Text:  John 13:31-35                                                                                 W Cantate (5^th Sunday of Easter)

“Now is the Son of Man Glorified”

            In the name of Jesus, dear brothers and sisters in Christ:  On those days that I’m called upon to conduct the weekly chapel service over at CLS, whenever possible I try to reinforce the message drawn from Scripture with some kind of an object lesson.  You know what I mean: some kind of thing or action that models and emphasizes the main point I want to get across in a visual way.  It’s a method often used to keep the students’ attention (especially the younger ones), and hopefully help them to remember the lesson a little better.  I do this despite the fact that experts in education say that young children are incapable of the kind of abstract reasoning required to correlate such object lessons with the points they are supposed to make.  But, hey, I use them anyway because, quite frankly, I think that the kids can understand a whole lot more than the experts give them credit for.

Anyway, I want you to notice that today I spared no expense to provide you with an object lesson carefully designed to highlight the truths revealed in today’s Scripture readings, specifically the one from Revelation in which the Lord Jesus says, “I am making everything new.”  I mean, I doubt that as you came to church this morning you could have failed to see how the Lord has been making all things new. We’re in full spring now:  the grass is growing like gangbusters, the leaves of the trees are just about all out now, flowers are in bloom, and everything in nature has that fresh, crisp, clean, new look about it … you know what I mean:  it’s like someone has chosen the brightest colors and painstakingly tried to color within the lines to keep the contrasts sharp, not like later in the summer when there’s a bit of haze in the air and all the colors begin to fade and run together.  In any case, my point is that the Lord’s annual renewal of the land in the spring is a visual reminder for all of us of that day our God is going to make everything new in a radical, complete, and wonderful way.  The old order of things with all the problems of this world, all the sin, corruption, and death—all that will pass away, and the dwelling of God in the fullness of his glory will be with us forever.

All of which speaks of a new and complete relationship that we will have with the Lord at that time.  And that leads me to another springtime ritual of newness we often observe, and that is that (in most places in our country anyway) spring is the favored time for weddings to take place.  No, it doesn’t happen much around here because people are too busy planting to go through all the marriage preparations and festivities; but trust me, in the rest of the United States by far most weddings take place in May and June … and I suspect that even around here most young ladies dream of a spring wedding even if they can’t have one.  But what a wedding ceremony marks is the end of a preliminary relationship that’s very good but nevertheless lacking in order to begin an entirely new relationship that is complete.  Two people who have previously pledged themselves come together publicly and are bound by their mutual promises to begin living in the absolute commitment of husband and wife, to live together as one in love and dedication to each other.  What was before promised in anticipation by an engagement is brought to its complete fullness in marriage.

And that too is a theme reflected in the reading from Revelation in which the coming of the Lord at the end of time to make all things new is pictured as a wedding ceremony. Jesus Christ is the groom who is betrothed to his bride, the church.  For the time being she lives in anticipation of the day that he will come and take her to himself in a very close and intimate way … when they will truly become one and live together in perfect bliss.  But while she waits … well … she doesn’t always look her best. Fact is that sometimes she looks downright scary.  She’s disheveled by her toils and struggles in this world, and she’s often stained by her sins.  But on that day that he comes for her she’s going to be “prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.”  That is, she’s going to be all decked out and made up right – she’ll be clothed in Christ’s perfection and righteousness.  Her beauty will be breathtaking.  And we can relate to this image.  I mean, if there’s ever a day that a woman wants to go all out and look her best, it’s on the day of her wedding.  That’s when she wants to appear in all her womanly glory, as it were.  And this is the picture the Scriptures give us of that day when we, the church, will be made new and prepared to meet our Lord.  In his glorious return, we too will be made glorious when we begin to share all things with him in the fullest sense.

            But all this speaks of a future glory to be revealed; a glory we will know one day when Christ returns.  And we eagerly await that day.  But in today’s Gospel reading, Jesus speaks of a glory that’s known and experienced in the present when he says, “Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him.”  This is something different than the splendor of his final return when he comes to take his church to heaven.  It’s a present glory that Christ displays now – and which, I might add, he shares with us, just as he will share with us his final glory.  It’s this present tense glory that I’d like to spend some time considering this morning.

            There were, of course, a few occasions on which the Lord Jesus gave us a glimpse of his heavenly glory.  His transfiguration on the mountain is surely the clearest example.  At that time his appearance became so brilliant that his disciples could barely stand to look at him.  But this morning’s text in which Jesus speaks of being glorified has nothing to do with the transfiguration or the kind of glory displayed there.  So what is he talking about?  What’s the occasion of this present glorification?

            Well, if we’re looking for the object lesson that provides a visual clue it would be pretty easy to miss.  There’s not much glory evident in the scene before us as Jesus speaks these words.  It’s Thursday of holy week, the night of the Passover celebration.  Jesus and his disciples are gathered around a low table in an upper room in a home somewhere in Jerusalem.  The accommodations are rather Spartan and cramped.  Upper rooms were usually used for sleeping and were fairly small – even a big one like this would be small by today’s standards.  But they’re meeting here precisely because no one would expect an upper room to be used for dining and celebrating the Passover.  This is a secret meeting place, a safe house, where they can avoid the miracle seeking crowds, the curious gawkers, and the ever watchful eyes of Jesus’ enemies.  The point is that there’s nothing glorious about the setting.

