the grace of friendship

Second Sunday after Epiphany● January 14, 2024

Readings: 1 Samuel 3: 1-10, John 1: 43-51

Riot Mueller, Guest Preacher © 2024

You can view the full worship video recording at:

https://youtu.be/0hEDuI80Sns?feature=shared

Good morning Church of the Village, it is good to be with you. Good morning, I would like to put in my formal edit to the bulletin here right now. Live action, I'm changing the title of my sermon. You can now refer to this sermon in your bulletin as "The Grace of Friendship." It is with this spirit that I ask you to get into whatever position is comfortable for you to feel the presence of God that is here in all things and pray with me.

Always dear God, we love you. We know you. We wrestle with you. There's so many things going on inside of ourselves, outside of ourselves. Some days it feels like there's more questions than answers. God, I ask that you guide us and keep us in the way that you taught us in Psalm 139, that you know us and love us. Allow us to open our hearts, our minds, our bodies to feel that love. In your name, we pray. Amen.

Church, I want you to think of your best friend, the closest friend that you have. Bring that person to mind right now. Could be a friend or family member, someone you knew a long time ago, an animal, a plant. This is a friend that you just love for being who they are. You have the same interests, the same type of jokes crack you up. You see this person, and you see them now and you see a plan and vision that you have for their life, the greatness of their life. You see them doing great things, and you truly want the best for them.

I'm going to tell you a little bit about my person. For me, that person is Phoebe. Phoebe is an artist and a weaver, a beautiful musician. She's Pitch Perfect, she can harmonize with anything and anyone. She's really wacky, surprise, surprise, I have a wacky best friend. She's really big energy, she's super talented. She speaks four languages. Everyone loves having a chat with her. She was raised in Athens, Greece, by a Greek father and an Australian mother. But raised in a Greek household. Phoebe went to college in England, Spain, and Canada. So she has this kind of “Third Country” personality where she was raised by multiple cultural backgrounds and currently lives in the United States. So she's too westernized for some of her hometown friends and family in Greece, but she's also not westernized enough to fully understand everything that went on in our wacky gender expansive community in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Phoebe and I tell the same stories over and over again and roll on the ground laughing. She's one of those friends that the way that we joke and talk and reason things out with each other, we talk in a way that sometimes I do not want God to know all of the pieces of my heart and everything that is going on in my mind. It's a friendship about Grace. You need this type of friendship that has grace in it, where you can say just the most absurd things that you're thinking and know that this person isn't going to think anything less of you.

She can come to me with questions about sexuality, gender, trans identity, queerness. I go to her with questions about global politics from a non-US perspective. Philip and Nathaniel have one of those types of friendships. It seems like they really trust each other and know each other. They have the same interests, seems to be the Torah and scripture and God. It's the type of friendship where when Philip is called by Jesus, he immediately runs to Nathaniel. That's the first person he wants to tell. It's a type of friendship where you're able to say anything that comes out of your mouth. So Jesus finds Philip, and even that statement that Jesus found Philip, that's a topic for a whole other sermon. Jesus found Philip, Philip didn't have to go out and seek Jesus.

But Philip finds Jesus, Jesus finds Philip, and Philip immediately goes and tells Nathaniel, "We found him, we found the one. We've been studying Torah together, we've been studying scripture. We've been arguing about what these laws and texts mean, and we found it. We found the one that Moses said is going to come." And Nathaniel responds in that way that you could only speak to one of your closest friends. "Can anything good come from Nazareth? You found the one, Jesus of Nazareth, that little town over there. It doesn't have a synagogue, it doesn't have schools. It's just a little nothing town on the side of the road. What are you talking about?"

That's a line that's similar to lines that Phoebe and I have said to each other, a line that when it comes out of your mouth, the only thing you have to say to your friend is like, "Dude, I love you, but you really can't say that." It's like, "Wow." But you stay with that person, you don't leave them in that. I hear Philip saying, "Brother, you're being mean. You're thinking really small. I'm trying to explain something to you, something that we've been talking about for a long time. It's here, something that we've always wanted, we've prayed about, we've sung about. It's happened, and it's happening right now." But Philip doesn't even say that. He responds like a best friend. Philip just looks at him and says, "Come and see," and he takes Nathaniel and he brings him to Jesus because he knows Nathaniel. He knows where his heart is and where his values are. He sees his God-given talents, his great wisdom and love, even when his judgments and biases and ignorances are running rampant. He knows Nathaniel. There's a level of trust and vulnerability in being known by someone at this level.

The joy of the Gospel message this week is that we get a friend to sit with us in the pit. We get a friend to go through our calling with us when our call comes and we respond with small-minded thinking or fear or resistance. We get to sit with someone in that. I've heard people say the phrase, "Don't worry alone." It can be a scary place in our own brains, in our own minds. We have a friend in the pit with us. So then Nathaniel goes, and I imagine he goes with a bit of a defensive eye roll. You know, for me, it can be kind of embarrassing when Phoebe calls me out when I'm talking in this very U.S. perspective, as if I know things about things I actually know nothing about, and she calls me out, and it's kind of embarrassing. But she says it's okay, come check it out for yourself. I'll show you. It's in her knowing me and knowing my heart that I'm able to go. And then what happens? Nathaniel meets Jesus, and Jesus responds in such a Jesus way. He immediately greets this person who moments before was talking smack about him to his best friend and says, "There's a good person. There's someone who shares in my vision. There's someone who cares and loves and is studied. There is a true Israelite with no deceit."

