Come and See, Come and Stay

Sermon                                   Come and See, Come and Stay

January 19, 2014

Isaiah 49:1-7

John 1:29-42

Dr. Jacquelyn L. Foster

Compton Heights Christian Church

(Disciples of Christ)

The Gospel of John tells us that two days in a row, John saw Jesus coming toward him and John pointed him out, saying “Look, there is the Lamb of God”   The first time he says that he (John) saw the Spirit come down like a dove and rest on Jesus.  John said “I have seen and I testify that he is the Chosen One of God.”

The second day, John was standing with two of his own disciples, when he pointed out Jesus, and identified him as the Lamb of God.   These two disciples of John heard what John said and they made the decision to follow Jesus!  One of the two was Andrew and the other is not named.

So Andrew and the other disciple leave John and take out after Jesus.  And here is a fascinating, strange, and telling exchange:    Jesus turns around and asks them ‘what they want – “What are you looking for?”     Their reply is “Rabbi, where are you staying?     Jesus replied “Come and see” and they went and saw where he lived and stayed with him that day.

“Where are you staying?”  seems an odd answer to “What do you want?”  or  “What are you looking for?”   In a sense they did not answer Jesus’ question.  Maybe they were not ready to answer it; they did not yet know what they wanted from this man.

You ask me a question and I’m not sure I’m ready to answer that question but it doesn’t mean I don’t’ want relationship.   I need to know if I can trust you.  I need to know if you will ‘let me in.’   What they wanted at that time was just to be with him, to have relationship – to know if they could trust him.   To know if he would let them in!

The text says that they went and stayed with him that day.  So it wasn’t a quick meeting.  He was willing to be with them.  We might have expected Jesus to be busy.  Yet he wasn’t too busy for them.   Even in those first hours of relationship,  Jesus was teaching them what it meant to be in relationship with him and with others.  Clearly we know from the continuing story of their relationship with Jesus that being in relationship with him would involve a whole lot more than hanging out in his house talking and praying.   He would expect that they go with him out into the neighborhood, the city and the towns loving, feeding, healing, teaching and embodying God’s mercy and grace with the people they met.  Being with Jesus would be involve learning how to be in right relationship with others – including those despised Samaritans, and women, and children, and Romans soldiers, and widows and orphans, and oppressors and oppressed.  Being in relationship with him would transform the relationships of everyday life!

Having flown to Chicago and Indianapolis and back this week, a news story caught my attention:  On Jan. 6, after spending a week at Disney World, Shanell Mouland and her family were on a flight from Orlando, Florida making their way back to their hometown of New Brunswick, Canada. Mouland’s husband and their 5-year-old daughter, Grace, sat in one row, while Mouland and 3-year-old Kate, who has autism, sat behind them. Mouland was a bit nervous — depending on Kate’s mood, the young girl’s behavior can range from affectionate to hysterical, so a patient and understanding seatmate would be crucial.

In an open letter titled, “Dear Daddy in Seat 16C,” posted on her blog “Go Team Kate,” Mouland writes, “I watched the entire Temple basketball team board the plane, and wondered if one of these giants might sit by Kate. They all moved toward the back. She would have liked that … I watched many Grandmotherly women board and hoped for one to take the seat but they walked on by. For a fleeting moment I thought we might have a free seat beside us, and then you walked up and sat down with your briefcase and your important documents and I had a vision of Kate pouring her water all over your multi-million-dollar contracts, or house deeds, or whatever it was you held. The moment you sat down, Kate started to rub your arm. Your jacket was soft and she liked the feel of it. You smiled at her and she said: ‘Hi, Daddy, that’s my mom.’ Then she had you.”

Luckily, Kate’s seatmate was Eric Kunkel — a businessman and married father of one from Villas, N.J. — who for the duration of the flight, entertained Kate by allowing her to fiddle with his iPad and playing a video game with her. The pair talked about dogs (Kate will be getting a service dog soon) and Kate’s experience meeting Winnie the Pooh and the Disney princesses at the theme park.

