CLC Sermon 1/4/26

What are you looking for; come and see; follow me

What are the things that deserve explanation and what are the things that are impossible to describe?

This gospel passage this morning essentially tells the story of the first encounter between Jesus and The People, and it starts with this pair of questions. Jesus asking "What are you looking for?" and them replying, essentially "well what have you got to show us?". The whole exchange is very coy, they imply that they're looking for the teacher, the messiah, and he kindaaa doesn't really tell him what he has to teach, only "come and see" and "follow me". It's not until the end of this bit that he says, basically, if you follow me, "you will see the heavens opened and the angels ascending and descending" which is, not a very clarifying thing to say.

But in the midst of a world that is as broken and confusing as it has ever been, whom among us isn't looking for a teacher or a messiah to give us some clarity-- about what's going to happen, about what we should do, about if and how everything is going to turn out okay, about the nature of evil and how we resist it. We want somebody who can help us feel righted in a world that can feel so wrong. We are prone to seek out that feeling from all kinds of places, by our choice in politicians or in news sources, from titans of industry or from wellness influencers or pundits or from whomever. And I don't really have much to say about whether or not that is a good thing or a bad thing, it is just a thing. There are a lot of people out there who are trying to be the loudest voice in our ear telling us what's right and what's true in a world gone mad, and some of them even stand to make quite a bit of money from being the loudest.

But what's real, I imagine, is that if you are here at church- gosh, here or at any church- you have found some semblance in church of rightness in the world, some semblance or how to act in a world full of bad actors, some semblance of belonging in a lonely world, an ounce of meaning in a nihilistic world! We aren't quite the type of church that puts the pastor on the pedestal of rabbi, Pastor Anne and I don't gatekeep what's right and what's true and how to act, the way that maybe some other types of churches do, but that rightness lives in the middle of all of us disciples here together working out how to treat each other right, be a community, and take care of the world around us, in the middle of all of that, I bet you've found something that's mattered.

So if somebody were to approach you and say, um, "what's going on over there at Christ Lutheran", or even better, "what have you found there?" I wonder what you would say. I feel like there is this uhh, sorta temptation still to let the answer just be come and see or follow me, but we forget maybe that "come and see" was the first thing Jesus says in this Gospel. It was to people who had very little context for him, who didn't know how the story would play out or what would happen to him, they didn't know about the kinda church that would be birthed from his life and ministry. We have a lottt more context for what we're doing here, maybe, than Peter, Paul, John. We can talk about his resurrection, his parables, the vision he had for the world and how it matched so much of what was raised in the Old Testament, about the work the church has done and is doing, what it feels like to be here, and what circumstances meant that you sought this place out and found your place within it.

I say all this not to say that "come and see" is an insufficient answer. It is sooo, so, so important to bring people here, because there are things about this place that are impossible to explain. And, we live in a time where it can feel a little bit like a invitation to church is like scratching off a lottery ticket, if somebody says "come to church with me" you reallyyy do not know what you're gonna get and it can run the gamut from like, fancy vestments and stained glass and a high altar to like a drum set and a t shirt cannon to a sermon that is a political screed or a self-help inspirational TED talk or one that doesn't really touch scripture at all!

And in the midst of all of this, there are people without a church, who are looking for a church, who need one badly, and who are afraid of the invitation to church for fear-- sometimes legitimate-- of what they might find when they show up. There are people who need the hope of Christ crucified and risen, who need a community of friendship and mutual care, a place to help them navigate tragedies or people to share their joy with, and if that's what you've found in your faith or in your church, it needs to be told.

When I started as the campus minister of The House, gosh almost five years ago, we didn't really have any students, and I spent a lot of my time kinda idly wondering what The House would be for the students that ended up finding it, when at the time all we really had to say was, uh, come and see! A couple years later, we have something like 30 students, so many they don't really fit in our living room which is a funny problem to have, and here's what they say about our ministry.

Some say that they were absolutely adamant that they were done with church and not going to join a campus ministry, and then they found The House and somehow, church felt doable again.

Others say that the prevailing message of the church of their childhoods was that there was something deeply and fundamentally wrong with them, and that this was the first ministry that they felt like had something else to say, or that didn't shame them for having questions.

Many of our students say that they friendships they've made at The House kept them afloat during college and that the safety that they have created for one another is something that they have not experienced in a church ever before.

I might add that for me, a little church ministry whose primary modes of being involve art, creativity, laughter, and questions, make it a fun place to be for me, and for them too I think.

So if any of that interests or appeals to you, Come and See! Hah!

And in the meantime, I wonder what your answer would be for this church, for Christ Lutheran? What does this place mean do you? What does this faith mean to you? Amen.