1 Corinthians 1:1-9
John 1:29-42
Our two New Testament readings this morning lead us to a basic question: What is being a Christian about? What is the sense of Christianity? Just like there are five senses we humans can experience – sight, sound, smell, touch, and taste – what are the experiences that are a part of the Christian life?
In our gospel reading from the gospel of John, Jesus calls his first disciples. It’s a strange story. The story is like an onion, there are layers and layers of meaning to it. It begins with three of Jesus’ soon to be disciples watching Jesus as he walks by. One of them feels led in his spirit to say, “Look, here is the Lamb of God.”
The gospel writer John says that the two disciples heard this, and they started following Jesus. Sensing that they were following him, Jesus turns and says to them, “What are you looking for?” The two disciples ask Jesus a simple question, “where are you staying?” Jesus’ response is not to give them his address or the location of his hotel. Instead, Jesus’ response is an invitation, “Come and see.”
To answer some of the opening questions, we can say that one thing that it means to be a Christian is to be invited to something. That something is a relationship with the living Lord. “Come and see,” the Lord says.
It’s the first of our ‘senses’ of faith – sight. “Come and see,” says the Lord. But when we talk about sight and seeing in the Christian sense, we don’t just mean seeing with our eyes. Remember that we said this story is like an onion, there are layers of meaning to it. It’s that way with ‘seeing’ in our faith. We obviously can’t see God or Jesus or the Holy Spirit like I can see you and you can see the stained glass around the church. Instead, the sight Jesus is talking about is something that happens in your soul, in your spirit. Look for God working in your life. Maybe something unexpected came to you that you needed? Maybe you found peace when you prayed? Maybe you read a passage of Scripture or heard a sermon or someone say something faithful and you were convicted, you were motivated to do something different in your life?
The two disciples respond to Jesus’ invitation to ‘come and see’ where he is staying. They are so excited and also curious about who they have found in Jesus, that one of them, Andrew, goes and tells his brother Simon, “We have found the Messiah (which means Anointed One, the man of God)”. So they bring their brother Simon to Jesus and Jesus welcomes him, but with an odd greeting. He says to Simon, “You are Simon son of John. You are to be called Cephas (which is translated Peter)”.
This is the second of our ‘senses’ of faith – sound. Part of being a Christian is hearing the Lord call your name. And part of being a Christian is hearing a word from the Lord. We’re going to keep going back to the example of an onion because there are layers of meaning to this. When the church says that the ‘Lord speaks’ or the ‘Lord calls you by name’, it is most often something that happens inside of us. Most of us humans will never hear God’s voice from the clouds or God speaking in a way you can hear with your body’s ears. I think it’s possible that it can happen. But most of the time when we hear God in our soul, in our spirit is when we read Scripture or when we pray or when we listen to someone speak about God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit in a sermon or when we are asked to help out to meet a need. When we talk about hearing God, one of the things we mean is that we get a new or different understanding of something. Think about when you are having a conversation with someone – you might learn something about them, it might be funny and you might laugh, what they say could make you upset, or you might learn something new. It’s similar with our faith. We say that God speaks (a word from the Lord) and the other side of speaking is listening.
The third sense, smell, is a little harder to see on the outside of the story of Jesus calling these two disciples. But I think it’s there. Here’s how. Think about your home or your parent’s home. It probably has its own smell. You might not always notice going through your daily routines because you can get so used to it. But go away for a week and come back and that smell will greet you as you walk through the door. Or maybe you notice it when you go to someone else’s home. There’s a unique smell that is part of that person’s home.
Here’s how this relates to what it means to be a Christian. When Jesus invited the disciples to come and see where he was staying, he was inviting them into his home, the place where he was living. That’s important because our faith is something that is always lived out where we live. Put another way, you and I are Christians here in Lewistown and Central Pennsylvania in the United States of America. Of course if we moved to a different city or a different country, we wouldn’t stop being Christians. But, it is to say that we are Christians in a real place, with real people, with real smells, where real things go on – people are born, get jobs, lose jobs, get married, get divorced, get in trouble, get sick, get better, and die. Being a Christian is about following Jesus Christ in those very real things that happen to us and not just coming to church on a Sunday morning.
For last two senses – touch and taste – we will go to our reading from the apostle Paul’s letter to the Corinthians. The apostle Paul is writing a letter to a church that he helped start. It’s a very personal letter, like a message that you would send to close friends that you haven’t seen in a while. And one of the things that Paul begins with is calling the people in this Corinthian church he is writing to ‘saints’. “To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ…Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.”
Here’s how this relates to the sense of touch. Paul often calls his fellow Christians brothers and sisters. They are not related in a way by blood or by marriage. Instead, they are brothers and sisters in Christ. God has made them into a family called the church. And one of the ways that families can show their love for one another is by giving each other hugs and by shaking hands. So we’re going to do something that we haven’t probably done since the pandemic if I’m recalling correctly. We are going to pass the peace. If you want to and are comfortable with it, I invite everyone to get up now and pass the peace. You can do this by going around to other people, shaking their hand, and saying “peace of Christ be with you” and then saying back “and also with you”.
We are the body of Christ as the church. That means that we want everyone, no matter who they are or where they are on life’s journey, to experience the love of Christ in our fellowship and friendship with one another. We may not always agree with or like one another, but we are called to be brothers and sisters in Christ and to love one another and show grace, mercy, and tell each other the truth as our Lord showed those things to us. Jesus Christ turns strangers and enemies into friends. That’s the spiritual sense of touch. It’s being in Christ, in community with other people.
The part of Paul’s letter to the Corinthians that we read is the letter’s opening. After the greeting section, the apostle Paul starts by giving thanks. Paul is thankful for them as people and what God is doing in and through them. Here is what he writes, “I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that has been given you in Christ Jesus, for in every way you have been enriched in him, in speech and knowledge of every kind…” I thought of our last human sense here – taste – when the apostle Paul writes that “for in every way you have been enriched in [Christ].” I connect it with taste because ingredients are often ‘enriched’ – enriched flour for making bread and enriched cereal with added vitamins and nutrients that help our bodies stay healthy.
We can also connect it to communion. When we take part in communion we break bread and say ‘this is the body of Christ’ and when we drink the cup, we say ‘this is the blood of Christ’. These are the spiritual senses of taste. Just like food nourishes our bodies and food can also be very pleasing to eat and taste good, so Jesus Christ is like food for our souls. His words, his teachings, his forgiveness in his life given freely for us – all of those things enrich us and make our heart, mind, and soul come alive.
What does it mean to be a Christian? What is the sense of Christianity? “Come and see”, the Lord says. Peel the onion and look and see what the Lord might be doing. Open the eyes of your heart. Hear God’s words so that you can learn God’s voice and hear God calling you. Embrace the smells of life. The computer, XBox, phone, and the TV are fine, but the Christian life is lived out in the sights and smells and sounds of the world. Be brothers and sisters to one another because the Lord has made you his brother and sister. And finally, taste – as the Psalmist writes, “Taste and see that the Lord is good.”
Amen.