Kunkel even tried to distract Kate with her toys when, at the end of the flight, she began screaming to remove her seatbelt. He also allowed the Mouland family to exit the plane ahead of him. “Thank you for letting us go ahead of you,” wrote Mouland. …Thank you for not making me repeat those awful apologetic sentences that I so often say in public. Thank you for entertaining Kate so much that she had her most successful plane ride, yet. And, thank you for putting your papers away and playing turtles with our girl.”

Kate’s mom doesn’t use faith language in telling her story, but I believe she experienced the holiness of right relationship, in someone who took time to be in caring relationship with her child.  And she needed to tell the story, to witness to what she had seen because it was an example of the love of God embodied.

In the last issue of Christian Century, William Willimon shares  Lamin Sanneh’s reminder that the Christian faith is different from “spirituality”.  You don’t find the Christian faith by walking in the woods and rummaging around in your own ego.  Meditation and centering, breathing and feeling the breath of God surrounding us is important, in fact, I happen to believe it vital to our well-being and it is certainly consistent with Christianity and can help us live and reflect on our Christian lives.  But spirituality is not Christianity. Christianity is something additional. The Christian faith is known only through relationship and in the stories of how Jesus related to the world and therefore how we are called to relate to the world.  Christianity is not about meeting God on a spiritual plane above or away from humanity.  Christianity is about incarnation; God in humanity and cannot be separated from how we live in relationship in the world. It is fundamentally about being human in relationship with others in the world.

Willimon says:  “We know what we know only through epiphany – that is witness, testimony” – God revealed to us in the life and experience of Jesus and then those who knew Jesus and those who heard from them and those who passed the witness on generation after generation..   AND those who see/witness God’s love in our own lives and pass it on.

“Have you seen or heard anything from God worth testifying to another?”

                                              (In Willimon’s article in Christian Century, Jan 8, 2014)

On this Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday weekend, I can say that I have seen relationships of love, care, respect and reconciliation replacing the hatred, disrespect, and bigotry of the past. Years ago, I would never have imagined that in my lifetime and in my ministry I would be blessed to participate in the weddings of couples of different races and to celebrate the joys of their families!   It is a revealing of the realm of God in our midst.

AND I can say that I have seen the continued ugliness and destruction of racism and I see Christ in those who continue to work, to give their lives to heal it, to change it, to bring new life out of old death-dealing ways.

I would never have imagined that I would live in a time when gay and lesbian couples would be able to marry and witness to their love and to the wholeness of their families,  and that the church would be blessed and more whole because of the witness of your faith.

In this Week of Christian Unity,  I witness to the joy of sharing in worship and work in mission with churches of different denominations, belief, and practice.  Having shared space with Disciples, Pentecostal, Presbyterian, Ethiopian Orthodox in this building we can witness to the unity that is in Christ, while still recognizing that we have far to go.

As John saw and pointed to Jesus, saying “Look there is the Lamb of God”– we can look out at the world around us and  point and say:

There! – There where the businessman puts down his work and enters relationship with the autistic child – there is the Christ.

And There!  There where the walls of racism are beginning to crumble, where families and communities are able to celebrate the gifts of people of different races – creating something new  – there is the Christ.

And There!  There where love and commitment is respected, celebrated and nurtured in families gay and straight.  There is the Christ.

And There!  There where the Church is beginning to reflect the oneness that is in God – There is the Christ.

Come and See. Come and Stay.  And then, testify to what you have seen –  share what you have witnessed:  The Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world!

The Christ who brings relationship with a child, healing the sin of self-importance and disregard.

The Christ who brings reconciliation in families and communities and nations to heal the sin of racism.

The Christ who brings respect and celebration to heal the sin of silence and oppression of gay and lesbian people.

The Christ who brings oneness in the church to heal the sin of division and idolatry.