John 8:48-59

Feast of Holy Trinity | June 12, 2022 | Sermon Text: John 8:48-59 | David Brooks |

Last Sunday, as we celebrated the Feast of Pentecost, one of our prayers included this:

On this day, you once taught the hearts of your faithful people by sending your Holy Spirit. Grant us in our day by the same Spirit to have a right understanding in all things…

Having a right understanding of things—frankly, of anything at all—seems to be at a premium these days. We are all living with the tectonic shift that is occurring, where people of all ages and walks of life are struggling with themselves and with one another about meaning: what does it mean to be human? What does it mean to be a citizen? What does it mean to be a family? What does it mean to be in community? What does it mean to have and be under authority? It is these and other questions that lie behind our pronoun policing, our flag-waving, our marching and counter-marching, our arguments with loved ones, and more. More and more, each of us and all of us believe and act on the idea that the only real place to find “right understanding” is within myself—that the answer to all the questions I just posed, all the questions of life are answerable by the self, and the self alone. No one can or should grant to any of us right understanding, but we find it ourselves, within ourselves, for ourselves. We each, alone, determine the answer to the question “what does it mean?”

Yet, a moment of honesty would show that we are doing a poor job of determining on our own answers to the question “what does it mean?”  By any measure, we are an anxious, depressed, angry, and confused people. Anti-anxiety and anti-depression prescriptions are at an all-time high; deaths from drug use, alcohol abuse and suicide, especially among the young, are at all time highs; the number of people quitting work because they question the value of what they are doing is rising; fewer of us participate in community because other people aren’t worth the risk or the effort. We try to bring meaning, insisting that others do as we wish, but even if we can enforce compliance, we cannot create willingness; we cannot make others wish to live as we want. Our lives are being undone by the chaos we are unleashing. It is true that those who have access to more resource can hold things together for a time; like the rich alcoholic who can buy off the injured and aggravated, hire lawyers, or pay for detox, the wealthy among us can feign order, provide a simulacrum of life that is self-defined, but sooner or later we all run out of resources, and all that is left is the question that is asked at every grave: “what does it mean?”

You might remember that the question of meaning loomed large in last week’s account of the first Pentecost. The rushing wind, the tongues of flame, the many languages, the outpouring of power, but only one question: what does it mean?  Peter rises “to give the sense,” to speak meaning into a situation that appears chaotic and uncertain.  But we know that Peter does not self-generate that interpretation, that bestowing of meaning to the situation unfolding before the crowd. No, Peter speaks as he has been taught, he speaks out of what has been given to him, he speaks not to his own glory but to the glory of the One whose Word he keeps. “Those who keep my word will never see death” says Jesus, who was obedient even to dying on a cross, and yet who was raised up, vindicating the truth of his Word. Jesus’ word and teaching are trustworthy, giving meaning to lives being undone by chaos, giving purpose to living, giving a right understanding that proves itself sufficient in all things, in all times and places. Peter speaks of what he knew—echoing what Jesus told Nicodemus, that night-time visitor once upon a time—and from there gives his listeners wisdom: “here is what you can do.”

It is the wisdom that Jesus gives which we so desperately need, wisdom that does not fail, wisdom that is not self-generated, wisdom that does not end at the grave. Possessing the wisdom that Jesus provides gives us insight into God’s creative work, or to say it differently, enhances, strengthens, facilitates our participation in the work God is doing in the world even to this very moment! We who are fashioned in the image of God are meant to be participants in the lifeworks God is bringing forth every day. Again, a moment of honesty: our wisdom is not self-generated, but we beg, borrow, and steal from all sorts of places to find ersatz wisdom meant to shore up or vindicate what we want to do. The doctor says this is fine! My four-year-old speaks truth! This TikTok celebrity is exciting! These people I met online have my best interests at heart! My political party is the way, the truth, the life! We cobble together bits and pieces, but all we are really doing is letting the world take advantage of our creative power as persons made in God’s image, for the world’s wisdom has no creative power of its own—it has no life in it. Only Jesus, only the Son, has life in him.

And he has called us to his side, to learn and live his wisdom, to have right understanding in all things. He knows our foolishness, so he teaches us through his Word. He recognizes our wandering hearts, and so gives us his yoke to guide our steps. He sees how we give ourselves to all sorts of life-stealing lies, so he gives us himself, his endless life in the Holy Supper. In all things—in all of life, even to the grave and beyond, our Lord is with us, so that we can say with confidence, “Thanks be to God, this is what my life means.”

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Pr David Brooks

pr.dave.brooks@zoho.com

Raleigh, NC USA