            Nor is there anything glorious evident in the goings on.  They were celebrating the Passover:  an ancient ritual meal that every Jewish family observed annually.  They had all done it many times before.  For as long as they could remember, each year they had recited the same old stories of the Exodus, sang the same old psalms, ate the unappealing unleavened bread, and tasted the bitter herbs.  It was just something you did if you were Jewish.  But this year, as Jesus led them through the service, there seemed to have been greater solemnity … more weight placed on the meaning of the words. Family Passover celebrations were usually fairly light and upbeat; this one, while still joyous in tone, had been much more serious and sober.  There had even been a few uncomfortable moments.  Before the meal began, Jesus had washed his disciples’ feet.  It was a task considered so low in that culture that a slave could not be ordered to do it for his master – and here, Jesus, their Lord and master, was doing it for them.  Each one in turn was embarrassed and disconcerted to see Jesus humiliate himself before them.  After having stooped so low, it must have seemed awfully strange to the disciples to hear Jesus speak of being glorified.

            And the thing is, when Jesus says it, there’s no obvious change in him or in any of the outward circumstances.  Everything looks exactly the same as before.  I can imagine the disciples looking at each other with puzzled faces, “Glory?  What glory? I sure don’t see it; do you?”  The only thing that’s different is that Judas has left the room.  The disciples think that he’s on some special mission for Jesus – but, of course, we know otherwise.  We know that Judas has gone out to betray him – and Jesus knows it too.  That’s what prompts him to say that his glorification has begun.  And what he means is that he is glorified specifically in his betrayal by a friend, his illegal arrest, his multiple sham trials, his long, bitter suffering, and his ignoble death as a criminal.  And while all these unjust, horrible, and evil things are going on, God the Father is glorified in Jesus the Son.  And that sure doesn’t seem very glorious to us, does it? No, it’s everything we hate and wish to avoid.  It’s ugly, gut-wrenching, and repulsive to look at – but in these things God’s glory is revealed.

            How? It’s because it is in these things that God reveals his love for us.  God is love: love that is absolutely committed, that will bear any indignity, cost, sacrifice, or pain … a love that knows no bounds whatsoever.  When you see such pure love, then you are looking at God because that’s who God is – and it’s that kind of love that is revealed when the Father gives up the Son for lost mankind and the Son willingly hands himself over to suffer these things on our behalf.  What I’m saying is this:   if you want to see God’s glory in the present, don’t think about bright lights and heavenly splendor with choirs of angels singing magnificent anthems of praise; instead, look at the cross and see the love of God for a world that hates him … a world that continually betrays, rejects, and condemns him … no, bring it home closer than that:  see on the cross God’s love for you who have often left, betrayed, and by your sins nailed him to that cross to die in shame.  There you see God’s glory revealed here and now.    

            And if you can see it there, and you know that it is by such glorious love that God forgives you your sin and makes you a new person, then it is this kind of glory that the Lord wants to reveal not just to you, but also in you. Jesus told his disciples, “A new command I give you:  love one another.  As I have loved you, so you must love one another.”  And understand that his display of sacrificial love for us is more than just a noble example to try to follow:  “Jesus gave himself up for me, so now I should be willing to give myself to others.  I guess I’ll try to do my best”—no, it’s more that that.  God’s love for you in Jesus is the power that enables you to be loving as he is loving so that you, in your actions and words, can reflect the glory of God’s love.

            But part of the problem of our fallen condition is that we still don’t fully grasp what love is.  An editorial in this week’s Clarinda paper revealed a common misunderstanding of Christ’s love.  The writer equated the acceptance of evil in others, the tolerance of their sin, and a morally lax permissiveness with love.  Jesus simply wanted everyone to be free to be themselves and try to live the best way they knew how – whatever that way might happen to be.  It was for holding that radical idea that Christ died; or so the writer thought.

            He could not have been farther from the mark.  Love is not whatever it is that causes least conflict and confrontation. It’s not whatever makes people the most comfortable.  It is not love to permit evil or sin to continue unchallenged, or to sit by while people are ruining their lives or the lives of others.  Love does not ignore immorality or injustice – it acts to end it, whatever the personal consequences might be.  Loves serves, it gives, is suffers, and it endures without fearing or taking account of the cost to self.  In this fallen world of ours, love will get you hurt and insulted and maybe killed.  Jesus Christ was glorified by displaying that kind of love for us, and when he did, his Father was glorified in him.  That’s the kind of love the Lord Jesus empowers us to have now by his Spirit, and it’s by showing forth this love that we demonstrate to all that we are his disciples.  When the world sees our love, they will see Christ glorified in us.

            And so in this time of spring renewal, it’s fitting that we take pains – and I mean really take pains – to examine ourselves to see where we have failed to love one another.  We need to ask: where have I been selfish, or controlling, or manipulating of others. In what ways have I failed to serve or give of my time and abilities?  When have I allowed pride, or a sense of superiority, or the fear of getting involved or criticized to stand in the way of doing what was right or rendering assistance to someone who needed it?  When has Christ’s love not been evident in me?

            These are the sins that need to be identified and taken to the cross where God’s glorious forgiving love is revealed.  That’s where those sins are taken away by trusting in the sacrifice of love he made – and in their being taken away Christ gives you the new, cleansed spiritual self that has both the will and the ability to begin the glorification of Christ in you.  Then, just as the annual greening of the earth previews the final recreation of all things, so also our love for one another, flawed and imperfect as it is, echoes the love displayed for us by our Lord on the cross when he died for us, and also previews the perfect love we sill have when he comes for us on the last day. So, in this way, by continuous repentance and reliance on him, may each of us be able to say from now until the day that he comes, that “now the Son of Man is glorified in me”. In Jesus’ name.  Amen.

Soli Deo Gloria!