Come and See |
John 1:29-42 |
As some of you know, one of my favorite things to do in my spare time is to play music with my friends. We call ourselves The Lawnboys and we play mostly loud, weird, and original instrumental music that would probably give most of you a pounding headache. Come to think of it, it gives me a headache sometimes. But anyway, even though we’ve been playing together about 2 years or so the one thing that we have yet to do is go out and play live somewhere. We’ve recorded a few tunes. We’ve played at a couple of picnics and parties of friends and family, but as far as getting out there and playing in public where a larger number of people might hear us and become interested in our music, it has yet to happen. Well, imagine my surprise a couple of weeks ago, when Chris, our keyboard player e-mailed to tell me that there were radio stations in New York and Boston who were E-mailing to ask if the Lawnboys would be willing to come and play live in their studios. How in the world did they even know that we existed when we’ve never played anywhere live? I’ll bet some of the young people here this morning can tell us? Where do you think they heard about us? Thanks right, they found us on our myspace page. Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve heard of myspace. You might not understand what it is, but you’ve heard of it, right? And in spite of the unfortunate reality that it has become a primary source for abuse by sexual predators, the original concept and ultimate reality of myspace is fun and honorable enough. Myspace is designed to be an online meeting space where friends can invite and be introduced to new friends in this sort of virtual gathering of mutual friends and acquaintances. Imagine a party where you invite all of your friends and family to come, encouraging them to bring along all of their best friends as well, all with the idea that everyone will have the chance to introduce themselves to one another. They can share and talk about common interests and hobbies and get to know a whole slew of new and interesting people. Now imagine all this happening on line, in a virtual environment through a series of web pages that serve as both formal introduction and a place to share ideas, and you’ve got myspace. Well in the past 3 weeks or so since Chris put our page up, we’ve had over 600 visits, hundreds of plays of our songs, and we have 21 new friends. And while I have to admit that one of my kids could do a better job of explaining to you what all that means, the one thing that I do know is that because of myspace, there are hundreds of people, including a couple of radio programmers who have discovered our music. And it’s all happened through a series of cyber connections made between individuals who discovered our music and shared it their friends one by one by one. And as weird as it sounds, I have a feeling that if Jesus were to come to earth today, he’d probably have his own myspace page as well. Because when you think about it, the one friend discovering a new friend or good thing and and inviting another friend to come and see it approach that has made sites like myspace, facebook and youtube so popular is exactly the same approach that Jesus used in building his kingdom on earth. Just look at this mornings’ scripture lesson which records the earliest days of Jesus ministry. Let’s take a look at how the story unfolds. It was John the Baptist who was the first to recognize Jesus to be the Messiah at his baptism. As he was standing with two of his disciples the next day, he saw Jesus coming, and he said, “Behold, the Lamb of God!” Then, without hesitation, John’s Gospel tells us, “The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus.” They asked him where he was saying and all he said in response was. “Come and See.” And they did. Then in verse 40 the story continues as John tells us that “One of the two who heard John speak, and followed Jesus was Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother. He first found his brother Simon, and said to him, “We have found the Messiah” He brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, “So you are Simon the son of John? You shall be called Cephas” (which means Peter). And the rest is history, the next day Jesus found Philip and Philip found Nathaniel, and so on, and on, and on the story goes until Jesus had rounded up his 12 disciples one by one. And then they went out into the world. They attended a wedding feast here, and plucked grain in a wheat field there. They stopped at a well to draw water and each Sabbath they were in the house of God worshiping. And all along the way, they made new friends. One, by one by one Jesus following grew until the day that upwards of 5,000 of Jesus’ closest friends could be expected to show up anywhere that he happened to be teaching and healing. And it all happened like adding friends on myspace, one, by one by one. What a strange way for God to choose to build his kingdom on earth. Of all the options that he had available, God chose to spread the word, and gather the citizens of his earthly kingdom of love and grace via a word of mouth campaign, one by one by one. Think about it. As we said at Bible study on Thursday morning, God could have chosen to come to earth in the form of a 200 foot tall giant. God could have sat down on top of Mt. Sinai, glowing with all the radiance of heaven and offered free food, shelter and all the answers to life’s questions to anyone who wanted to come and visit him. But he didn’t. God could have manipulated the power of the holy spirit and the electrical impulses of the human brain and announced Jesus arrival as well as his will for all creation via a kind of “State of the Union” address delivered simultaneously and directly into the minds of every single human being on the planet. But he didn’t. God could have amassed the greatest, and most powerful army ever created. Angels and human warriors together, armed with lightning bolts and all the power of creation at their fingertips they could have alerted and converted the entire world and not even break a sweat. But he didn’t. Instead, God showed up in the form of an itinerant carpenter and teacher who wandered around the Galilean countryside, visiting widows, wedding feasts and tax collectors. And one by one by one, his kingdom on earth was built. And that leads us to me and you. Somewhere along the way, Simon, or Andrew, or Nathaniel or one of he other disciples invited one of their friends to come and see. They told them about the teaching and healing and love and grace of Christ. And they took them by the hand and brought them to where Jesus was, and it changed their life. And so that person brought another friend, who in turn brought a friend of their own….. And so it has happened down through the years, and decades and millennia one by one by one people have been invited to come and see Jesus until someone came to you and said, “Hey, come and see something cool that I’ve discovered.” And they brought you to church or they read you the Bible, or they told you a story and here you are…. Here we are. And now it’s our turn. There’s an old saying that says that the church is always one generation away from extinction. And it’s true. If our friends and family, if our children don’t catch the fire of Christ that burns in our souls, then when our fire goes out so does the fire of Christ’s presence in the world. Have you ever wished that more people acted like Jesus? Have you ever dreamed about what it would be like to live in a heaven on earth? Have you ever wished that our Sunday morning worship attendance were higher? Have you ever dreamed of a time where our sanctuary couldn’t hold all of the people who were genuinely excited to come here to sing and pray and offer God our praise? Have you? Well it’s possible, and here’s how it happens. It happens just the way that Jesus started this whole thing, one person at a time. You invite your friends and they invite their friends who in turn invite friends of their own, all saying “come and see” this thing that I’ve discovered. It’s called grace, and it lives in the hearts and lives of these people who meet at a place called the Quaker Hill Baptist Church where they worship this guy named Jesus who said that we should love, and forgive and care about each other endlessly and eternally. Come and see. Three simple words that can change the world if you are willing to share them. |