It's Greek to Me (Reflections on Lent 5, Year B)

 

“And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” (John 12:32)

 I never imagined I’d be preaching on the Gospel passage assigned for Lent 5, Year B (John 12:20-33) as often as I do, but—given my serendipitous career as the pastor who is called upon to bury every deceased “Christmas & Easter” Christian and semi-agnostic in Northeast Philly and Lower Bucks County—I’ve become quite familiar with this text. It’s the passage used in our Lutheran Occasional Service Book for prayers at graveside. I suspect this is because of the image of the grain of wheat “dying” when it goes into the earth.

Whenever I read this passage by someone’s last resting place, I feel compelled to make a tiny apology for the word “hate” used in verse 25. Jesus seems to be suggesting that it’s a pretty cool thing to “hate” your life. Now, I’ll grant that life hasn’t exactly been jolly since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, and some of you might have been tempted to say that you hate your lives right now. After all, a lot of the fun stuff has been removed. We can’t go to restaurants like we used to, we’ve had stay-at-home orders, we’re sick of the kids being home schooled, sick of wearing masks, sick of not going to the mall or the movies or to church like we did in the good ol’ days. You might hear this passage and think, “Heck! I hate my life right now. Guess I’m going straight to Heaven when I die! Good for me!” 

You would be missing the point by that interpretation. This passage is tricky because our evangelist, John, speaks Aramaic but is writing in the universal language of his time, Greek. I guess everyone in the ancient Mediterranean world spoke a little bit of Greek. It was how you got by. Unfortunately, although the Greeks had about four different words to express different aspects of “love,” they only had one word, miseo (misew for all you Greek scholars out there!), which meant not to love. It could mean to despise intently, but it can also mean just “who cares?” We could read verse 25 as “Those who are all into worldly things will miss out, but those who put this world in proper perspective will know the joys of eternity.” If COVID-19 has taught us nothing else, it might just be that we’ve learned the difference between what’s important and what’s just piddly little stuff. 

Jesus knows when the Greeks show up, the game is almost over. “Greeks,” by the way, does not necessarily mean people from Greece. As I said above, lots of folks spoke Greek back then, so what John might really mean is “non-Jewish folks.” When Jesus gets famous even among the gentiles, the Jewish and Roman authorities are going to get nervous and will want to put a stop to him. Jesus knows the cross is near and, using the metaphor of the grain of wheat, he tries to explain that some things have to die before they can really achieve their purpose. We need the fact of loss in order to appreciate having. Another way I’ve always looked at this is learning doesn’t start until the lesson is over. That is, if you’ve got the teacher standing next to you, you don’t know what you know. You can always copy the teacher or ask him/her for help. It’s only after the teacher has left that you’ll understand what you’ve really taken to heart, what has taken root in you, and what is bearing fruit.

 I really dig that John tells us in verse 27 that Jesus’ soul is troubled at this particular moment. Gosh: if I knew I was about to be arrested and hung on a cross, I’d be pretty troubled myself. Even though Jesus seems a little more God-like in John’s Gospel than in the synoptics, I appreciate this very human detail. The coming moment will be painful and hard to bear, but through it God will be glorified. Jesus will connect all people through his suffering, for every last one of us—of all nations, races, occupations, genders, lifestyles, cultures, etc.—will feel at one time or another the pain Jesus is about to feel. We’ll all know loneliness, disappointment, desertion, betrayal, helplessness, scorn, physical pain, and impending death. It will be the same for all people.

 John never tells us if those Greeks ever got their meet ‘n’ greet with Jesus. We know, however, that the whole world would come to know Jesus on the cross. On the cross was the ultimate union of God and humanity. Still, you’ve got to hand it to those curious Greeks. They heard about this Jesus guy, and they wanted to see him. So do we all. The cool thing is we can see Jesus around us all the time. Jesus joins us in our pain, but we join him in his love, his forgiveness, his sacrifice, his praise of the Father God, and his ultimate healing nature that is a foretaste of our own resurrection. Whenever we see such things in our brothers and sisters, we’re seeing Jesus. I always figure that my job as a Christian is to look for Christ in others and, by my own submission in the face of my own often troubled spirt, to show Christ to others.

 May Christ dwell in you, and may you know his love today.