Meeting Jesus

Epiphany 3

January 21, 2024

Fr. Tim Nunez

May my spoken word be true to God’s written word and bring us all closer to the living word, Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

When preparing to preach, a preacher studies the text and often finds an itch that needs to be scratched. In today’s Gospel, we heard Mark’s account of Jesus calling his first disciples. There are distinct differences from John’s Gospel account, which we heard just last Sunday. John says Jesus called Peter and Andrew down on the river Jordan with John the Baptist close by. Mark says they were on the shore of the Sea of Galilee after John the Baptist had been arrested. Matthew and Luke align with Mark but add more details and context. (Mark is very fast-paced.)

Six years ago, actually exactly six years and one week ago today, I preached here for the first time, filling in immediately after Fr. Tom Seitz retired. That was the second Sunday after Epiphany and I preached on John’s account of Jesus calling his first disciples. And I likened it to my first date with Meg, which was a “blind date” and, without going into all the details, I shared that by the end of the evening I had fallen in love. That was a first step in our relationship that has led to today, our 35th wedding anniversary.

I shared that I could not possibly have foreseen all the blessings that would follow that first date, and today we look back on that long and winding path with thanksgiving for the blessings and for God’s presence and help all along the way, especially when we had times of deep sorrow and struggle.

Many of you have heard that story. But now you’re going to hear the rest of the story. That blind date was not, technically, the first time Meg and I met. Many years before, her grandparents (her grandfather and my grandfather were friends from college) were hosted a cookout to which our family was among many that were invited. We call it the Piñata Party because there was a piñata and that is mostly what I remember from it.

I was four. Meg was two. That made a big difference back then. I was free to run around with the other kids while Meg watched from her playpen, in a diaper. There is a picture from that party that shows me near the playpen. So close, yet about 22 years from seeing her again.

I share that story to illustrate that meeting is one thing and establishing a relationship is quite another.

“When you and I met, the meeting was over very shortly, it was nothing. Now it is growing something as we remember it, what will it be when I remember it as I lie down to die, what it makes in me all my days till then - that is the real meeting. The other is only the beginning of it.” C.S. Lewis, “Out of the Silent Planet

The clearest explanation for these discrepancies between Mark and John is that together they describe a meeting which led to further meetings, all of which led to a point of decision for these disciples.

What is true for these disciples is true for the people of Israel. As a people, from Abraham forward, they have had encounter after encounter with God, most often through prophets like Isaiah, through whom God said things like:

Here is my servant, whom I uphold,
   my chosen, in whom my soul delights;
I have put my spirit upon him;
   he will bring forth justice to the nations.
He will not cry or lift up his voice,
   or make it heard in the street;
a bruised reed he will not break,
   and a dimly burning wick he will not quench;
   he will faithfully bring forth justice.
He will not grow faint or be crushed
   until he has established justice in the earth;
   and the coastlands wait for his teaching. (Isaiah 42:1-4)

Then one day, as Mark’s brevity makes so clear, everything changes. “Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the Good News of God…” Now Jesus starts preaching. Now Jesus starts calling his disciples. That past is clearly past. The page has turned. The new age, the Kingdom of God, has begun.

And isn’t that how life flows? We come to a big decision or event in life, it happens, then you look back over your shoulder and see how you got there. There are always precedents, but you don’t see them as precedents until the big change comes and you look back and see them.

I had no idea when I was four that 22 years later my parents would set me up on a blind date with that cute two-year-old in the playpen. (She really was so cute! Still is.)  I had no idea before she opened her door on that blind date that we would marry and build a life together.

I had no idea that a friend’s invitation to a Bible study when I was 12 would lead me to pursue ordained ministry 25 years later. I had no idea six years and one week ago, when I came here on January 14, 2018 to help this church start a search process, that by that October Meg and I would joyfully accept God’s very clear call to serve Church of the Good Shepherd. Five years in, our eyes remain fixed on where Christ is calling us, calling our children.

Meeting Jesus is a recurring encounter. We hear or read something about him, we look deeper. We encounter him. He calls us forward, step by step. He calls us beyond ourselves, beyond our families, beyond our aspirations, always further up, always further in.

I’m going to share that quote from C.S. Lewis again. This time, we will share it as a prayer to Jesus.

“When you and I met, the meeting was over very shortly, it was nothing. Now it is growing something as we remember it, what will it be when I remember it as I lie down to die, what it makes in me all my days till then - that is the real meeting. The other is only the beginning of it.”

What will your relationship with Jesus be like when you lie down to die?

Let us pray.

AMEN