John 13
During supper Jesus…got up from the table took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him.
After he had washed their feet, had put on his robe, and had returned to the table, Jesus said to them, “You call me Teacher and Lord—and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you. I tell you, servants are not greater than their master, nor are messengers greater than the one who sent them. If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them. Truly, I tell you, whoever receives one whom I send receives me; and whoever receives me receives him who sent me.
I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.
John 14
Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.
If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you. I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you…I have said these things to you while I am still with you. But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you.
John 15
I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. You did not choose me but I chose you.
John 16
You will be scattered, each one to his home…Yet I am not alone because the Father is with me. I have said this to you, so that in me you may have peace. In the world you face persecution. But take courage; I have conquered the world!
John 17
I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.
Biblical scholars refer to chapters 13-17 in John’s Gospel as the farewell discourse. That’s a fancy way of saying these are words attributed to Jesus by the author of John’s Gospel intended to fill the early church with a sense of the work of the Holy Spirit. Jesus has lived, died, risen, lived again and now tells his disciples he is leaving them. Jesus is not leaving these followers as “orphans”, rather he is sending something he calls “the Advocate” to intercede and highlight the work that is left to do in Jesus’ name.
The summary I have shared with you, from these five chapters, lays out a clear mission for these disciples. They are to serve, to receive, to witness, to prepare space, to include, to call each other friends, with the clear confidence that Jesus has conquered the powers of the world and set us free. We are home. And at our home there is a table and there is a chair with our name on it. And praise Jesus, there is a chair with our neighbour’s name on it too! There is room at this table. And as we have received an invitation so we are called to invite others too. That’s called grace, that’s called a free gift of love, that’s called unconditional love.
And why is it such a big deal that Jesus invites others to his table and asks his disciples to do likewise? We know Jesus was criticized, heavily, for whom he ate with; sinners, tax collectors, people with diseases. In our culture this washes over us like the choice between sitting at a table or a booth. But in Jesus’ time who you ate with reflected who you were. Rich people ate with rich people. Peasants ate with peasants. Jews ate with Jews. Gentiles ate with their kin and their social equals. If you walked by a structure at a meal time and looked inside you would see a community of like-minded persons, people from the same social class and religion, ethnicity and income. At the centre of this meal would be the host and the one in the gathering who held the most power and influence in that community.
Jesus didn’t just eat with people who were a mixture of different incomes, religions, genders, social classes, he also asked hosts to fill their empty seats with people who were standing outside their structure, physically and spiritually, to go out into the streets and bring people in. (Luke 14) Jesus’ rational was simple, those at your table were there because they were expected to be there, because they owed the host or the host owed them. But those who would come from outside would receive the invitation as a free gift and thus would feel no entitlement, no sense of ownership, no expectation that their place at the table was earned or based on merit.
The act of hosting, serving and breaking bread together is more than nutrition or social etiquette. When you host a gathering you are telling your guests that they matter, that they are included and that their presence changes the spiritual chemistry of our collective gathering. We tend to spend a lot of time thinking these days about what we shall eat, and we should. But do we spend as much time thinking about whom we will invite to this meal?
This is Pentecost Sunday. Many will be hearing the famous Pentecost Bible story of Acts 2, when the Holy Spirit comes to the early church and voices of different languages are heard extolling the glory of God. Pentecost is often thought of as a super-charged Spiritual happening. And we mainline Protestants tend to shy away from such ecstatic references, we tend to experience God in more reasonable and expected encounters. But our text for this morning is no less surprising or potentially emotional. Jesus’ farewell to his disciples in John Gospel has a power all its own. When we, Jesus’ disciples, live out Jesus’ witness, we too make miracles, we too, do amazing and great things that hold us for eternity.
