Scripture: Psalm 31 (The Message), 1 Peter 2:1-10
Message Apr 20
“I am in the Father and the Father is in me.”
Who’s on First. What’s on Second and I Don’t Know is on Third.
That’s the classic American expression of people talking at cross purposes, and cluelessly or willfully, misunderstanding each other. How many times have you wanted to interrupt that routine and say to both Abbot and Costello – Stop it! Who, What, and I Don’t Know are players’ names. The first baseman is Taiwanese and his last name is spelled HU, pronounced like the pronoun, “Who.”
We have a similar misunderstanding being expressed in this Bible passage. Jesus says he goes to prepare a place for the disciples and that he is the way to get there. But do they understand? No. They ask for a map.
He says the disciples know the Father – God – through him. And they ask for an introduction.
In essence, the disciples want to Google God. Just give me the search terms and I’ll find the answer on the Internet.
Our modern-day misunderstanding continues in this passage, when Jesus’s offer to answer prayer requests is reduced to the prosperity gospel: You want a Mercedes? Just ask in prayer and if you trust enough, Jesus will see that you get it.
I believe that language is God’s gift which makes us human. But language also limits us and keeps us from fully understanding God or sharing our insights. So we are thrown back on metaphor, on figures of speech or narratives to tell our truths. Jesus tells his disciples, if you can’t believe or understand what I’m saying, then look at what I’m doing. Or if you can’t understand the words, understand your experience.
I’m going go bite off a leetle tiny piece of this passage and try to understand it through experience. Jesus said he is “in” the Father and the Father is “in” him. There’s a lot of theology hanging on this phrase. I’m going to look at one tiny word, one of the shortest in the whole passage: “in”
In?
As in, “in the groove,” “in the moment” “in sync”
My mother-in-law, Ruth, is tasting, for the first time, the experience of being a journalist. She’s writing a story for the newsletter of her senior citizens’ residence. And she’s having a lot of fun, as well as frustration, in getting this story just right.
She told us the other night in our every-other-day phone conversation that she got some very good feedback on her story from one of her friends. She started revising the story and she got so immersed in the excitement of creation and revision that she missed her hair appointment. She never misses a hair appointment. But she was so caught up in the moment.
Barry and I both recognized the feeling. She was “in” that story, that process of writing, so completely that she forgot everything else, even the sacrosanct weekly hair appointment.
I recognized that feeling. It’s what kept me working at the newspaper for so long. It didn’t happen all the time, just every now and then – driving back from an interview or a breaking news story and the lead would come to me, and I couldn’t wait to get to a keyboard to write it down. I knew what my colleagues meant when they would say, “this story wrote itself.” They were “in” the groove.
Song writers, poets, novelists, have been quoted saying much the same thing. “The characters are in charge of my novel.” “I set out to say one thing, and the song took over.” “This poem wrote itself. I just tweaked it.”
I’ve felt this “in” feeling, singing with choral groups. Not every song, not every performance or worship service. But now and then, the choir or chorus would be singing an especially demanding or meaningful piece of music and everything would come together so powerfully that when we were finished, we would be standing in awe. Sometimes, this awe would bounce back from the congregation or audience in a silence that was electric. I have occasionally been in the audience when that happened with a singer or group in a concert. There’s a hush before the clapping begins, a collective “in sync” of appreciation for what just happened.
I’ve felt this “in” feeling sometimes in prayer. It’s always when I’m praying with someone, whether I’m speaking or someone else is speaking, or in one case, when no one was speaking. When Joseph Pulitzer Jr. died, all the employees of the Post-Dispatch gathered in the lobby and second-floor balcony for a moment of silent prayer. Hundreds of people just standing there, not saying anything. But most of us were praying.
The feeling was so powerful it almost knocked me over. A whoosh of energy that you could almost hear. After we heard the “amen,” I turned to the woman next to me, Sue Thomson, and she acknowledged my unspoken question: “That was powerful, wasn’t it?” she said. And I knew she had felt it too.
We were “in” prayer.
These “in” moments are intellectual, they’re creative, they’re mental, they’re emotional and they’re physical. Mere words can’t begin to describe them, but you know the experience.
So now I’m going to ask you, for a brief – please – description of when you have had that “in” feeling, of complete absorption, essential creativity, spiritual communion, divine unity or oneness.
Tell us about an “in” moment.
…
Jesus had an awareness far beyond what his disciples – including us – could sustain. For Jesus, his “in” moments were more or less all the time. And he knew them to be divine. He was “in” God and God was “in” him. Whenever we want know what that is like, we have only to believe and trust. In the original language of the gospel, one word stands for these two English words – believe and trust.
“Believe me (trust me): (Jesus said) I am in my Father and my Father is in me. If you can’t believe that, believe what you see—these works. –If you can’t trust that, trust what you see—these works. — The person who trusts me will not only do what I’m doing but even greater things, — The person who believes me will not only do what I’m doing but even greater things.
Believe and trust, whether it’s Jesus’s words or his works. Whether it’s the language of words or of experience. If you want to know God, study Jesus.
Jesus ends this passage with a promise. It’s not about praying to receive material goods or for things to go your way. It’s about having those “in” experiences.
Jesus says, The person who believes me will not only do what I’m doing but even greater things. Because I, on my way to the Father, am giving you the same work to do that I’ve been doing. You can count on it. From now on, whatever you request along the lines of who I am and what I am doing, I’ll do it. That’s how the Father will be seen for who he is in the Son. I mean it. Whatever you request in this way, I’ll do.
Praise God. Amen.
Tags: Easter, gospel of John
