I think Philip must have been from Missouri - you kow, the “show me” state. He’s just as much a doubter as Thomas, if not worse! Remember how Thomas got his nickname? After the resurrection, Jesus appeared to all the disciples but Thomas, and when they told him what had happened, Thomas didn’t believe their story, even though they were eye witnesses. And he’s been “Doubting Thomas” ever since. But it does make a certain amount of sense to doubt second-hand accounts.
But here the disciples are face to face with Jesus himself, eating the Passover meal in the upper room, and Jesus is trying to prepare them for what lies ahead. He has told them that he will be leaving them soon to go to the Father, and that they’ll join him there when the time is right. They still don’t get it. Thomas - the famous doubter - asks for a road map; Jesus, still patient, explains that he himself is all the map they need, in what is probably the best-known verse in the chapter: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.” [v. 6- 7] You’d think this would be enough, wouldn’t you? They’ve followed Jesus around for the past three years, they’ve heard him say things like this before.
But you know, sometimes it just doesn’t matter what words we use. The underlying idea just isn’t going to connect. I found a great story that illustrates this point about an incident that took place to one particularly dense young recruit during basic training. The drill sergeant was explaining what was in store for his squad during the next two months. One youngster raised his hand and asked, “Sergeant, when do we get our guns?” The drill sergeant quickly corrected him. “Private, we don't have 'guns' in the army. We use the M16, A1 Military Assault Rifle. If I catch any one of you calling the M16 a 'gun' I'll have you drop and give me 50 pushups. Now then, Private, repeat your question.” The young man nodded and then said, “Yes Sir, Sergeant. When do we get our guns?” Has this ever happened to you? With your kids, or your spouse? Even if they can repeat your words right after you, the message hasn't actually sunk in.
The disciples know that when Jesus talks of “the Father,” he’s referring to YHWH God, the Lord of Hosts, their own Hebrew God, that of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Not too long ago they heard him say to the complaining Pharisees, “Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me. Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is from God; he has seen the Father.” [John 6:45b-46] They should be able to take his word for it, even if they don’t understand how exactly it’s going to work. But no. Philip has to issue an additional challenge. “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.” [v. 8]
Well, the last time anyone asked to see God face to face was Moses on Mt. Sinai. ‘Moses said, “Show me your glory, I pray.” And God said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you, and will proclaim before you the name, 'YHWH;' and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. But,” he said, “you cannot see my face; for no one shall see me and live.” And the LORD continued, “See, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock; and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by; then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back; but my face shall not be seen.” [Ex 33:18-23]
So Philip knew perfectly well that he was asking for the impossible. Maybe he was just desperately grabbing at straws, using a delaying tactic so that Jesus would change his mind and stay with them. On the other hand, maybe he wanted Jesus to repeat the experience he had shared with Peter and James and John, when he was transfigured on top of the mountain back in Galilee before heading up to Jerusalem. Or maybe he really hadn’t grasped yet that Jesus the man and the Holy One of Israel himself were one and the same.
So Jesus underlines what he had already told them. “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, 'Show us the Father'? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? [v. 9-10]
But you know, Philip still didn’t get it. Because it’s even harder to believe that God could actually become flesh and bloood than it is to believe that God can raise a human being from death. They had, in fact, seen Jesus bring Lazarus back from the tomb, even though it wasn’t the same sort of thing as Jesus’ resurrection later on would be.
How can an invisible, transcendent, holy and dangerous God become human? How can God actually take on hunger and thirst, life and death? How could an immortal being put on mortality? It’s the very reverse of what Paul tells us is in store for us after our own deaths: “This perishable body must put on imperishability, and this mortal body must put on immortality." [1 Cor 15:53] It’s a mystery that took the Church over 300 years to nail down, in the Nicene Creed, with its insistence that Jesus Christ is of one substance with the Father. This is the mystery that offended the Greeks 2000 years ago, and that still offends Muslims today. And yet this fact is what Dr. Andrew Purves in his new book on Pastoral Theology (I had the privilege of reading it in manuscript form for my summer class) insists is at the core, the center, of all that it means to be a follower of Jesus Christ.
