How did you come to know Jesus?  If you know him at all, or perhaps it’s better to say if you are getting to know him.  We never come to an end of getting to know Jesus.  How did it begin?  How did you hear?  Was it through a family member?  Was it through someone preaching or proclaiming who Jesus is?  Was it through a friend?  How did we come to know Jesus?  If you’re saying “Well I can’t really say as I know him,” then how might you come to know him?  This is assuming that you have some level of interest in knowing him.  I think this is a safe assumption as if you had no interest, it’s doubtful you’d be hearing this.

We spoke and sang last week about letting our lights shine.  Letting the Light shine in and through us.  This is of course something that we are called to do together.  Letting the light shine together.  We have heard about Jesus so far in John’s Gospel and we have heard about John whom we call “the Baptist.”  The first witness.  From v 19 to 51 in the 1^st chapter of John, we are given an account of four days.  The first day we hear John speak about the one who was coming after him.  The second day, we read that John saw Jesus coming toward him, and John declares, “Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”  Declarative preaching. Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.  Christ-centred preaching is a vital practice.  “It is the Lord!” we heard not long ago from the end of John’s Gospel.  Jesus is always the message.  John lays the message out.  “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him.  I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain is the who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’” (32-34)

Here is the Lamb of God!  Here is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit – the one who has given the gift of the Holy Spirit within us!  Here he is as he’s walking toward John.  Here he is as he walks on by. Let us put ourselves right in the middle of this story, dear church because here we have the beginning of the church in the Gospel of John.  In order to understand who we are and what we are to be about, we go back to our beginnings.  We return continually to the one who is our beginning and our end.  Listen to how he is described in our text and remember that thrum of excitement which came from personal contact with the Lamb of God; the Messiah; the one about whom Moses in the law and all the prophets wrote; the Son of God; the King of Israel; the Son of Man.

I love this scene as John describes it.  Two disciples of John the Baptist are standing with him.  They are interested in what John is proclaiming.  They are engaged in what John is proclaiming.  They are having a meeting.  Let us not neglect meeting together in places where Jesus is proclaimed.  We want to encounter him.  We don’t want to miss him as he is walking by.  John is standing with his two students and Jesus walks by and John tells the truth along with an invitation to look.  “Look, here is the Lamb of God!”  The message is heard.  The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus.  The following came about after the speaking and the hearing.

What can I say about what hearing the good news of Jesus proclaimed has meant for me?  What it meant in my young life to hear about God’s love, grace, mercy, forgiveness, hope, peace, joy week after week.  What did it mean in those times when Jesus seemed distant, and that was because of me, not because of him?  What has it meant in your own life to hear the one who calls himself the truth proclaimed?  Let us not neglect the proclamation nor the hearing – even if it needs to be largely virtual depending on our circumstances.  Let it not solely be virtual unless it has to be due to our circumstances.  In any case, we are thankful for the technology which allows us to gather in that way.  When we gather, the good news of Jesus may be proclaimed from unexpected places.  The good news of the Lamb of God.  The good news of our shepherd.  A few weeks ago, here in church before our prayer time with the children, I was talking to them about breakfast.  We were looking at the story of Jesus making a fish breakfast for his followers on the beach.  I asked the kids who made breakfast for them, expecting them to say a parent.  What was the first answer?  God!  I said “You went right to the heart of the matter. child!”  God our provider, our sustainer.  “You open your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing,” as the Psalmist sang. 

“It is the Lord,” as one of those followers said before that beach breakfast.  It’s Jesus who is worthy of our attention, our devotion, our adoration.  “Look, here is the Lamb of God!” They begin to follow, Andrew and this second disciple who is not named.  Jesus turned and saw them following. Jesus asked them a question.  We talked last week about the questions that are being posed to us when we gather together with God.  Our God is one of questions.  There is an element of grace in asking a question sincerely.  Not in an accusatory way or with a hidden agenda, but in a way in which we invite one another to share what is going on in our hearts.  When humanity went wrong, the first words that God spoke were a question.  “Where are you?”  God is always looking for us and we see that in our passage with Jesus today.  Where are you?  When a blind man calls out to Jesus “Have mercy on me” from the side of the road, Jesus stops.  Jesus asks him a question.  What do you want me to do for you?  When it comes to caring for those around us and being able to shine the light of Christ, what questions might we be asking?

Jesus asks, “What are you looking for?”  It’s a good question.  There’s a certain restlessness around; a certain unease; a certain restless searching.  Before we say things like “I still haven’t found what I’m looking for,” we need to consider what it is we’re looking for.

