DAILY GRACE
April 23, 2020, Thursday in the Second Week of Easter
Scripture: John 3:22-36
After this Jesus and his disciples went into the Judean countryside, and he spent some time there with them and baptized. John also was baptizing at Aenon near Salim because water was abundant there; and people kept coming and were being baptized —John, of course, had not yet been thrown into prison.
Now a discussion about purification arose between John’s disciples and a Jew. They came to John and said to him, “Rabbi, the one who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you testified, here he is baptizing, and all are going to him.” John answered, “No one can receive anything except what has been given from heaven. You yourselves are my witnesses that I said, ‘I am not the Messiah, but I have been sent ahead of him.’ He who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. For this reason my joy has been fulfilled. He must increase, but I must decrease.”
The one who comes from above is above all; the one who is of the earth belongs to the earth and speaks about earthly things. The one who comes from heaven is above all. He testifies to what he has seen and heard, yet no one accepts his testimony. Whoever has accepted his testimony has certified this, that God is true. He whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for he gives the Spirit without measure. The Father loves the Son and has placed all things in his hands. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever disobeys the Son will not see life, but must endure God’s wrath.
Meditation
“. . . He whom God has sent . . .”
I can hear in this passage the response to a genuine, profound human need —- that of knowing who can be believed. So many television shows like “Dateline” and “20-20” are based on this premise. With such a plethora of mystery and courtroom dramas on television, it’s hard to believe that new programs based on the same basic plots can make it. Yet they do and they hold our attention. Why? Because of the deep need — perhaps obsession — to know who is telling the truth. Whose testimony is true?
The same issue is at the center of the political discourse today. Who is telling the truth? Whose testimony is true? Is this politician just “selling” a position, or telling the truth?
That is what is happening in this passage from John. The final paragraph above is rendered in the NRSV without quotes. That is, the translators see the words of this paragraph not as a continuation of John the Baptist’s words, but as a sort of insertion by the Gospel’s author, John the Evangelist. As such this insertion seems to form the conclusion to a disagreement that the Evangelist has just narrated — namely, a disagreement between John the Baptist’s “camp” and “a Jew” regarding ceremonial washing. John, the Evangelist, the Gospel’s author, realizes that the Person of Jesus is at the heart of the disagreement. What he hears in the disagreement is an underlying need to know if Jesus can be believed — is he telling the truth?
Through the gift of the Spirit, John the Evangelist says, it has been revealed that Jesus has been sent by God. Unlike others, even one as great as John the Baptist, for the Evangelist Jesus alone communicates first-hand testimony, —- i.e. what he “has seen and heard” directly from the Father. The Evangelist, the author of John’s Gospel, says he ((that is, himself) has received this understanding of Jesus as a gift of the Spirit, a gift “without measure” and therefore “certifies” that God is trustworthy. On this faith (this truth), the Evangelist stakes his life.
John’s assertion about receiving the Spirit and therefore being able to certify that what he believes is trustworthy of course is quite subjective. Others who did not accept Jesus would have dismissed it out of hand. Years ago I, along with several others from the church I was serving in Sandy, Utah, participated in a monthly ministry at the Utah State Penitentiary. We would go out on the fourth Sunday of each month to the prison where we would host a worship service. At these services I would preach the sermon. One night several years into this ministry, before the service began, an inmate whom I had never seen before walked up to me surrounded by about five or six other inmates and said, “I have the Spirit and have received the Spirit’s message that I am to preach tonight.” I didn’t know quite what to say. It put me in an awkward, even scary position. If I refused to let him speak what would happen? Would I and the other members of the team be attacked, ruffed up? I had no way of knowing. Out of concern for this possibility I acceded to the man’s position. Several minutes later a group of other inmates showed up, men that our group knew from before, and when they learned that I had given into the other man’s request, they were very distressed. One of them, a leader among them, said, “You should not have done that. You should not have agreed to his demand. He had no business doing so.” But I had already agreed to letting the other man preach. And so it was let to be. Unfortunately, the inmate’s sermon that night was a rather disjointed “prosperity gospel” message, which boiled down to: “if you will just believe on the Lord Jesus, then God will bless you with success and turn your material poverty into material wealth.” It was painful to listen to, and hearing him go on and on in that vein made me regret my decision.
There is a fine line here. It is one thing to claim, as the Evangelist does, that one has received a measure of the Spirit, and of course we are thankful for his testimony. On the other hand, just because we claim to have the Spirit does not necessarily mean that in fact we do. A hallmark of our Presbyterian tradition is that the leading of the Spirit is best discerned in a group. This is why matters of governance are always handled by committees and by the church session rather than simply the pastor. Having said this, it is still true that one’s own personal leading or testimony is very important. A question this obviously raises is very personal for each of us. “Have I accepted Jesus’ testimony?” Today’s Gospel clearly suggests that this is key for both the discipleship of John the Baptist and John the Evangelist —- and for us. We too are called to accept Jesus’s testimony, and certify that “God is trustworthy.”
Prayer
God of eternity, Father of mercy, you are the One who sent your Son, Jesus, into our world. We have celebrated Easter and commemorated the greatest testimony you gave to your Son —- his resurrection. I don’t pretend to understand everything you have revealed about your Son, but I wish to give witness to what I do understand. May I testify not only by my words, but by my life, that I am your Son’s disciple. Amen.
Contemplation
“He gives the Spirit without measure.”