A priest and performer considers religion, the arts, and the often thin space between sacred and secular, church and culture, pulpit and pew.

Wednesday, January 3, 2018

The Tenth Day of Christmas: January 3 (John 1:29-34)

On the tenth of Christmas, God’s true Love gave to me…

…the excitement of discovery.

John sees Jesus of Nazareth coming toward him and names him immediately: “Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” He goes on to describe who Jesus is, how this newcomer’s way of baptizing (with the Holy Spirit and with fire) will be different than John’s method by water, and how he, John, ranks far below Jesus. John would not have known Jesus, except that when he saw the heavens open, the Spirit identified Jesus to John, who testifies that he is the Son of God, the Chosen One. And now, here he is – here he comes!


“Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” Or, if you prefer: “LOOK! Here comes the Messiah! The one we’ve all been waiting for!” (Note: there are no exclamation marks in the Greek New Testament.) In the fourth gospel, John (not the same one as the gospel is named for) is less “the Baptizer” than he is “the Testifier”. His testimonies will lead others to Jesus. And I like to think that John, and these others, were as excited to see and begin to know Jesus as I imagine them to be from the punctuation in my modern NRSV. And I trust we are, too – because there’s always more to know.

No comments:

Post a Comment