The Rev. Robert G. Certain

Jeremiah 31:31-34 | Psalm 51:11-16 | Hebrews 5:5-10 | John 12:20-33

Jesus has arrived at Jerusalem. A lot of people have gathered as they always do around the Passover. A couple of Greeks, not Jews of the dispersion but pagan Greeks, come up to Philip and say, "Sir we wish to see Jesus." Philip in his usual way goes to Andrew and says, "Andrew, I think we have a problem. Remember what Jesus said to the woman at the well, that I was sent for the lost of house of Israel not to the dogs. There are some Greeks out here that want to see Jesus, what should we do?" Andrew said, "Let's got talk to him." They went to find Jesus. They tell Jesus there are some Greeks, Gentiles that want to talk with him. Jesus says, "Unless a seed falls in the dirt and dies, it can't grow into a plant." What? "Unless you are willing to lose your life you will never gain it. You can't grow unless you die. If you die you will bear much fruit." Sort of the same thing done at the well. Walks right past, whoever it is, or it seems that way.

John had to have had a reason to have recorded the story this way other than "that's just the way it happened." Those two statements, the Greeks wanting to see Jesus, and the seeds have to fall on the ground and die before they can grow don't seem to connect. By the time we get to the end of this reading we know they are talking about his crucifixion. But how do they follow? There has to be a connection.

The agricultural comments are obvious. Everyone knows that seeds will not grow as long as they are in the little packs. They will not grow in the cabinet or in your garage or even in your green house if they are still in the package. They have to go in the dirt.

But then he says, "If you love your life you are going to lose it." Now we are in trouble. I am in trouble anyway because I have always loved my life. Getting up in the morning, especially here on this beautiful day, it's a great day to be alive. Every time I draw my breath or every time my heart beats I am deeply grateful; and I love it. I love my career as a priest of the church and really enjoyed my life before then. In the Air Force, in college, in high school and all the way back. Growing up in that family of mine, there were hard times and unpleasant times but I loved it. So if I love my life, we are in trouble.

I had a great family and extended family. When they came to visit we would have to stack them like cord wood just to have a place to sleep at night. Side by side in the living room and dining room. In the parishes where God has placed me, those have been great places. The people and ministries and missions have been wonderful. So I have loved it and continue to love it. Jesus says if you love you life you are going to lose it. What does that mean?

I have a seed for a ficus tree. If this seed wants to stay the same, it will never grow a ficus tree. If it loves its seedness it will lose its life. It will eventually be impossible for the seed to grow. The church and you and I are the same way. As long as we want to maintain our seedness we will remain little, maybe hard and shriveled up and of not much use. But if we are willing to give that up in order to become much larger and much more useful in life we get bigger and better. Maintaining will cause us to collapse. Yet in the church we really like to maintain things the way they were in there glory days (whatever those were). The people who lived in the glory days thought they were pretty bad too, and they longed for their own glory days.

We have all heard that joke, "How many Episcopalians does it take to change a light bulb? What do you mean change that light bulb? That was a memorial to my Grandmother."

We like to maintain things. We like the church to stay the same. We do not like it when the hymnal changes or the Prayer Book gets changed. We do not like to change our responses. We like it to stay the same. If we stay the same we become a mausoleum instead of a growing organism.

Some of us even pride ourselves on being a pillar of the church. I can remember as a boy hearing my mother refer to people as the "pillar of the church." I used to think that was a compliment. A pillar is pretty solid. However you will notice that pillars stay in one place and hold everything else up. If it is a building that is pretty good but for a person that's not so good. Especially not in the kingdom of God, not in the kingdom on Earth. So the maintenance church is concerned about keeping things the same, greasing the squeaky wheel so we do not have a lot of noise or irritation. If we insist on being a maintenance church we will spend a lot of time worrying about those things, and not much time worrying about the kingdom of God.

People need to see Jesus. These Greeks come to Philip and want to see Jesus. They come to you and say a similar thing, "Why can't you play golf this morning? Why give up a beautiful day like this to be in a church?" That's how they say it today. "Why do you keep going down there? You go every Sunday." That's how the word comes to us today. "We wish to see Jesus. What is it that keeps you coming back? What is it that brings you to this place? We want to see that."

The world is dying, not in order to be raised to life again, but because it does not know that we are seeds. They are seeds. They have got everything inside them to become the glorious redeemed children of God. The do not know it. Sooner or later they will end up like a bunch of seed on the shelf for ten years and have lost their ability to grow into anything. They will come to us without any words about religion, "Did you see the headlines today? Did you hear what you Presiding Bishop said? Or did you see what the world council is funding?" Why do you bother? If you look at the church that's not good. If you want to see Jesus the church can point to him.

