Foretaste of the Sermon to Come
A little nibble of the Revised Common Lectionary
Sunday’s scriptures are 1 Samuel 3:1–10—20, 1 Corinthians 3:17-4:2, John 1:43–51
In Phillip’s call story, Jesus finds him. Jesus doesn’t just stumble on a random guy, he finds Philip. This is a purposeful seeking and finding, like the shepherd who leaves his 99 sheep to find the one, or the widow who won’t stop looking until she finds her lost coins. Because Jesus knows Philip before he finds him, he specifically searches for him and when he sees him, he tells him he already knows him. And Philip, newly empowered with the gifted knowledge of who Jesus is, seeks out and finds Nathanael.
Jesus makes Philip an evangelist. Just hearing Jesus speak makes Philip an evangelist. We probably first think of someone like Billy Graham or John the Baptist when we think of evangelists, but Philip is the perfect example of the evangelist that all Christians can be. First Jesus finds him and creates the evangelist through his Word. Then Philip develops a short elevator speech to share with Nathaniel: “We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.” That’s it. And then when Nathanael challenges him with a follow up question, Phillip simply invites Nathanael using Jesus’ Word: “Come and see.” We don’t need a degree in theology, or a lifelong faith; we don’t need to be eloquent extemporaneous speakers or biblical scholars. We don’t need anything more than a brief statement about our faith – why we follow Jesus. Then, when we speak, we don’t have to be prepared with any answers. Our next action is an invitation and we don’t even own the results — The Holy Spirit empowers our invitation, and the Spirit through Word and Sacrament will take it from there and will empower the invited’s response.
The Great Commission at the end of Matthew is a commandment. “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations…” It’s easy to look at “Come and see” as a commandment, as Law, and it is. Saying the words is the commandment of the Great Commission. We need to make an effort to say them and we need to make an effort to “come.” We have to get dressed, maybe get our kids dressed and find transportation to get to church. That takes effort, and sometimes it takes monumental effort when we’ve worked all week and gotten our kids to all of their extracurricular activities and done all of the routine stuff that has to be done in our lives that is necessary but not certainly not fun or life-giving. Sometimes we just want a morning to drink an extra cup of coffee, put on a movie for the kids and find a moment of not doing. And sometimes even being at church is an effort when our batteries are low.
But if that is what we focus on, we miss the gospel promise which is “see.” Come takes effort, see is the gift we receive when we come. Here is the promise: If we come, Jesus will find us. He will show us who we are (his beloved), he will show us who he is (our savior), and he will show us where we belong (in his kingdom).
Phillip teaches a full course on Evangelism 101 in two sentences.
