"Those Who Aren't Here Yet"  John 17:20-26

A Sermon Preached By

Rev. Peter W. Shidemantle

Seventh Sunday of Easter,  May 23, 2004

PEBBLE HILL PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

5299 Jamesville Rd., Dewitt, NY  13214 

Phone:  315-446-0960

                                                                                    phillchu@twcny.rr.com

I have found myself using a certain phrase these last couple of years – I’m not sure where I first saw it – as we’ve been talking more and more about growing our congregation.  I’ve been referring to those “who aren’t here yet.”  I like that phrase, for a couple of reasons.  I like it because it assumes that there will be others who’ll be joining us, and that kind of anticipation, I think, is essential for any endeavor that one is serious about (if one is serious about it).  And I like it because there is a kind of healthy confidence about it, that there is something here that is worth being part of, something valuable and helpful.

          Jesus’ prayer, in today’s gospel text, is in part for those who aren’t here yet.  He prays for “those who will believe in me through their word” – that is, the word of his disciples – not just the disciples sitting at table with him at the Last Supper, but the word of his disciples ever since.  His prayer is for those who do not yet believe, yet who will come to believe, through those who already believe in him.

          So there are two groups here – those who believe, and those who do not yet believe.  It is through the words of one, Jesus prays confidently, that the other will come to believe.  It seems that Jesus, in his confident prayer, assumes an almost organic connection between coming to faith and sharing it with others.  Surely others will come to believe through them!  This is how his church will grow.  It’s as the story that tells about Jesus, when he went to heaven, was asked by the angel Gabriel:  “Jesus, now that you’re up here, who’s going to continue the wonderful work that you started down there?”  Jesus responds, “I’ve left eleven good people down there.”  “That’s it?” Gabriel asks astonishingly.  “I’ve made no other plans,” says Jesus.

          Is this how we see our role as Christian believers, as followers of Jesus – that others might come to faith through us?  Well, how else?  Now, maybe some of you might be getting a little nervous that I might be getting ready to charge you with harassing your friends and neighbors about the condition of their souls.  This is sort of the stereotypical image most of us have of a person-to-person evangelism, and I’m assuming that most of us wouldn’t be doing that anytime soon.  We have that image, I think, for a couple of reasons.  One is the experience many have had of being manipulated or intimidated into a kind of frightened belief, almost in a cult-like sense.  We rightly reject that, as our Lord, I believe, desires that people come to him and to his church out of the freedom of their own yearnings.  But the other reason I think we hang on to that stereotype, and it remains so strong a negative image, is because it serves as a kind of defense mechanism for us.  It makes it easier for us to avoid our role, even our responsibility as believers in bringing others to faith.

          We’ve come to this as the identity of Christianity and the church and its relationship to larger society over time.  Many of us, as we say, “grew up” in the church, during a time when the commonly accepted practice and expectation was that Christianity was simply “passed on” from one generation to the next – from baptism, through early training in Sunday School and confirmation, on into adult membership in the church.  Many of us have benefited from that kind of steady nurturing in the faith.  If you came from a family where the practice of the faith was a regular part of life, and where there were community supports in place, it was an almost natural process of moving from non-belief to belief; you grew into it.

          Nowadays, as we know, this is increasingly not the case.  Our church institutions, naturally enough, still operate as if it is – because they were built to support and provide for a large and growing Christian culture.  Institutions, as we know, are slow to adapt and change.  The church is no different than any other institution in that regard.

          What I’m saying is that we have gotten lazy in bringing others to faith.  It hasn’t been intentional on our part.  It’s just that we’re in a new time and place, and we’re out of practice.  A society growing increasingly diverse, an anti-institutional bias that my whole generation grew up with, suspicion of authority or of authoritative approaches to what is thought to be an extremely personal matter like religious faith, not to mention the various scandals and divisions that continue to plague the church of Jesus Christ – all of these things have come together in such a way that is calling us, I believe, not just to find new ways of passing on the faith and building up the church, but for a renewed commitment to doing it.  I think we need to lay claim again to that word that has for the most part left our church vocabulary and been taken over by others whom we are all too ready to let have it – evangelism.

          But there should be nothing foreign or scary about it because the word only means “good news.”  Good news.  Can we not affirm that the gospel is good news?  And what do you do with news?  You spread it.  That’s what news is.  It wouldn’t make much sense for a newspaper to be printed and then not send it out to readers.  It wouldn’t make much sense for a TV network to prepare a broadcast and do it for just a studio audience.  No – you get it out there.

          The core message of the good news of the gospel is that God is in love with the world, that in fact God so loved the world that God gave the only Son – who lived an astounding life, died an excruciating death, and that God overcame the power of death in him – so that those who are “in him,” who see the way of his life and death and resurrection as the path that brings true wholeness of life (which his what “salvation” means), life that does not end with physical death, but eternal life that is present to us now.

          That’s a lot to take in all at once.  All of us are still working on it.  Maybe we’re not sure about every little part of it.  Jesus doesn’t really say anything about swallowing it whole.  But that’s not the point.  Our witness to the world does not depend upon our own certainty about matters the church has formulated into doctrine, our knowledge of the bible, or even our own moral strength.  What he prays about and prays for his followers is their unity and their love.  This is how the world will come to believe – as they see our unity in Christ and our love for one another.  And what draws people into such a community is the love that is at the center, the love of God for the world, the love of God for each, the love of God for all.

          The church is the community of those who acknowledge and confess their need for God.  God is love, and we are not whole without God - just as we are not whole without the other people in our lives who make us more than we are alone.  Isn’t that what love is?  Isn’t it the bond that seals our need for one another?  This is how we are created, and our deepest need is for God.  This is what we say when we are part of the church, we “confess” our need.  That in itself is a pretty radical thing to confess in these days.  We’re not supposed to “need” anything that we cannot get for ourselves.  But we cannot “get” God – we can only receive God, only accept God’s love as a gift. 

          Is that good enough news to share?   That gift is for us, and for those who aren’t here yet.  It’s not about the place; it’s about the gift.  And sometimes, let’s admit it, the place gets in the way of the gift.  But we are committed to the love, and we keep working at it, and we get practice in forgiveness, and we seek deeper understanding.  We share one another’s grief, and we minister to one another’s pain.  We rejoice in one another’s happiness.  None of it perfectly, not without struggle, certainly not without disagreement.  But our unity does not depend on that, but on the gift, on the love.

          “Lord, I need you.”  That is the deepest confession of the human heart.  And it opens up into a whole new world.  It’s a world that folks are just longing to know about.  Our words can help usher the way in.  So can our actions.  So can our lives of service and standing for justice and speaking up for the hurting and the lonely.  What does not is keeping the good news to ourselves.   

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