When people come to us and say things to us that at first seems upsetting or critical the message is still the same. We want to see Jesus! We need to die to the maintenance idea. We need to die to the defending idea. So that we may grow and live to the proclaiming idea. We need to die to our desire to maintain the church the way it always has been because it has never been the way it has always been. If we want it to be the way it has always been we would have to go work in the sewer. Underground someplace.

The church has never been what is has always been. It has always been a living, breathing organism. It has always been a reflection of Christ in the world. So it changes all the time just like our bodies always change. So the maintenance church is dying. The church that is worried about budgets and worried about clean windows and that the children make noise or scuff up the walls is a dying church. It is only focused on the structure and mechanisms and not on the mission of Christ in the world. The mission church is growing because it is focused on the message and knowledge that inside this little seed is all the DNA necessary given the proper environment of fertile soil and water to grow into a pretty large tree. Just like we are. Created in the image of God and with the proper environment, soil and moisture, we too can grow into something majestic in Christ.

So the mission church is growing because it is focused on the message of Jesus Christ. That God loves this world and wants us in his presence as beloved children. The mission church is focused on the great commandments. "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, all your mind and to love your neighbor as yourself." Everything else Jesus says is commentary. Canon Law _ commentary. Prayer Book _ commentary. Everything else.

Mission church is focused on the great commission. On the day of Ascension Jesus told us what he wanted us to do. "Go into all the world, baptizing and making disciples and teaching other people to know, love and obey the Lord." So we go. We come here to be refreshed, renewed and know we are not alone. We rise up from here and go out from here and find somebody who does not know Christ and tell them about him because they want to see Jesus.

So Jesus is right. In order for the Greeks to see Jesus a lot of things had to happen. First, Jews had to be willing to talk to Pagans. Second, Pagans had to be willing to talk to Jews. Third, everyone needed to be willing and able to see that God was incarnate in Jesus Christ. The world was changing. We are to die to the old attitudes that keep us from seeing and knowing Christ. The more we die, the more we live. The more we die to our worry of ethnicity; they are all sinners like you and me. The more we die into the idea that church does not belong to some groups, the more we are going to live in wider circles of friendships and salvation. The more we die to the idea that some people, due to their economic standing are not worthy of our consideration. Whether they are very wealthy or very poor or somewhere in between. Then we will begin to gain a much wider appreciation of God's creation. The more we die to the idea that liberals need to be driven out of the church or conservatives need to be driven out of the church then the more we can understand that God speaks to everybody in different ways even if their opinion is different from mine. Then we can learn from each other. What is it that motivates and drives people? When we do that we will have a much broader view of God's world around us.

When we die to the idea of churchmanship being so important. Whether it is Anglo-Catholics with incense and holy water or low-church Evangelicals with Bibles and going out into the world, the more we can say God is working through all of that, then the deeper our knowledge of God's majesty will become.

As we are lifted up in Christ to be Christ for the world, we will change. We will be transformed gloriously. Just as Christ was. The wider our arms are stretched out like our Lord's were on the hard wood of the cross, we will discover that the arms of Christ were made bigger and more encompassing and we are moved from offering the world what we are to offering to the world is Jesus Christ.

We will be moved from competition to collaboration, from saying, "We need to be bigger than that other church," to, "people need to hear about Christ." If we can't say it in a way they can hear, let them know there is another prospect for you. We can move from hoarding to sharing. We have a room full of talented people we would like to only use at St. Margaret's but maybe that talent can be used in Indio or Palm Springs or someplace else in the world. From keeping what we have to offering who we are to the world around us. The more we're lifted up the less room we have in our hearts for hatred because it is being replaced by love for God's people.

So when Jesus says, "Unless the seed falls into the earth and is covered over and watered, it is useless. You must die in order to live," that is really good news. We are not going to lose our life. We will just lose it as we know it. It will be replaced with something majestic and greater in God. The more we show forth Christ in our lives then the more others are going to change their language when addressing us, from "why don't you play golf on Sunday mornings?" to, "Why do you go to church on Sunday mornings?" And finally to, "Will you show me Jesus. I want to see Jesus."

Let us pray:

Lord Jesus Christ, without you we are seeds out of soil. Plant us in this place. Surround us with the fertilizer of your word. Water us with your life-giving spirit. Cause us to die to what we are as seeds in order to grow to the glorious tree of life you intend for us to be, that we may show your salvation and love to all who do not know you. Amen.