John 12:20-33 Good News For All

Jesus is preparing his followers and disciples for his death which is coming close. He’s in the temple teaching, perhaps in the area where the Gentiles aren’t allowed to be. We often think that the only ones who worshipped Yahweh, or God, were the Jews, but there were many Gentiles who were attracted to the belief that there is only one God, called monotheism, to the morals in the Jewish faith and what God stands for in his justice, righteousness, and mercy, while at the same time hating the nationalism of the Jewish faith. They would come to the Jewish festivals to worship and learn more through the festivals who God is and who God wants his people to be.

The Passover is about to be celebrated and so there are a number of Greeks who show up to celebrate the festival. While they’re there in Jerusalem, it’s almost impossible not to hear about Jesus, how he raised Lazarus from the dead, rode into Jerusalem as a king, drove out the animals and money changers from the temple, and who is teaching about God. They go to Philip, since he has a Greek name and comes from the northern Galilee area where a number of Greek cities had been built, since they likely felt more comfortable coming up to him, and ask, “Sir, we would like to see Jesus.” Just a side note, many churches have this request carved into the pulpit for the preacher to read before they begin to preach.

These Greeks want to see Jesus, to come close to him to hear him teach, to ask him their questions, and to experience being in Jesus’ presence. Faith is both knowledge of Jesus and the experience of being with Jesus. It’s like when your mom and dad first started to get to know each other; they began by asking friends and other people about each other and getting to know about each other, but they really started to get to know each other by spending time together, talking about what they liked and didn’t like, the things they’d done and things they hoped to do. This is what the Greeks want to do to get to know Jesus in that personal way. This is still true today. When you share your faith, when you invite someone to follow Jesus with you, they don’t want to know facts about Jesus, they want to meet and experience Jesus with you. This is Holy Spirit work, but the Spirit uses our experiences of meeting Jesus to help others to meet him too.

One of the things that interests me is that at the beginning of Jesus’ life, wise men come from the east to meet Jesus, and now near the end of his life, men come from the west to meet Jesus. It gives us a glimpse in Jesus’ life how people from all the nations are drawn to Jesus, that the good news is for all humanity, not just one small nation in the Middle East. After the Greeks ask Philip to help them to see and meet Jesus, Philip goes to tell his brother Andrew about the Greek’s request and they go to Jesus and tell him that there’s a group of Greeks who would like to see him.

But it’s like Jesus completely ignores what Philip and Andrew have just told him and starts talking about kernels of wheat, loving life, and glorifying God’s name. Jesus is focused in on his coming death and preparing his disciples for the coming time, helping them understand why he has to die. Jesus realizes that what he’s telling the disciples isn’t going to be understood by them right away, that it’s only going to start to make sense after they witness his death and resurrection. The disciples aren’t a whole lot different then we are; there’s a lot of what we read in the Bible that we don’t always understand at first when we start following Jesus and dig into the Bible, but the more we read the Bible, study it together, talk to Jesus in prayer, and learn to see the world around us through God’s eyes, the more we start to understand why Jesus came and had to die the way he did. Jesus came to take the curse that comes from our sin and is ours to carry, but Jesus takes it on himself in order to destroy that curse on the cross so that we don’t have to walk that journey. Jesus’ death brings us new life, as we reflected on last week.

Jesus tells Philip and Andrew and all those around him, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it does, it produces many seeds.” Jesus sees his coming death as a way of being glorified, of bringing glory and honour to God. Last week we saw that Jesus’ reference to himself being the Son of Man looks back to Daniel’s vision of the promised Messiah coming down from heaven to earth. It’s a vision of power and strength, not of weakness, Daniel 7:13–14, “In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence. He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all nations and peoples of every language worshiped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed.”

Jesus talks about dying, but it’s a death that’s going to produce a whole lot of fruit because of the death. You can use the kernel of wheat and grind it to make flour for bread, or you can place it in the ground and it will produce many more seeds, some of which can be made into bread while more seeds can be planted to create even more seeds. Through Jesus’ death and resurrection, a movement began that is still around and still growing even today; this movement is what we call the church and it’s still on the move today. We often mourn about how the church in Canada is getting smaller and less influential than it was in the past, but perhaps the church here needs to do some dying to parts of who we were, and maybe even still are today, in order to grow again. Sometimes it’s good to be reminded that we are a church called to share the good news of Jesus by serving on our knees with humility and grace. We want to be relevant, but relevance doesn’t mean being just like everyone around us, it’s about answering the questions and hurt today by pointing to Jesus, to the Holy Spirit who is active in the world.

John’s hearers of his gospel lived in a shame and honour society, and it’s good to listen to what Jesus is saying here through those lenses. Death shows commitment and a willingness to die for a higher cause, which brings honour, important in that culture. By dying for sin of the world, Jesus receives honour from God. We hear this is God’s response to Jesus’ cry, “Father’ glorify your name!” when he says, “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.” This is why martyrdom has had such a powerful effect on the church, the honour in dying for Jesus has always strengthened the church and grown the church, especially in the majority world, reflecting back to Jesus’ parable on the dying of the kernel of wheat in order to grow more kernels of wheat. In talking about loving or hating their life, Jesus is talking about commitment here; for those committed only to their own life, a selfish life, they will lose their life since their have separated themselves from Jesus, while those who are committed to offering their life to Jesus, to shaping our lives around his teaching, will gain eternal life with Jesus. The call is to follow Jesus as a servant. As we humble ourselves in service to Jesus, the Father will honour us.

In Jesus’ day, people were divided by ethnicity, gender, and social and economic class. The Pharisees liked to keep people in their place and were disturbed at how Jesus upset the social order. Our culture today is still divided. In this passage, Jesus tells us that when he is lifted up on the cross, all will be drawn to him. In a world of division, we’re reminded that Jesus draws all people to himself. The divisions today may be different, today those on the outside may be First Nations, LGBTQ, those battling addictions, those from different cultures, or whoever we choose to keep away so we feel safe and unchallenged. I’ve been wondering all week on how do we understand Jesus when he says, “When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all people to myself.” Jesus draws all people to himself through his death on the cross; through the forgiveness, grace and new life he offers all those who believe in him. Life change comes when we are drawn to him, life change we model to the world which then draws others to Jesus. How are we drawing all those in our community to Jesus, to the good news of salvation?