So what are we looking for?  Happiness?  Freedom?  How do we define those things?  Peace?  The good life?  To be a better person?   Purpose?  Meaning? A path?  A career path?  A place to live?  Belonging?  Connection? What are we looking for?  Have we found it?  Who might we tell about it?  (more on this in the next segment)

They said, “Rabbi (which translated means Teacher), where are you staying?”  This is an excellent question.  Let it be one of the questions of our lives when it comes to Jesus.  We’re not simply talking not about where Jesus is physically located.  We’re asking the question “What does it mean to stay with Jesus”  What does it mean to live in Christ?  Our homes say a lot about us.  What we surround ourselves with may say a lot about us.  What does it mean to be at home with Jesus?  “Come and see,” is the invitation.  It’s not an argument.  It’s not up to me or anyone else to offer up an irresistible argument or destroy someone else’s argument.  It’s not something for which I’m called to offer irrefutable proof.  It’s an invitation from Jesus.  “Come and see.”  Can anything good come out of Nazareth?  Come and see!  Can anything good come out of the motley crew that makes up a church?  Come and see!  It’s not just us you see.  Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done.  Come and see a man who knows everything about me to the depths of my heart – and loves me.

Andrew and the other disciple came and saw.  They stayed.  Same word as abide when we’ll hear Jesus say “Abide in me as I abide in you.”  Just like a branch abides in the vine and we’re not just talking about viticulture now.  Stay with me as I stay with you, says Jesus.  This is what it means to be found in Jesus or finding Jesus – both are happening in our story.  Jesus is finding people, people are saying “We have found him!”  God plays a role in our finding us and we play a role in being found.  We hold these two truths together lest we think it was all up to us or it was all up to God.  These two disciples give the good and right and fitting response and may we all do the same.  They went and remained with him all day, until about four o’clock in the afternoon.  I want to be where you are.  May that be our prayer.  I want to know you.  I want to be made like you. 

I want to know what you’re like.  We never come to an end of finding out what Jesus is like.  Spending time with Jesus in the Gospels is one of the ways in which we find out.  We find out things like Jesus moved toward people with compassion and service.  The “Jesus, He Gets Us” campaign ran an ad during the Superbowl this year which caused a lot of discussion and controversy and outrage (and really outrage is so often our default position these days).  No matter what our opinion on the effectiveness/cost/portrayal of such a message, they spoke a deep truth about Jesus as they depicted foot washing.  An act of love and service.  Reading an article about this I came across this story about Tony Campolo, an American speaker/pastor/sociologist/follower of Christ:

“Tony Campolo, …once found himself eating at a late-night diner when a group of prostitutes came in:

One of the women, named Agnes, said her birthday was the next day and observed that she’d never had a birthday party in her life. Campolo overheard the conversation and asked a man behind the counter if the women came in every night. He said yes.

The next night, Campolo brought some simple decorations, hung them up and threw Agnes a surprise party in that diner. She cried tears of joy and ended up taking the cake home, untouched. It was the first birthday cake she had ever received. After she left, he prayed with the people who remained in the diner, and one of the employees asked him what kind of church he belonged to.

Campolo’s answer was perfect: He said he belonged to the kind of church that gives a party for a prostitute at 3:30 a.m. Not, obviously, because he approved of prostitution. But because he cared for Agnes. He threw that party for her before he knew how she’d respond before he knew whether she’d leave the streets and before he’d had a chance to say anything at all to her about Jesus. The party itself spoke to her more loudly than any words could have.

We are called to show Jesus.  The first Gospel that many people will read is us.  We are called to tell and invite others on this follow.  Our families.  Andrew starts with his brother.  Jesus finds Philip and says “Follow me.”  Those in our circles of care.  Philip finds Nathanael and says “Come and see.”  We do this individually, and we do this together.  We make the invitation, “Come and see.”

Be our guest.  This is what we are planning to call something which we feel God is placing it on our hearts to do here at Blythwood.  Be Our Guest.  We plan to create a hospitable space here at Blythwood on eight Sunday evenings starting in March.  It’s a space to invite people who are interested in discussing the deepest questions of life, no matter one’s faith perspective.  What are we looking for?  In what or whom do we hope?  What does connection mean?  Led by our brother Mike Ariza whose chaplaincy call leads him to this kind of questions and discussions all the time. Dinner will be shared.  Open, accepting, honest conversational space will be shared.  Pray for those who will be there.  Pray for those you might invite. 

The invitation ultimately is to daily live in the one who promised that, in him, we would see heaven opened and angels ascending and descending.  In other words, the one who is the bridge between infinite and the finite, the forever and today.  The one in whom we live in/dwell in/abide with the Divine.  The Lamb of God.  The chosen one.  The king of Israel.  The Son of Man.  The Son of God.  Jesus from Nazareth.  Our inviting teacher/Lord/God.  Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift.