by Rob Martin
GOSPEL JOHN 1:43-46
43The
next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him,
“Follow me.” 44Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of
Andrew and Peter. 45Philip found Nathanael and said to him, “We
have found him about whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus
son of Joseph from Nazareth.” 46Nathanael said to him, “Can
anything good come out of Nazareth?” Philip said to him, “Come and see.”
Our Lenten lectionary
text today from the Gospel of John deals primarily with the character of
Nathanael. But Nathanael himself is a
rarity, an odd bird. Nathanael is
mentioned nowhere in the gospels of Mark, Matthew, or Luke, nor does he find
his way onto the lengthy list of apostles.
No—Nathanael appears only in this first chapter of John and in the final
chapter of John’s text where it is written that Jesus showed himself to “Simon Peter, Thomas called the Twin,
Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, and two other disciples.”
And so we discover that
Nathanael was a resident of the town of Cana—a very important point, and not to
be missed, if we are to understand his
somewhat pointed comment about Jesus coming from Nazareth! “Nazareth!”, Nathanael proclaims to Philip,
“How can anything good come from there?”
But first we need some
important historical and geographic information if we are to understand the
content and the context of Nathanael’s blatant negativity . . .
The village of
Cana—Nathanael’s hometown, was located
on a beautiful hill that gradually sloped toward the west. Homes were built in terraces up the slope so
as to receive the cool west wind which blew in from the Mediterranean. South of the village was a copious spring
which yielded an abundant supply of clear, fresh drinking water—and thus Cana
was a resting-place, a refreshing place,
for Hebrew herdsmen and other travelers.
It was also located on an imperial road used by the Romans—and thus Cana
was flush with residents who secured their livelihood through trade with
military soldiers–thus supporting the vast Roman war machine. It is estimated that approximately 400
families lived in Cana in Jesus’ day.
And so, in the context of occupied Galilee, it was a good place to live
and it was a good place to be from.
But Nazareth—Nazareth
was quite a different story. Nazareth
lay just 4 miles to the south of Cana—but it was not on a major trade route,
nor did it have any specific export. In
fact, Nazareth was nothing more than a tiny bump on the road—a place deemed of
little significance by most. It
consisted of approximately 35 families and they shared a single-family farm
while subsisting only on rain water.
Unlike the neatly terraced hillsides of Cana, Nazareth was seen as wild
and uncouth, rough and primitive. But
the most damning thing about Nazareth was this!
The religious authorities in Jerusalem claimed that the residents of
Nazareth were lax in following the Law.
Their devotions were deemed as circumspect and their religious practices
were labeled as heretical. And thus
Nazareth—unlike Cana—was viewed by many as a horrific place to live and a
horrid place to be from!
So with that history in
mind do you now see why Nathanael—of Cana--was such a nay-sayer about Jesus—of
Nazareth? How could the one Moses wrote
about in the Law come from a place that the religious authorities of the day
had deemed as law-less? How could the
one whom the prophets wrote about be associated with such a heretical, off the
road, of little significance enclave?
How could the Messiah of the people come from such a messy and mis-guided
location? Is it any wonder that
Nathanael cries out to Philip, “Nazareth?
How can anything good come from there?”
I am always amazed when
Biblical texts clearly intersect our lives as a community in the here and in
the now! For in the midst of this season
of Lenten, a time of reflection and repose, I must tell you that I sometimes
feel that we, here at First Pres., are residents not of Cana but of
Nazareth—deemed by the religious authorities of our own day as a messy and
miss-guided community. Sitting just four
miles south of Menlo Park Presbyterian Church, many would say that we are a
law-less people in the midst of law-abiding Presbyterians, heretical in our
beliefs and unorthodox in our practices. How can God be truly worshipped in the
midst of a church that the Lay Committee dismisses for its support of refugees
and conscientious objectors; for its welcome of gay men, lesbians, bisexuals
and transgendered persons into full membership, and for its work for human
dignity and survival and its witness as an "Earth and Spirit Church?"
How can God be truly worshipped, many of my colleagues in ministry have
asked, in the midst of a community where
there are no boundaries or biases for membership, and where the communion table
is open to all? How can God be truly
worshipped in a church that finds more grace in the search for understanding
than it does in dogmatic certainty—more value in questions than it does in
absolutes? How can God be truly
worshipped in a church that welcomes all into its midst—women and men, young
and old, conventional Christians and questioning skeptics, those of all sexual
orientations and gender identities, those of all classes and abilities, those
who strive for a better world and those who are willing to challenge the powers-that-be and the powers that have for too long
been?
