Last night, I preached at STCCC from the Gospel of John, and focused primarily on ch. 17. At the beginning of the week, I had a completely different sermon in mind, but as I spent time dwelling on select passages from John during the Daily Office, I was personally convicted.
Sometimes the sermons tagged “For myself” can connect best with the congregation, and this was one of those instances. My deliver wasn’t good. I stumbled, had awkward passes as I reached for my stashed-away emergency glass of water. I didn’t have dynamic illustrations are big stories. The sermon wasn’t in my usual narrative style. Still, it apparently connected with some people, and that’s all I can hope for.
As I’ve spent some time in John over the past weeks (it’s been part of the lectionary readings), something unique has jumped out to me about the nature of John’s story about Jesus. If Matthew is the gospel of the Jews, because of the way in which he uses the Hebrew Scripture, and if Mark is the gospel of A.D.D., and Luke is the gospel of logic, then John is the gospel of the sent.
The word send in its various forms occurs nearly 60 times in the gospel of John, usually referring to a key character in the story. The word send appears second most frequently in Luke, at around 45 times. To put that in proper perspective though, keep in mind the length of each of the gospels. In my bible, John is about 23 pages long, while Luke is about 32 pages long.
In John, Jesus is portrayed consistently as the One who is sent by God into the world, to do the work of his Father. But he is simultaneously portrayed as the One who sends on God’s behalf. I think this reveals something to us about God, about Jesus, and also about the believing community. (I’ll get to the last one in another post).
In John, we can clearly see one of the fundamental understandings in missional theology: God is a missionary God. God sends Jesus into the world, with a task to accomplish—and that task isn’t just to die so God can vent his anger. Rather, God has a purpose—an end—in mind for the creation. Even through the mess of destruction brought into the creation through the Fall, God is working to bring about his purpose through the creation. This becomes what is know as the missio Dei (the mission/sending of God).
Jesus, as the One sent from God to do his mission, stands in continuity with God as a missionary God.
First God sends Adam & Eve into the garden with a task and a purpose. God then calls and sends Abraham to be part of God’s redemptive work. God sends Moses. God calls Israel to “be a light to the nations.” God sends the prophets to call Israel back to her mission. And God’s sending (& missionary) action reaches its climax in the sending of Jesus into the world—but it does not end there, because the church has a part to play in this story.
The fact that God sends into the world is incredibly important—because it is far to easy for us to fall into deism. One of the worst perversions of Scripture is the idea that God is unconcerned and uninvolved with the world, because Scripture always points to God investing himself in the world, often at great cost. Deism is more prevalent in the Christian church than what we often realize. It’s damaging, because if God is aloof the the struggle of this world, then we can be too. But the Gospel of John—the gospel of the Sent—shows us that the god of Scripture is a God who enters the mess.
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but [he sent his Son into the world] in order that the world might be saved through him. —John 3.16-17 esv
More soon.
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