Come and See

Text: John 1:29-42

It seems a little foolish.

It seems a little foolish to follow this man to who-knows-where for who-knows-what purpose. To follow Jesus on the strength of John’s exclamation: Look, here is the lamb of God. As if that were a reason. But it turned out that that was reason enough for Andrew and the other disciple (who does not even get mentioned by name). Enough to abandon one kind of life, known and familiar, for another kind, unknown and exotic.

There is a notion that becoming a follower of Jesus, becoming a Christian, allowing Jesus to be one’s guide and leader, is a decision that can be made rationally and with clarity. Something thought through and figured out. And sometimes that may be how it works. But often enough what happens between you and Jesus is unexpected and mysterious, and in a moment one’s life is rearranged. It is rarely prudent.

So it was with the first disciples, who in all the Gospels follow Jesus suddenly and for no apparent good reason. Come and see, Jesus says, and they do.

Or mostly suddenly. They do ask Jesus for his resume, for a reference. “Where are you staying?” Where do you live, might be another way to put it, where do you abide. But “where are you at?” is more the meaning. What exactly is with you? Where do you stand on important issues? They try for a moment to pin Jesus down. But as so often in the Gospels, Jesus will not give them a straight answer. Jesus does not offer them a position paper or a business plan or mission statement. Instead of an answer of this sort, Jesus makes them an invitation. Jesus just invites them: Come and see.

They call him a teacher, and like all teachers he teaches less about truth and more about possibility, which is perhaps better truth. Jesus’ invitation is always: Come and see. Come and see what might happen, Come and see who you might be, Come and see who you might become, Come and see what the world might become, Come and see what it might be like to follow me. The disciples do not know the answers to these questions when they turn to follow Jesus. All they really know is that they have received an invitation. That seems to be enough.

Invitations draw us into the future. Invitations are the foundation for adventure, freedom, and joy. They are spoilers of certainty, stability, and control. Life makes steps by constant invitation. Who knows where they will lead or how things will turn out? You are invited to be married, have a family, change jobs, go to school, start a company, join the army, run for office, speak out against injustice, leave your home. Who knows what will happen? The disciples didn’t.

It seems to me that the invitation that Jesus makes to us has four parts. Or maybe better to say Jesus makes four invitations, each intertwined with the others.

First, Jesus invites us: Come and be with me. The invitation is both personal and corporate. That means that Jesus is asking you to be connected with him. It also means that you will be connected to his ministry, and therefore all the other followers of Jesus. Our focus is on a particular person, Jesus Christ. We are not invited to join an organization that is centered around an idea or a doctrine. The center for each of us is Jesus. At the same time, we are part of a group of people who are all expected to work together and who bring each other hope, comfort, and mutual admiration and also warning, and to embolden and hearten each other.

Second, Jesus invites us: Come and transform the world. In his ministry, Jesus paints a picture of a world different from the one of his time and of ours. In it, people give away all their money. They do not fight back. They lend without expecting anything in return. They love their enemies and their neighbors. They are compassionate even if it leads to trouble. They rely on the good will of others to be fed and housed, and those who have food and housing freely share them. What kind of world would it be if all who followed Jesus did as he preached? Or worked to make a world in which it was easy to do those things rather a world which considers this kind of talk to be unrealistic and naive at best and revolutionary at worst.

Third, Jesus invites us: Come and be brave. The disciples suspected soon enough that to follow Jesus was a risky endeavor. We in our time know it is. To be Christian is to take risks. Not so much risks of persecution, though that has been a risk and still is in some places. But more, the risk involved with doing what Jesus tells us to do and to be. Transformation is not welcome if you like the way things are. If you preach that the last will be first and the first last, those who are first now might not be happy with you. If you love your enemies, your friends might not be be happy with you.

And fourth, Jesus invites us: Come and transform yourself. If we accept Jesus’ invitation to come and see, what we will see is a broader horizon. We might be able to see people who before were invisible. We might act with courage where before we were timid. We might accomplish things that before were impossible. We might love the unlovely. We might let go what before we grasped tightly. We might walk lightly where before we were burdened with things of the earth and things of the spirit. We might trust God where before we trusted no one. We might become different people, with new names, as Simon became Peter.

The invitation of Jesus in all its parts is of the essence of Christianity. A God of grace, as we know God to be, does not coerce us, does not boss us around, does not play games with us. A God of grace makes us an offer. Christianity is in part an invitation to see and be and behave in a new way.

People sometimes describe faith as a body of knowledge, a done deal, learn it and be it. but because it is invitational, it is more experimental. Christianity is an experimental religion, not in the way that people say “an experimental airplane,” but experimental in that we don't quite know what is going to happen moment to moment. We try things out. Our faith is built on experiences. We respond to Jesus step by step, as the first disciples did, opening our faith as he continues as he continues to offer his invitation.

On the radio last week there was a story of a young girl who was blind. She had been reading a new kind of book, a picture book in braille, with bumps and forms on the page that let her imagine the images as a seeing person would from a photograph. The book was a book about astronomy, and the pictures were pictures of galaxies and nebulae and shooting clouds of interstellar gas. The girl, having been given the gift of the universe through this book, said she was interested in space exploration. The interviewer asked her whether she would like to be an astronaut some day. She said: Uh huh, totally, yes!

Not all of us answer as emphatically when we hear Jesus’ call. Sometimes we respond “totally, yes!” and sometimes it takes a while. We do not know why Andrew and his friend—and later Simon Peter and all the others—we don’t know why each of them followed Jesus. We don’t know whether they were confident or nervous. We don’t know whether they thought they were frightened or amused. We do know that Jesus invited them to come and see—and they did.

It may be that the message of Jesus is universal. But that does not mean it reveals itself in each of us in the same way, or that we all hear it in the same way. It is interpreted in each of our lives in individual ways. And the way you interpret it and respond is a result of how the invitation you hear bangs up against all that you know, and are, and have been.

Our bishop wonders whether it is time go go from “come and see” to “go and tell.” But all we really can tell is that there is an invitation. And all we can really tell is the invitation that we, each of us, have heard. All all we can really tell is what happens to us when we hear jesus call us: Come and see.