The setting for today’s Gospel text is Jesus’ farewell address at his last supper with his disciples. Jesus has washed his disciples’ feet and has explained to them what this means (13:1-20). He has told his disciples that he will be with them only a little while longer, and that where he is going, they cannot come (13:33). No wonder the disciples are troubled. Their beloved teacher is leaving them. Jesus calls them back to this fundamental relationship of trust and assures them that he is not abandoning them. When Jesus says that they know the way to the place where he is going (14:4), Thomas, like most characters in the Gospel, takes Jesus quite literally. He wants directions, a road map to this place (14:5). Jesus responds by saying that he himself is the way: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (14:6).
Unfortunately, this verse has often been used as a trump card, or worse, as a threat, to tell people that they better get with the program and “accept Jesus as their personal Lord and Saviour” in order to be saved. To interpret the verse this way is to rip it from its context and do violence to the spirit of Jesus’ words. This statement by Jesus is a promise, a word of comfort to his disciples. Jesus himself is all they need; there is no need to panic, no need to search desperately for a secret map. Jesus adds, “If you know me, you will know my Father also” (14:7). The conditional phrase in Greek is a condition of fact, meaning that the condition is understood to be true: “If you know me (and you do), you will know my father also.” So that there can be no misunderstanding, Jesus adds, “From now on, you do know him and have seen him” (14:7).
Philip is not quite convinced. “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied” (14:8). Jesus’ response contains perhaps a hint of exasperation: “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father” (14:9). This is the whole of Jesus’ mission, to make known God, to reveal who God is. Jesus, who has come from God and is now returning there, is the fullest revelation of the person and character of God. If we want to know who God is, we need look no further than Jesus. All the words that Jesus has spoken, all the works that he has done, come from God and show us who God is (14:10-11).
And what is the symbol, the ritual, the community sign, that Jesus is present to those who follow him? Remember the Gospel story from a few weeks ago? Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.” So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, a hundred fifty-three of them; and though there were so many, the net was not torn. Jesus said to them, “Come and have breakfast.” Now none of the disciples dared to ask him, “Who are you?” because they knew it was the Lord. Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and did the same with the fish.
Of all the parts of that story that weave together to bring Jesus alive to us the two I want to lift up this Pentecost Sunday are these; that meal was a surprise (Jesus is present after all) and there are many fish brought to the nets (new people are joining the movement). When our text this morning speaks of If you know me, you will know my Father also we are being reminded that to know Jesus is to expect him where we might least expect him. In essence to eat with Jesus is to experience Jesus as the one we least expected to be at our table.
In our kitchen at this very moment 15 people from Bethany are preparing a meal for 200+ people at St. Andrew’s United Church often referred to as the “Sunday Suppers”. When I ask people who attend that meal every Sunday about the meal they never tell me about the menu or the quantity of the offering. What guests at the suppers tell me they remember is how they were welcomed, who called them by name, how they felt a part of the community.
In our Communion meal later in this service the four people who will serve you bread and grape juice will ask your name. When you share your name the server will respond, “Kevin, there is room for you at this table, this is the bread of new life/this is the cup of blessing.” I want you to know, when we welcome someone in Jesus’ gracious and grace-filled name you are offering something life-giving and life-changing. Pentecost is the coming of the Holy Spirit, that Advocate sent by Jesus to remind us of the presence of the Living-God. This welcome changes you, it changes me and it changes us. The Holy Spirit is a surprise and what a surprise it is! Who would know there is room for all of us? God knows. And you know too.
All of us crave the certainty that we matter, that there is a place for us somewhere. That Jesus is preparing a place for us is transformational. Moreover, offering a place at the table is equally transformative. To be welcomed, to welcome, what could be better? This Advocate we receive, this Holy Spirit that comes when we least expect it, from those we least expect to be present, is enough to change our lives. Those encounters last a life-time, last in eternity. The Kingdom, heaven, is less a mansion build to reward the rule-followers and successful few, it is the place where Jesus has prepared room for all, where those outside become those inside, where all of us make each other clean, each other welcome, each other loved.
God is our Advocate in this journey. Thank God for this invitation. Amen.