Come and See
One of my pastor friends told me this story: He and his wife recently returned to a church where he once served. To their amazement, a woman they knew, Hazel, stood up to introduce them. Hazel had been battered and bruised by life in just about every way possible… physically and psychologically. She was a desperately fearful woman who could hardly manage even a very short conversation with anyone, especially a male. This pastor’s wife had spent many hours with timid, quivering Hazel. And yet, here she was, standing up in front of the entire congregation, introducing them! After the service, they asked a long-time member of the congregation, “What did you do?” “We did what you started,” she said. “We just kept including her.” Nothing fancy… nothing extraordinary… just old-fashioned human kindness and decency… the offer to walk alongside her… not in front of her or behind her… and an invitation to include her in the adventure of life.
That’s why I find such irony in this passage of scripture. Here is John the Baptist, continually holding Jesus up for admiration and respect… praising him before his own disciples… witnessing to this extraordinary person… telling his disciples that this is the Son of God. I don’t know what these disciples of John expected when they went to Jesus, but with that kind of an introduction, I know I would expect something profound… something miraculous… something amazing… but that is not what they got. Jesus simply says, “Come and see”… and then, there is no record that he did anything extraordinary… or mysterious… or miraculous. He just invited them to share his journey… to witness his day-to-day interaction with people that illustrated in a powerful way his teachings of love… of compassion… of inclusion… of how to live the Christian life.
Sometimes, when we struggle with ways to attract people to our church, I think we get caught up in the need to present something that is “better than what any other church is doing.” We want some special program that will draw people to us… because it is a special witness… or a special outreach…or a special ministry. We forget that most of the time, Jesus wasn’t doing something special. He was just walking around, inviting people to join him as he shared… in word and deed… what it meant to be God’s people in this place. And, most of the time, the things he did were not miraculous… or extraordinary. He did small deeds of kindness… of compassion… of love… of mercy… for people who were tired… lonely… ignored… overwhelmed… beaten down by life. For those people, what he did was like a cup of cold water in the middle of a hot afternoon… or a little piece of chocolate in the middle of a busy day.
I know that I often put in front of you examples of people who, to us, are larger than life… heroes who have earned a place in history by what they have done for humanity… like Mother Teresa… Martin Luther King, Jr… Ghandi… and so on. But often these people represent a level of commitment to a cause that you or I can’t aspire to. The same applies to biblical heroes we find in scripture… Moses… Elijah… Ruth… Mary… or Paul. Sometimes, I think these stories of exceptional saints backfire. Because I believe that, if we set the bar too high… if the example that we use is too extraordinary… people think they can’t live up to it and they simply walk away. We don’t need a bunch of “saints” in our church. What we need are ordinary people who are willing to walk alongside others and invite them to share the journey.
This invitation can be as simple as inviting someone to share our potluck lunch next Sunday. There is nothing extraordinary about this meal. Everyone brings something to share and we sit down together to share it… to simply break bread together. We enjoy the food. We enjoy the company. We enjoy the conversation. And there is no expectation placed upon us to do anything special… anything miraculous… anything mysterious… anything extraordinary. It is ordinary people sharing an ordinary meal. When was the last time that you invited someone to come with you to that meal? When was the last time that you said, “I really like my church and one of things I like best is our ‘Two-Cent-A-Meal.’ Come and see?” Come and see what we do… as ordinary Christians in an ordinary place. Come share the journey. Folks don’t have to bring anything to this meal… just come and share. I know there are some concerns that we might run out of food… but you know, I would rather see twice as many people and no food… than twice as much food and no people. Most of the time, we are trying to figure out what to do with all the leftovers after the meal. Wouldn’t it be great if we had so many people that we worried more about what to do with them after the meal than what to do with the food? Invite someone to “come and see”… to share the day with you… the way that Jesus invited these disciples of John to simply share the day with him.
Mark Ralls, in his essay entitled “The Other ‘H’ Word,” says, "Hospitality has lost its edge in the contemporary church. We no longer see it as a weighty moral issue; it is now more about manners than morals... But the hospitality of Jesus was controversial. He chafed against the limits of social propriety by welcoming prostitutes and adulterers… crooks and outcasts into his gracious presence. His hospitality knew no limit. It was not just indiscriminate: it was promiscuous." What if our hospitality was that way… indiscriminate… promiscuous? What if we invited the outcasts of society to our “Two-Cent-A-Meals” or our All-Church Dinners? What if, instead of trying to find some new extraordinary ministry, we simply invited people to share what we already do… what we already have? What if we extended an invitation to worship with us… eat with us… study the Bible with us… to every person who came to the church seeking emergency assistance during the week… or to those we meet in the grocery store… the beauty shop… or Wal-Mart? Oh, yeah. Some of them may already have a church home… but statistics show that more than 60% of them don’t. The ones who do, don’t have to come… but the ones who don’t could simply share what we have… and what we already do.
