Bearing Witness

A Meditation on the Lectionary Texts for Easter 5C

I was feeling good the other day when I was standing in line at the local drugstore check out counter. When it became my turn, the cashier asked me happily, “And do you want to give a dollar to benefit the Children’s Hospital?” “All right,” I grudgingly grunted. “Well, you don’t have to,” the cashier graciously offered. “No, I want to, I really do. I don’t know why I sounded so unwilling.”

And, as I left the store, just a little richer for giving to the Children’s Hospital, I had to admit to myself that I really didn’t want to give that dollar. In fact I had just about had it with people asking me for money, for the pleasure of my response to the offer of lower mortgage rates, or dish TV, or new vinyl windows.

I’m just going through a phase. Maybe you have “phases”, too. I feel like the line in the song in “Jesus Christ Superstar” when the crowds clamor after Jesus to heal them of all their diseases. Finally, in exasperation Jesus screams, “Heal yourselves!” So, I have not felt very patient lately when I get calls asking for help about “this and that”, or when I hear about the churches that are fighting over “thus and so”. Oh well, it’s just a phase I keep telling myself.

The lectionary texts for this week make me wonder about bearing witness. Peter bore witness to the inclusiveness of God’s grace, that even Gentiles, non-Jews, could receive the Holy Spirit and the gift of eternal life! John bore witness to the vision of the Holy City and to the promise that “to the thirsty the Christ, the Alpha and the Omega, would give water as a gift from the spring of the water of life.” (Rev. 21:6)

And, in John 13:31-35 Judas bore witness to the means by which Christ would be glorified and by which we would all be saved. Judas is not mentioned by name in the passage from John’s gospel, but in verse 31 the person that left the room before Jesus gave the New Commandment was Judas.

I wonder a lot about bearing witness. I don’t think I bore a very Christ like witness to the cashier in the drugstore. Too often I find myself hopeful that people don’t know that I’m a clergyperson. I have been too gruff, or insensitive, or too unfocused.

Do you have those days when you’re glad that "God has given even to the Gentiles [read “us”] the repentance that leads to life?" (Acts 11:18)

Thank God for grace! Thank God for the communities of grace with which we share faith in our savior Jesus! Thank God that through the gift of the Holy Spirit we have the mission to bear witness to the grace, love and fellowship of God in Christ.

Blessings,

Rick Cowles