they remembered the first thing they said to the Lamb of God?

“What are you looking for,” Jesus himself turned and asked them.

Dumbstruck, all they could reply was, “where are you staying.”

Think of it! The savior of the world asked them the question we’re all been waiting to be asked, “What are you looking for.” But all they could bring themselves to ask for, was his address!

Talk about botching your one big chance!

*It’s like that time when I was in kindergarten, a newscaster was at our school. And she asked me and another student some question or another. With the mic in our face and the camera pointed at us, we panicked and ran away without saying anything. 

That’s how I imagine Andrew and the other disciple replying to Jesus that day.

So, do you think they ever looked back on that day, and thought, “why did I say that?” 

But, be honest. If on your way home, Jesus turned up and asked you, “what are you looking for.” Do you think you’d have a better answer? Do you think you could you find the words to express what your heart longs for? What you’re searching for?

Because truthfully, this happens to us more often than we see.

This is the Gospel of John. And he delivers the Good News of Jesus in such a way that we are shown over and over again that there’s more going on than we see.

This Gospel is full of symbols and metaphors, all pointing to the deeper things that happen right under our noses. *Druer Revelation Woodcuts*

The deep truth is, Jesus does show up to us. More often than we see. He comes along and asks us, “what are you looking for.” 

…But when the question gets put to us, we’re as clue as the first two disciples. All too often the only reply we can come up with is, “how long ’til brunch.”

That used to drive me crazy; the flimsy answers we give for why we turn up in church week after week. But, after seeing the first two disciples do essentially the same thing, I have a little more sympathy…

…It’s the beginning of another new year. Full of hopes and resolutions. 

And I used to poo-poo all that, too. But I’ve come to see it isn’t that bad of a thing. That it’s good to have resolutions. To have hopes. 

But I’ve come to see is, the resolutions we make. The hopes we carry into the two-thousand and eighteenth year of our Lord, these are one of the ways we try and give answer to the question we’ve all waiting to be asked, “What are you looking for?” 

The resolutions we make, the hopes we have for the year, they’re how we try to answer that question; what we’re looking for. 

How do we want out lives to look. What do we hope for the world, the year.

Because we’re all still searching, aren’t we? *U2: “Still Haven’t Found…”

But what happens is, we all find out, like those two disciples, that when the question is finally put to us, we have trouble finding the words!

It’s like how, in these short 16 verses we heard in the Gospel today, over eight(!) different titles are heaped on Jesus! Only one of which he uses himself…

Everyone who meets Jesus comes up with different words to tell about him!

…because when you finally meet the one you’d been looking for; describing him is nearly as hard as putting into words what you’d been searching for before.

It’s hard to find the words, but in that strange fact of our predicament; the Good News is hidden! Although our words fail us; the Word made flesh will not!

Jesus is the one we’re looking for! He’s who you’re after. The one who fulfills us. Our longing. Our hopes.

*Our hearts are restless until they rest in you. 

You see, Christianity isn’t about giving the right answer, it’s about following Jesus. It’s answered by the soles of your shoes, not the right answer to a test question. 

In fact, when his message is first met with skepticism, the only “answer” Philip can give to Nathanael  is “Come and see.”

…Come and see. 

Honestly, it’s not all that bad of a reply. Because that’s the way faith works. 

As Luther is at pains to show us, faith is experiential. Justification is not a doctrine that works like a math equation, it’s the experience of despairing in all the other places you’d been looking for else, and finding in Jesus the one who can actually deliver. What you’d been looking for!

…And when you see it like that, you have a little more sympathy for the two disciples. Don’t you? Because it’s hard to describe what exactly it is we’re looking for. And when we’re finally asked the question we’ve been trying to answer with our lives, words tend to fall short.

It’s like the advice St. Augustine, the master preacher, gave to a novice who had written him with questions. The novice asked why, when they thought about what they wanted to say, their heart swelled, but when they tried to put it into words, something was lost. 

And the novice hoped Augustine would give him some techniques to speak better, but old Augustine, he just smiled and said, “it’s like that for the best of us, too.”

Our words fail us; but the promise we have is the Word made Flesh will not!

And anyway, I believe the two disciples were asking more than they knew. More than they could. 

“Where are you staying.” In their own way, I think those two disciples were trying to ask Jesus where he could be found.

And haven’t we all asked that before? “Where are you, Jesus?” 

“Where are you, God?”

So here’s the icing on the cake today, because Jesus isn’t just what you’re looking for. He’s also the one who won’t send you away. 

*And really, isn’t that what we’re looking for; this love that abides? 

Did you notice Jesus didn’t send those first disciples away for their pathetic answer? He just called them a little closer to the Truth. To himself. “Come and see,” he said. *Sound familiar?

What matters isn’t what we say; it’s about what Jesus says to us. “Come and see.”

Today Jesus, the Holy Spirit, the Church turn to you and ask, “Why are you here?” “What are you looking for?”

And while you struggle to answer the question we’ve all  wanted to be asked, you're told “Come and see.”

In other words, keep following Jesus. Keep following. 

We’re all searching, aren’t we? 

And it’s so easy to give up. To look for nothing more than just the next deadline, the next day on the calendar. But don’t. Because today Jesus turns up and asks you, what are you looking for. 

And the promise you have is that, in following him you will find it.

*It’s like the lyrics to that song that was on the radio last summer, “The more I know you, the more I want to.”

“Come and see,” the Holy Spirit calls to you. Take her at her word; I promise you won’t be disappointed. 

Come and see. Come and see…