A Bit More Reflecting On The Gospel Of John

So here is another odd thing that interests me. In chapter 6 of the gospel of John, Jesus has gone up a mountain on the other side of the Sea of Galilee and a lot of people are following him. Jesus sees the crowd and maybe because it is noon or maybe Jesus himself is feeling hungry, he brings up the topic of food. And he asks Philip, "Where are we to buy bread so that these people may eat?"

John says that Jesus singled out Philip for this question "to test him." And then nothing more is said about this test. Philip gives a reply but doesn't even get mentioned again. I feel disappointed. What happened with this test? Did Jesus feed all those people just so he could test Philip? Or was that an afterthought?

John says that Jesus knew what he would do. Jesus knows what he is about to do, but he asks Philip a question that implies he wants to buy bread. A test. Odd test. Feels a little misleading even a tad deceptive. But, of course, I am thinking in terms of myself. Projecting onto Jesus how I would feel if I did something like that.

The only reason I might do something similar is to tease the other. To reveal a big surprise, a pleasant surprise, a happy surprise. Something like, "Oh, yeah, it's your birthday. Where are we going to buy a cake?" Full well knowing I have one made from scratch in the pantry and have planned a surprise party in the next room.

Who knows maybe that is the kind of testing that Jesus does. A teasing test so that he can reveal the surprise, the unexpected, the whatever that is in the next room.

Reflecting Again On The Gospel of John

I don't get Jesus. I mean, I do, but I don't. He is an odd sort of person, and the further I read in the gospel of John, the odder he is getting.

In chapter five, Jesus heals the invalid beside the pool of Bethesda. It is a brief but interesting account. Jesus behaves oddly. Out of what my version says are multitudes of invalids lying around, Jesus singles out one man. Now maybe Jesus healed more of them, but I'm guessing he didn't because John specifically says "one man" was there who had been there a very long time. One out of multitudes. All of them sick. John says "blind, lame, and paralyzed."

First, I have to ask. What was Jesus doing there, in that pool area? Was he taking in the sights of all the invalids? Did he go there intending to heal only one person? Was that spontaneous? Did he look at the others who were there?  John says that it was so crowded that no one even seemed to notice that this guy got healed. The healed one didn't even find out who it was that healed him until later. Unbelievable that no one saw this and yelled, "Hey how about me? I 'd like to walk, please."

Second, I feel somewhat confused. What prevented Jesus from healing more than one? I work in a state hospital. The patients there are sick. Mentally sick, emotionally sick, physically sick, and spiritually sick. Nearly every work day, I think how wondrous it would be to be able to miraculously heal them. But not just one. There are so many for whom I feel compassion. I want them to be well because I care for them. I see their pain, their suffering. But unlike Jesus, my powers are limited. What prevented him from healing more than one of the multitudes? I don't get it. It is odd. Jesus is odd.

He healed one and left unnoticed. I am not bothered by the leaving unnoticed. The leaving after only one bothers me. I know that I'll just have to live feeling bothered by Jesus' actions. He didn't seem concerned that his actions bothered the Jews. I'm sure that my feeling bothered is of no consequence. Nevertheless, Jesus behaves oddly. And yes, some would explain it somehow so that Jesus doesn't look so odd.

But really, I am absolutely okay with Jesus' being a bit odd . . . okay, with being a lot odd.

Another Reflection on the Gospel of John

Jesus and John

As I continue reading in John, I am fascinated with what I am noticing. For this post, I plan to write about the “weirdness” of Jesus. Just a warning so that you have time to exit and go somewhere else in the blogging world.

As I was saying, Jesus strikes me as odd, bizarre, weird. Now it could be that it appears this way because John omits bits and pieces of the conversations that Jesus has with people. But it is so odd that it probably did indeed take place as written. Otherwise, John is a poor storyteller and makes Jesus look like a weirdo. Either way, Jesus seems to say weird and off-the-wall things.

Now I have heard preachers try to explain this weirdness, but they make a lot of assumptions. And who, really, can get inside Jesus’ head by means of a few words on a page and speak for half an hour about something that is just too weird to explain. I’ll tell you what I think. I think Jesus’ weirdness is scary, so they have to make up some rational explanation so that Jesus doesn’t appear to be munching mushrooms when his disciples weren’t looking.

Now, I am not trying to be disrespectful here. I am just saying that some things Jesus says are way out there—downright weird. And for the record, “weird,” according to the dictionary, is “strange, bizarre.” So there you have it. Jesus says weird things. And in John, I have noticed these weird things.