You see, being a Christian is not just about doing good things, it’s not just about loving your neighbor and being a good steward of creation and telling the truth, as important as those things are. It’s about being reunited with the source of life, with love itself, the very power that created the universe. And the only way to achieve that one-ness is to become incorporated into the very being of Christ so that in him we too are one with the Father. Apart from Christ, “no one shall see [God] and live.”
But what do we see, what did the disciples see in Jesus that tells us, that shows us, that allows us to experience the Father?
Of course they saw many things. But what Jesus himself underlines in this passage is what we need to look at. "Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me,” he said, “ but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves." [v. 11]
The disciples were asked to look at his authority for their proof. One of the first things that people noticed about Jesus was that ”he taught them as one having authority, and not as their scribes.” [Mt 7:29] And over the past three years, Jesus had proved his power over water and wine, sickness and health, demons and storms, and finally even over death itself. Jesus Christ is the Logos, the Word of God, the co-creator of the universe, and as such is both “the power of God and the wisdom of God." [1 Cor 1:24] John the evangelist, the writer of this Gospel, tells us that “All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being.” [Jn 1:3] And Paul says, “in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers-- all things have been created through him and for him." [Col 1:16]
What is wisdom? It’s getting close enough to God so that his view of reality becomes ours. It’s getting intimate enough with Jesus for us see from his perspective, with his eyes, and see underneath the falsehood of the present age, the fascinating glitter of materialism, the self-promoting illusion of personal autonomy, the comforting myth that meaning well is good enough for God.
What is wisdom? “The fear of the LORD is the beginning..." [Pr 1:7] That’s what the Old Testament taught. And it is still true, because fear in this context doesn’t mean to quake in terror, expecting arbitrary and random punishment for the amusement of a capricious deity, it means to respect and obey. But Moses discovered that the people did not want to come near to the inaccessible, holy, dangerous God who passed before him while he hid in the cleft of the rock. People wanted to be left alone. They did not want to be challenged to live a holy life, in intimate communion with God. “When all the people witnessed the thunder and lightning, the sound of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking, they were afraid and trembled and stood at a distance, and said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, or we will die.” [Ex 20:18-19]
Even after he had seen Jesus Christ, walked with him, been taught by him, eaten with him, Philip still didn’t get it. It took the coming of the Holy Spirit to make it possible for us to see that God and Jesus Christ are one, and that when we are in Christ we are with the Father.
God became human in Jesus Christ, so that we could see that the power that created the universe is not only holy, but loving. In Christ we can see that the wisdom and power of God are intended to heal and restore, and that destruction is only for those who refuse to be healed, who prefer darkness to light. And yet the fact that he is accessible to our mortal eyes makes him - and us - vulnerable.
Everything that God has created is good... but if we try to take God’s gifts for our purposes instead of his, they become tools in the hands of the enemy. Because “it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to perish. But we speak God's wisdom, secret and hidden, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.” [1 Cor 2:7-8] Nor would they mock him as they do in the new movie “Saved”, nor would they try to obliterate every vestige of his influence on our society as has happened recently in the ACLU’s success in getting the cross removed from the official seal of Los Angeles.
People try to borrow bits and pieces of God’s wisdom for their own use, pieces like love, service and compassion, freedom and equality. But these goods - which were brought to the world by Christ and the followers of Christ - have the potential to become destroyers if used without God's wisdom. But “we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit that is from God, so that we may understand the gifts bestowed on us by God.” [1 Cor 2:12] We do not live in an age when it is easy to be a Christian. But I believe that we live in an age when it has never been more important to know what we believe, and why, and who it is we follow, and how. It is not easy, but it is worth it. “As it is written, “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him”-- [1 Cor 2:9]
