A Fresh Perspective

Did you notice how often the word “world” appears in this passage? v. 6: “I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world.” v. 9: “I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world.” v. 11: “And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. . . . protect them in your name that you have given me” v. 14: “the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world.” v. 15: “I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one.” v. 16: “They do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world.” v. 18: “As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.” That last statement is the one I want to focus on today. Luke says the Holy Spirit will turn Jesus’ followers into witnesses. Here in John we are told that as the Father sent Jesus on a mission to the world, so the Christ sends us to continue his work.   ...

It’s a refrain we all know: “What the world needs now / Is love sweet love / It’s the only thing / there’s just too little of.” It’s not the only thing there is too little of, but it’s the most important thing there is too little of. I think all of us would agree that we could stand for some more love – of the kind that is healthy, honest, redemptive, restorative, and transformative. In John 13 Jesus says, “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.” In his book, If the Church were Christian , Philip Gulley tells about accepting a call to be the pastor of a Quaker meeting in Indianapolis when he was beginning his ministry. The small congregation was deeply loving and compassionate, primarily due to Lyman and Harriet Combs, who had helped to start the congregation years before. Both were retired from their secular voca...

Our passage begins with Jesus telling the disciples to not be troubled. That is much easier said than done. In fact, three times in John’s Gospel the writer tells us that Jesus was troubled. He was troubled over the death of Lazarus. He was troubled at least on one occasion when he contemplated his own death. And he was troubled when he realized that his own disciples would desert him in his final hour. So, let’s not assume then that being troubled is somehow a lack of faith or a sign of spiritual immaturity. I doubt if any of us are willing to say that Jesus lacked faith or spiritual maturity and yet clearly he was troubled on occasion. Being troubled is a common human experience. The challenge for us is not to allow those disturbing feelings and alarming emotions to rule our hearts and wills and lead us into despondency or despair. We can understand why the disciples would be troubled. Jesus just told them that he is going away. Toward the end of chapter 13 Jesus says to the dis...

I little introduction to the reading today. It doesn’t take a seminary or religious degree to notice that the way Jesus teaches in the Synoptics – Mark, Luke, and Matthew – is very different than the way Jesus teaches in John. The style, language, vocabulary, imagery, and structure is very different. The consensus of mainline biblical scholarship is that the Synoptics give us a more reliable historical picture of how Jesus actually taught. The discourses of Jesus in John, they say, are more reflective of the interpretations and understandings of John’s church. In other words, these discourses in John by Jesus are most likely expositions of short sayings of Jesus by the author of this Gospel and the community from which it came and to whom it was written. That doesn’t mean these discourses in John are any less important or meaningful than the teachings in the Synoptic Gospels; it just means these are not the actual words of the historical Jesus. They are meditations, expositions, and p...