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One very useful way of reading the Gospel of John is to see
a spiral pattern of three concentric circles. The first and outermost circle
portrays Jesus as the Savior of the world (chapters 1-4), the second shows
Jesus as Messiah to the Jews (5-12) and the third shows him as Lord of the
Church. Each of these “circles” considers the whole ministry of
Jesus in order to give the portrayal that is being emphasized. This literary
technique seems to be a feature of the Johannine style and is observable in
the seemingly circuitous arguments of the Epistles and the convoluted spiral
evident in the book of Revelation.
If John’s gospel is read in this way one hears some things
in this text that would not otherwise be heard. The prologue has introduced
Jesus as the preexistent word who was eternally God, and thereafter John 1-4
shows that there is a “worldwide” impact of his salvific presence
in the world. John in his first four chapters does not want to cast Jesus
in any parochial light, his significance is to be seen as cosmic and worldwide.
The pericopes in these chapters show the ordinary sincere Jew
open to believing in Jesus, while the more elite Jewish leaders are shown
to be either not open to believe at all or people who find it very difficult
to do so. They also show Samaritans believing in Jesus and the incredible
faith of a royal official who represented a pagan Herodian court.
In these stories the text of John 1-4 shows that in the very
life and ministry of Jesus the programmatic for the spread of the gospel from
Jerusalem and Judea, to Samaria and then to the uttermost parts of the earth,
would have already been evident. He was the Savior of the world.
These were people that were actively looking for the Messiah
to come (1:41) and had been in sync with what God was doing up to that point,
in that they received the ministry of John the Baptist and became his disciples.
Their obedience of faith prepared them for and led them to Christ. So Andrew,
one of John’s disciples, introduced Simon (renamed Peter by Jesus). They
excitedly shared their “find” with relatives and friends.
The text indicates that Jesus “finds” Philip who was
from the same seaside Galilean town, Bethsaida, as Andrew and Peter. Philip
introduced Jesus of Nazareth as the anticipated Christ to the very honest
Nathaniel, who questions the possibility of any good coming out of Nazareth.
Nathaniel seems to epitomize for Jesus the “true Israelite” (a very
positive term as opposed to the often pejoratively used term “Jew”
in the Gospel of John). There is nothing insincere in him. The text seems
to have identified another hallmark of those early believers. Their sincere
open hearts overcome personal prejudices in order to be led to Jesus and his
message.
An ordinary wedding is the scene of the first miracle of Jesus.
As a consequence of this act the text says, “his disciples put their
faith in him” (2:11). This was in a rural village in Cana of Galilee.
The text highlights the key to the events as the advice of Mary, Jesus’
mother, to the servants to “Do whatever he tells you.” (2:5) Their
risk of faith in the midst of a crisis led them to see a miracle. This miracle
further convinced his disciples.
The acceptance of ordinary Jewish people in Galilee is contrasted
in the text with the outright rejection of Jerusalem based elite leaders,
in those cases where there is not outright rejection there is “blindness”
(of even sincere rabbinic teachers) and superficial belief.
The story of the clearing of the temple demonstrates that organized
urban Jewish religion is hostile to Jesus and that Jesus brings judgment upon
it. Jesus has come to replace the temple cultus with himself. In this connection
he predicts his resurrection in an enigmatic statement about the temple. He
says, “Destroy this temple and I will build it in three days.” The
Jewish religious establishment understandably mistook this statement as a
reference to the Jerusalem temple and dismissed it as an impossible, if subversive
threat. John notes that it is only after his resurrection that Jesus’
own disciples understood that his reference to this temple was to his own
body in his death and resurrection.
This section of the text ends with the indication, that in Jerusalem
there was evidence of some Jewish belief in Jesus but that it was essentially
suspect and not trustworthy. “But Jesus would not entrust himself to
them.” (2:24)
Nicodemus represents another element of the Jewish religious
elite—the Pharisees. He is portrayed in the text as sincere but unable
to understand. He seems to epitomize the “blindness” of the Jewish
religious leadership.
The text now shows Jesus reaching out to the Samaritans, these
close relatives to the Jews who were the objects of Jewish prejudice and disdain.
Jesus reached out to a Samaritan woman in this story, breaking
the social conventions that governed the relations between Jews and Samaritans
and also those that informed a relationship between a man and a woman. The
Samaritan woman responded to Jesus by going and inviting her whole village
to come to meet “the Messiah.” The villagers came to see Jesus and
many received him as the Messiah, in their mind he was “the Savior of
the world” (4:42).
