Rev. George Miller
Dec 19, 2021
John 1:14-18
Over the past 2 weeks there’s been a conversation about
the sanctuary, more specifically, the placement of the Communion Table.
Why is it front and center? Is it a distraction? Great questions to ask.
When worship is done intentionally, worship leaders
should be able to answer “Why?”, even if it’s an “I don’t know, but I’ll find
out.”
Where worship items are placed allows people to
understand what matters to a particular congregation during a particular season
in their life.
For example, if the Communion table was on the side, the
altar would be front and center. What does
an altar represent- sacrifice. And, in
ancient days, sacrifices were made to appease gods so they wouldn’t be angry.
Is the altar a place where we fearfully offer sacrifices to
make sure God is not mad OR… is the altar a place where we joyfully lay down
our offerings as a form of thanks to the God of Agape love?
We could move the pulpit to the center because that would
say we feel the sermon is most important, BUT if we’re not careful, we could send
a message that the preacher is a star.
So the Communion Table, as front and center, sends a
message to all- the Lord’s Table is the heart of our sanctuary, just like the
kitchen and dining room is the heart of any home.
To our fellow Faith Travelers, the Lord’s Table is to a
sign of welcome. Inclusion. AGAPE
LOVE. Where those who hungry are fed,
those who are thirsty are quenched.
This Table is a sign of nourishment, as Isiah 55 talked
about last week.
Are you hungry- come to the Table.
Are you hungry for life everlasting- come to the Table.
Are you hungry for justice, kindness- come to the Table.
And after you are fed with Heaven’s bread and wine- go and
do likewise.
By having the Lord’s Table front and center we are
sending a message to folk not only here, but in Ohio, in Canada, and South
Africa-
You are being nourished, and it is God the Father through
Jesus the Son who is nourishing you.
Eat, drink, rest, then go and do likewise.
Nourished- that’s the theme for today.
After weeks of anticipation we are finally being introduced
to Jesus. But John does not focus on
Jesus the baby, or Jesus the son of Mary.
He focuses on Jesus as the Word. The Word who was with God, the Word who is
God, the Word that slips into human flesh to become one of us: Emmanuel.
In today’s reading, John does something amazing; it has
relatively gone unnoticed, missed by the minds of men for hundreds of years
(and I intentionally use the word “men”).
In verse 18, John states “It is God the Only Son who is
close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known.”
Except, there’s a mistake in the English
translation. You see, the Greek word was
not “heart,” nor was it “side” as other Bible’s state.
The correct Greek word is “bosom.”
“It is God the Only Son who is close to the Father’s
bosom.”
Heart/Side/Bosom.
May not seem important at first.
But it is.
Ask any woman who has ever breast fed a child. It is a dramatic difference.
Because what we have here is not an image of Jesus the son
being held by God; we have the image of Jesus the child being breast fed by
God.
Let that sink in.
John is telling us that Jesus dwells at the bosom of God,
where Jesus is nourished by God.
This amazing, powerful understanding of the original
Greek text comes from Professor Karoline Lewis, a teacher at Luther Seminary in
St. Paul, MN.
In her commentary of John, the Rev. Dr. Karoline Lewis
explores the meaning of bosom in John’s Gospel.
It turns out that up until 1750, a prevalent image was of
the baby Jesus being nursed at the breast of Mary. It was an image that used to symbolize the
grace of God.
Think of the image- how Jesus being breastfed by Mary represents
love, closeness, tenderness, intimacy.
AGAPE.
Could there be a more intimate experience in all of human
life than a mother feeding her child via her own body, holding that child in
their arms, looking upon their face, her heartbeat beside the baby’s ears?
This image represented God as provider, sustainer, God as
nourisher.
This image of Jesus held at Mary’s bosom, fed by her fully
exposed breast was a way to let believers know that God would provide
everything necessary to sustain life.
Isn’t that what God did with bread and quail in the
dessert?
Isn’t that what Jesus does with loaves and fishes in the wilderness?
All these stories, these images- of God who is Father who
feeds us when we are hungry, who breast feeds the Son.
No wonder Isaiah 55 called all who hunger an all who thirst. It’s God’s very nature.
This image of Jesus being at God’s bosom finds its
culmination in John 13:23, during the Last Supper. We hear of the beloved disciple resting upon
Jesus’ bosom.
Who is this BELOVED ONE?
No one knows.
But 1:18 and 13:23 are the only times the word “bosom” is
used in John.
What if the unnamed disciple is actually meant to
represent you, represent me, meant to represent us?
Then we have a deep image of Jesus, at the very
beginning, being nourished at the bosom of God, and us, at the end of his
ministry, being nourished at the bosom of Jesus.
It’s a shame we lost that image.
Why was that image lost?
Because after 1750 a cultural shift took place. Modern medicine began to see the breast as
just a piece of the body. Pornography began
to sexualize it.
Eventually the church and culture began to sexualize the
most natural of all things, and so the image of Jesus at the Mary’s breast was
taken down, hidden away.
Male scholars who translated the sacred texts could not
image God having a bosom, nor a God who breastfed, so they changed the word to
mean side or heart.
In doing so, we lost a delicate, stunning image of God
that could have made all the difference.
Imagine where we would be as a faith and a people if we
were back in 1749 when an image of Mary feeding her son was seen as an act of
intimacy, moment of nourishment, a time of tenderness.
How different we would be as Christians, Americans, as
you and as I if all along we thought of Jesus being fed at the bosom of God?
But here is the Good News- thanks to the work of Rev. Dr.
Lewis we know this now, and with this knowledge, we have been granted a new
opportunity-
To see and talk about God as the Heavenly Parent who
nourishes.
To go about worship believing this to be so.
To welcome and share God’s AGAPE love with those who are
hungry, those who thirst, our neighbors, our community, those as far away as Biloxi,
Haiti, even to ourselves.
Let us continue to come to the Lord’s Table so that we
can find out.
Amen and amen.
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