Most scholars have written so much about the entire Bible, but also about this scripture, and they wonder why this phrase is being used. A lot of people have made it mean that Nathaniel has a level of seriousness for keeping God's covenant. That Nathaniel wasn't merely a biological descendant of Jacob, an Israelite of the flesh, but an Israelite of the spirit, a genuine descendant of the thought, the feeling, the heart of the Israelites. Someone who has no deceit. Nathaniel's the real deal, and Jesus can tell that. He sees it in Nathaniel. So Jesus says, "Nathaniel, you're the real deal," and Nathaniel responds, "How would you have any idea that that's true about me?" Maybe still feeling some embarrassment for talking smack about Jesus about two seconds ago in his hometown.

Jesus responds with this unbelievable response. Jesus knows that Nathaniel is the real deal because he was sitting underneath a fig tree. What does that mean? Most scholars say that sitting under a tree was equal to studying the Torah. It's a turn of phrase that Jesus is saying, "You've studied the Torah, you know the way, and therefore, you are the real deal." But linguistically at this time, scholars say that that turn of phrase wasn't being used, and it was used much later than this gospel was written. So what else is going on here?

I want to read from Micah 4, a promise from our scriptures. "They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore. Everyone will sit under their own vine and under their own fig tree, and no one will make them afraid, for the Lord Almighty has spoken." I like to think that Jesus is communicating to Nathaniel that they share the same vision for the future. Maybe up until now, Nathaniel has been doing everything he could to keep that dream of the Covenant alive, the hope of a promised land.

Maybe he spent all of his days in active protest, sitting underneath the fig tree, talking to people, showing the hope and possibility that lives in God's intention and knowingness and plan for us all. There will be no more war. No one will be afraid of one another, a world where every family gets their own little piece of land and sits underneath the grove of trees that is indigenous to that piece of the world where they can be at peace, taken care of, fed spiritually, physically, emotionally. When Jesus references this piece of the covenantal promise that God has planned for all of us, Nathaniel knows immediately, in the same way that we know when we meet our people. It was an instant connection.

When Phoebe and I met, I was just like, "There she is, that's my friend." We didn't have to spend a lot of time getting to know one another; it was instant because we shared a vision for the future. Phoebe and I, and many of my friends in the congregation here, we believe in the same things. Phoebe and I want a world where artists can thrive, where art and culture, expression, dance, music, embodiment can take the lead in our lives. We believe in a world where there's no war, where people aren't afraid of one another. Phoebe believes in a world where her family's olive farm can be revived and brought to life and produce olives and oil for all of us. We believe in a world that Jesus promised us, that the Psalms promised us, that God has a plan for us, that God knows us.

It can almost feel like too much. At times when I really think about that Psalm, it's like, "Ah, to be known just for being me. You love me just for being me. You love me from the time that I was stitched together in my mother's womb." It feels almost overwhelming or embarrassing. We almost resist this amount of attention and love, but this is the covenantal promise that God made for us. We're going to beat our swords and our spears into garden tools. It's so simple but not easy. Nation will not take up swords against each other; violence will stop. We aren't going to train anyone for war anymore. We're going to train people to be together, to tend to our trees, to tend to our art, to tend to our souls.

And sitting under that fig tree, no one will be afraid, for God has spoken. But this is a grace that we need to respond to. God laid it out in Psalm 139, and it's our responsibility, with the love and witness of the people who love us, to rise to that responsibility, to take action. We're in our calls together in that doubt, in that fear; you don't have to do it alone. And hey, if you're like Philip and you say yes right away, that's awesome; we need you too. We need you to go and grab someone and remind them of their beauty, of their worth, of their wholeness. We're pulling everyone forward, and everyone means everyone.

God is building a new way, and he's building a new way through us. As known and loved creatures of God, we are building a new society to make humanity and society move away from our emotional reactions to one another. That was just an emotional reaction that Nathaniel gave. "What good could come from Nazareth?" That's not rational thinking. Now we know good things come from all over this world, inside of ourselves, all over this city. God is building a new way for everyone. And on this road to the new way, it's going to be bumpy. It definitely won't be boring. There might be times where you want to talk smack about who's doing what, how, and when and shouldn't it be that person. But that's why you have your closest friend to be there with you and say, "Come and see."

We've been singing and praying and dancing and asking for this new world to come alive on Earth for a long time. And I want to remind you that it will and it can. But I need you, and you need me. We're pulling everyone forward to the greatest good. Think of the person who loves you the most, that you love the most, where it's easy just to be in their presence. Think of them, love yourself, and love your neighbor how that person loves you. Thank you, Church of the Village. I love you. Amen.

Copyright (c) 2024 - Riot Mueller
All rights reserved.