There is no clear statement in the text as to the nationality
of the “royal official” whose son is healed in this story. And,
while the story has several points of congruence with that recorded in the
Synoptics featuring a Roman centurion and his servant, we may not confidently
say they are the same story or that this royal official was a Roman centurion.
What we can say however, is that it was not unusual for the courts of the
Herodian dynasty to have non-Jewish members in its employ. It is likely then
that this royal official may have been a gentile. Whereas his nationality
cannot be asserted with any conviction, it can be said confidently that neither
Herod Antipas nor the members of his court represented anything near the mainstream
of Jewish orthodoxy. They indeed had embarrassingly paganized Palestine, and
this was so particularly in Galilee. They did this by introducing pagan culture,
pagan practices and pagan religion. The text shows Jesus reaching out to a
man who was in desperate need although he was a representative of this scandalously
pagan royal court. In fact this was the occasion of Jesus’ second miracle
and as a consequence the man and his household became believers of Jesus (4:53).
John writes his gospel to address the quintessential human need,
as he sees it the need to believe “that Jesus is the Christ, the Son
of God” and so that through belief people may have life through his name
(John 30:31). The text is therefore concerned with the valid human need for
plausible and credible evidence that would inform and support faith in Jesus
as the Christ and Son of God.
The text is also concerned with the need for all human beings
to recognize their inclusion in God’s salvific provisions in Jesus Christ.
This is so in spite of ethnicity, gender or social status: Jew, Samaritan
or pagan, woman or man, royalty and plebeian.
The text is also indicative that there is a need for an attitude
of openness to what God is doing to be able to appreciate it and consequently
benefit from it. The tragedy of voluntary “blindness” as a deterrent
to a saving revelation is in view.
God presents evidence through two miracles that demonstrated
that Jesus had power over nature (water to wine), over lack (no wine to abundant
and better quality) and over sickness (healing of the royal official’s
son). The care with which the credibility of the miracles is presented is
intended to demand a verdict of acceptance. The details in the text are compelling.
The recorded positive response to these miracles by their first
witnesses are also intended by the text to inspire confidence in the plausibility
of belief. The text states that even the disciples (partially committed) really
believed now, after they saw the water turned to wine and the royal official
and his whole household became believers. The implication of the text is that
there is compelling evidence for any fair examiner of it to believe.
The text embraces the poles of human demographics in demonstrating
the interest of God in Christ to minister to people and to bring salvation
to them. Time and effort is spent by Jesus in welcoming and convincing the
naive but sincere ordinary seeker. But time and effort is also expended to
confront elitist Jewish resistance. Equal effort is expended on the outcast
Samaritan woman and her village, as well as to the meeting of the needs of
the willing representative of the scandalously pagan court of Herod Antipas.
God’s answer is that his care and provision of salvation includes all
regardless of race, gender or station in life.
Throughout this text there is a positive reward for those who
are open to faith. The honest doubts of some of the first disciples are addressed
positively (Nathaniel) while hardened institutionalized resistance is rebuked
(temple cultus) and reprimanded (Nicodemus). The genuine inquiries for clarification
of the Samaritan woman are fielded and her difficulties were explained while
Nicodemus’ theological dilemmas are seemingly ridiculed. Samaritans and
representatives of pagan acculturation are welcomed in the family while vital
members of the temple’s religious machinery are physically expelled.
God’s answer is that all those who are open to receive salvation will
receive it, while those who are not open to do so will not receive it.
The response is to identify where one stands in respect to the
text. Does one find the evidence presented compelling that Jesus is the Christ,
the Son of God? If not, then who is he and if the evidence is compelling is
he worthy of having faith placed in him?
Further, there is a clear sense in which the text already causes
one to identify with attitudes displayed in the text, and challenges one to
an appropriate attitude of openness to be able to experience the benefits
of faith.
God’s salvation in Christ has a global reach and a global
interest. It is available and accessible to every one who is open to it, regardless
of race, gender or class. Jesus Christ is indeed Savior of the world and seeks
to save each individual.
The function of this sermon is to engender openness to the credible and plausible evidence of God’s presence in the world in Jesus Christ. It further serves to foster and encourage a personal commitment to Jesus Christ with the assurance of salvation to all who make this commitment.