The text that really got me thinking about this is in John 4. This is the story of Jesus’ conversation with the Samaritan woman at the well. The first weirdness occurs following an intense dialogue about water—who will draw it, who will drink it, where it comes from, well water, living water—basically, it has to do with water. Jesus brings her to the place where she wants the living water and asks Jesus to give it to her.

He then says, “Go get your husband.” What? They were just talking about water. She wants this living water. And Jesus changes the subject completely and randomly (although, I am sure it made sense in his head), tells her to get her husband. Weird. Of course, if you’ve read this chapter, you know that the conversation takes a few more turns, and by the end of it, they are talking about the Messiah. And then Jesus declares that he is the Messiah. But they get there by way of the husband. Now that is bizarre.

The second weirdness occurs when the disciples come back with food. They urge Jesus to eat. After all, he was tired and needed to rest. They figure he needs some nourishment to revive his energy. And what does Jesus reply to their urgings? “I have food. You just don’t know about it.” The disciples are confused. I would be confused. Then Jesus starts talking about sowing and reaping, fields, sowers and reapers, laboring, and getting paid. Weird.

It is as though Jesus ignores what his disciples are saying. And I imagine that Jesus got the kind of stare people have when they are envisioning something in their own minds and begin talking about it with a sort of flat affect because they are mesmerized by their own visualizations. I don’t know. Maybe I'm the only one that does that sort of thing. It just seems weird for Jesus to start talking somewhat off-topic.

And what really gets me is that nobody seems to care that Jesus is weird. They let him be weird. They even go along with his weirdness. I like that. And I like that Jesus is weird because I identify with weirdness. It gets people’s attention, makes them ask interesting questions, and prevents a certain comfortableness with the way things are.

I’ll be looking for more of Jesus' weirdness. It keeps me asking questions and prevents me from getting too comfortable with who I think Jesus ought to be or with what others have said about who Jesus is.

A Reflection on The Gospel of John

St. John the Apostle

 Recently, I began reading the gospel of John for my morning reflection. I got stuck on chapter 1 verse 5. "The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it." I felt confused by this. It seems to me rather obvious. I felt curious. What does he mean? John writes as though darkness is an entity with power to act. Could darkness ever overcome light? Why would John write such a thing?

No, I did not grab my Greek New Testament or my lexicon or any reliable commentaries or read through the entire gospel immediately to get the context of this statement. Instead, I sat with it that morning. I have been sitting with it since that morning. And here I am writing about it. Yes, I have read further in the gospel, and yes, I go back and reread that statement to discern how it fits with what I am currently reading.

But at present, it wants to stand alone. It wants to challenge me in some deep place, a dark place, a mysterious place with no name as yet. In my journal for that day's reading, I wrote "the darkness within me cannot overcome the light that is within me." I don't know, but I am thinking that this is mystical language. And of course, I would because that is what I like and prefer. Metaphors and analogies. Vague concepts and spiritual innuendos.

It could be that John simply meant something like "flip the light switch and wah . . . lah . . . darkness gone." But it appears otherwise. John gives darkness power to do something or to not do something. In this case to overcome or not overcome. To overcome light or not.

I like this switcheroo. John seems to be telling me (and certainly, I am personalizing this, and surely, it reflects my inner state of being at present, but nevertheless), he seems to be saying that what is dark in me will never overcome the light in me. Contrary to what I might believe about my life's circumstances or my own abilities, contrary to self-incrimination, self-accusation, or self-darkness, these things will not overcome the light within me.

They will not overcome what shines in me. They will not conquer that which gives me life. But of course, this is what John says in the verse preceding this one. Life is light. The key to this overcoming business is belief. I saw that John says something about this in verse twelve. So in my mind, I can either believe the darkened things about myself or believe the lightened things.

Seems to me that John would like for me to believe that Jesus came to enlighten me so that those self-darkening thoughts and feelings would no longer overcome me. Doesn't mean they no longer exist or that I can pretend they don't exist. It means that they won't do-me-in, they won't choke-me-out, they won't sink me like a chain around my neck in the middle of a swamp.

Instead, there is a steady burning light that doesn't go out, doesn't succumb, doesn't submit. Its source is eternal, fueled by heaven. In John's words, its name is grace and truth, grace upon grace. Grace lights me up, and the dark things that would like to throw me into despair have no power to do so. That is a powerful bit of lighted information. Something I don't want to forget.