How can God be truly worshipped in a place where the Bible is not taken
literally, where the conscience is not bound by law but freed by grace, and
where essential tenets of the faith are not deemed as that essential to a life
of discipleship? . . . “First Presbyterian Church of Palo
Alto! How can anything good come from
that place?” the Nathanaels of our own day cry out all around us!
But listen well to what
Philip says in response to Nathanael’s dismissive statement—for it is the same
response, the same invitation that must be issued to the Nathanael’s of our own
day who would write us off as a community of faith and condemn us as a church
of Jesus Christ. “Come and see!” Philip
requests of the nay-saying Nathanael, “Come and see—that your current
perspective might be changed and transformed!”
How I wish that those
who would dismiss and demean this community of faith would come and see—would
truly come and see this blessed place where it doesn’t matter if you are gay or
straight, bi-sexual or transgendered—for you are still welcomed—open-armed—into
Christ’s community! How I wish that
those who would tag us as fanatics and heretics would come and see—come and see
children, and young adults, and the elderly honestly grappling with the gray
areas of faith—what it means to really live justly, and equitably, and
peacefully as followers of the one who fully embodied God’s abundant love and
abiding grace. How I wish that those who
would call us un-Presbyterian would come and see—would truly come and see how
Presbyterian we really are—for as the Book of Order so clearly states, we
uphold the Presbyterian belief that “God
alone is the Lord of the conscience—and has left it free from the doctrines and
commandments of people”; we uphold
the Presbyterian belief that the “Church
is called to a new openness by affirming itself as a community of
diversity—becoming in fact as well as in faith a community of women and men of
all ages, races, and conditions—while providing for inclusiveness AS A VISIBLE
SIGN OF THE NEW HUMANITY!”; and we
uphold the Presbyterian belief that “the
biblical vision of doing justice calls us to deal honestly in personal and
public business, calls us to exercise power for the common good, calls us to
support people who seek the dignity, freedom, and respect they have been
denied, calls us to work for fair laws and just administration of the law,
calls us to welcome the stranger in the land, calls us to overcome the
disparity between rich and poor, calls us to bear witness against political
oppression and exploitation, and calls us to redress wrongs against
individuals, groups, and peoples in the church, in this nation, and in the
whole world”
And to the Nathaniels of our
Presbytery and the larger Church who refuse to come and see all this, who
choose to look away from us with loathing—I simply say this: Jesus’ ministry and message wasn’t formed in
Cana, it was formed in Nazareth—a place deemed as unorthodox by the religious
elite of the day. Jesus’ ministry and message wasn’t shaped in Cana, it was
shaped in Nazareth—a place labeled as heretical by those who held so
stringently to the Law!
Can anything good come
out of Nazareth? Can anything good come from feeding the hungry, or comforting
the grieving, or caring for the sick, or visiting the prisoners, or freeing the
captives, or sheltering the homeless, or befriending the lonely? Can anything good come from learning about
the historicity of biblical texts, and how the Bible was redacted, and changed
and edited, and how it ended up in its present form? Can anything good come
from following Jesus the Christ, while pursuing God’s nonviolent vision of
justice and human dignity for all people while sharing this understanding with
children, and the community, and the world?
Here at the First Presbyterian
Church of Palo Alto, in this season of Lent, I stake my very life and ministry
on the belief that it can and does!
But don’t take my word for
it! For listen instead to the words of
our former elder Stephanie Borrett who moved to Wilmington, North Carolina four
years ago. She writes:
We're settled into our home in Wilmington, Stuart started teaching
and Caitlin started school. I have kept my part time telecommuting job with the Beatitude Society (founded in YOUR backyard, Palo Alto)
and we are truly happy here. (Plus, the heat wave broke this week which is
making it bearable!)
And so it is
that no matter how sharp the critiques and condemnations of the Nathanaels of
our day may be, I hope you will continue to follow on the radical way of Jesus
of Nazareth without fear or hesitation–for it impacts individuals and it
changes lives!
Can anything
good come out of First Presbyterian Church Palo Alto? YES–for all you have to do is come and see!
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