So really, what DO you seek?

A RESPITE IN JOHN'S GARDEN

Alexander Shaia, the Maronite lay scholar of the four Gospels, describe the Gospel of John as a "garden of joy." He points out that John intersperses Sunday reading of the other three Gospels with insights into the beauty of the story being told in them.

This Sunday we have John's version of the "Baptism of Jesus." It is told, not as an "eyewitness" of the event, but as John's testimony. It is John, not Jesus, who speaks of the experience of Spirit's descent "like a dove." And John goes on to reflect on the meaning of the event, its impact on John and John's own sense of his call, the mystery of God in his life: "I myself did not know him...I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God."

Testimony and seeing is at stake here. What have you seen of the astounding purposes of God? And how have you "given testimony"? That word tends to be jargon in our religious culture--I think of Bart Simpson singing "testify!" as he conducts a lucrative revival ministry under a sheet-tent in the Simpson's back yard. But we testify when our actions and words try to reflect with integrity what we most deeply believe, what we think is most deeply real. How do our lives "testify"?

Seeing and testimony is still at stake in the next dreamlike sequence. John points to Jesus and uses that potent image: "Lamb of God." John loses two disciples who leave him to follow the new rabbi. Then one of the shortest and most powerful conversations in the Bible follows: "What are you looking for?" "Where do you stay?" "Come and see"

When we hear these words, we are invited to not be content with mere words, even the words of the Bible. It is we who are addressed, we who are asked, "What are you looking for?", and we fumble for the best answer to the most profound question we shall ever be posed. One of the rock band U-2's most powerful songs has the chorus "And I still haven't found what I'm looking for." What do WE seek? What do we answer? And are we willing to "come and see", or was just asking the question all that we can handle at the moment?

To paraphrase an old movie catchphrase: can we in fact "handle the truth"?