“Come and see.” What Jesus was a master of was inviting people to join him… to share with him… and that simple invitation transformed their lives. Can we do that? Or are things different now? In his book, The Heart of Christianity, Marcus Borg of Oregon State University describes how his university students today have a uniformly negative image of Christianity. "When I ask them to write a short essay on their impression of Christianity," Borg says, "they consistently use five adjectives: Christians are literalistic… anti-intellectual… self-righteous… judgmental… and bigoted." Now, we might object, saying, rather defensively, that it's unfair to draw sweeping conclusions based upon the report of one person. But, if we think that way, we would be right in our logic but wrong in our conclusion.
In a new book called unChristian, David Kinnaman of the Barna Group presents objective research that supports Borg's subjective anecdote. Kinnaman's three-year study documents how an overwhelming percentage of sixteen to twenty-nine year olds view Christians with hostility… resentment… and disdain. And, these broadly and deeply negative views of Christians aren't just superficial stereotypes with no basis in reality, says Kinnaman. Nor are the critics people who have had no contact with churches or Christians. Rather, it's based upon these individuals’ real experiences with today's Christians. According to Kinnaman's Barna study, here are the percentages of people outside the church who think that the following words describe present-day Christianity: antihomosexual 91%... judgmental 87%... hypocritical 85%... old-fashioned 78%... too political 75%... out of touch with reality 72%... insensitive to others 70%... boring 68%. It would be hard to overestimate, says Kinnaman, "how firmly people reject… and feel rejected by… Christians".
Gabe Lyons of the Fermi Project who commissioned the Barna research study remembers his first look at the data. "I will never forget sitting in Starbucks… poring through the research results on my laptop. As I soaked it in, I glanced at the people around me and was overwhelmed with the thought that this is what they think of me. It was a sobering thought to know that if I had stood up and announced myself as a 'Christian' to the customers assembled in Starbucks that day, they would have associated me with every one of the negative perceptions described in this book". So, Borg was right. Maybe even more right than he knew.
In our text this week, Jesus speaks for the first time. When Andrew and a friend ask Jesus where he is staying, Jesus says, "Come and see." And so they did… they went and spent the whole day with Jesus. They were so taken by that one day with Jesus that "the first thing Andrew did," writes John, was to find his brother Peter and say: "Come and see." The very next day, John writes, Philip grabbed Nathaniel and said the same thing: "Come and see." Thus were the unlikely beginnings of an improbable movement. The gospels record how throngs of people were so captivated by the preaching… teaching… and healing of Jesus that they did, in fact, "come and see" for themselves. Based upon what they experienced with Jesus, their lives were radically transformed.
What would happen if someone spent a day with you? Would they see something so amazing… would they experience something so wonderful… so profound in the ordinary things that you do that it would transform their lives? Why or why not? If someone spent the day with you, would they see the Christian that outsiders believe we are… according to the research done by the Barna Group… or a true reflection of the person and ministry of Jesus Christ? Isn’t that the dilemma of being a Christian in the world today? We can invite others to “come and see,” but we worry about what they will see… so, rather than issue the invitation, we come alone… breaking our bread with insiders and leaving the outsiders outside. That’s not what Jesus wanted from his disciples. He knew that they could not be perfect, for only God is perfect. What he wanted them to do was to understand his message of love and compassion and to demonstrate it for others… however imperfectly they did so. For he knew that, in that struggle to be what he was, they would grow in their ability to love… to share… to show compassion… and to be all that they could be. He also knew that those they invited to share the journey would witness their efforts… and the transformation in their own lives… and come to a real knowledge of the love and grace of God. You see, God does not expect perfection… God expects… and respects… the effort that we make to be the reflection of Jesus Christ in this world. God also knows that, if we share the journey, it is not just our lives that will be transformed… it is the lives of all those we invite to share it with us. “Come and see.” Share the journey with me. Bring someone else along. It will change your life. Amen.
John 1:29-42