A Sermon by Rev. Lillie Mae Henley
The scribe of the Gospel of John was the most lyrical and creative of the Gospel writers. In fact, the scribe was, shall we say, so “inventive,” that theologians call Matthew, Mark, and Luke the Synoptic Gospels and place John somewhat aside. It is because they find in the Synoptic Gospels a certain agreement, similarities, and cohesiveness to the overall, over-arching, story of Jesus of Nazareth. John on the other hand, written last, is strikingly different, intended more to “explain” Jesus’ purpose rather than to tell Jesus’ story. It is intended more to bring God into human history than to have humankind see God at a distance.
Today we will explore the impact of the first few verses, we will look at Michael Servetus, a Spanish theologian who lost his life for his anti-Trinitarian beliefs, and we will consider what all of this means to us today.
John’s beginning is profoundly provocative. And with these words, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…” he attempted, quite successfully, to connect the Jesus of the Passion Story to an eternal existence, to make Jesus a part of God outside of human history. The only other scripture where we find “In the beginning” is in Genesis. The writer of John wanted the reader of this Gospel to find herself or himself involved with a Jesus who was the Christ of Creation, a part of something bigger than an itinerant preacher from Galilee.
The genius of John was that he brought God into everyday life by making Jesus divine. God was no longer Yahweh, inaccessible and transcendent, to be worshipped by obeying the law. When Jesus became Christ, God’s Word, God incarnate, then each person could have, as theologian Gail R. O’Day, “an intimate, palpable, corporeal access to the cosmic reality of God.” [The New Interpreters Bible]
The writer of John, by claiming “All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being” made it possible to believe Jesus of Nazareth was more than an ordinary man who lived and died an extraordinary life. If Jesus the Christ was a part of God, then his story is a story for all time, for all humankind.
I do not believe that John could have foreseen the controversies ahead for the followers of Jesus, but he did intend for those dedicated followers to have something more in which to believe than an embarrassing, cruel death on the cross. As Christianity evolved, as the Church became stronger, those provocative words of John chapter one became the cornerstone for the universal church for fifteen hundred years. But they did not become doctrine without controversy.
By the late third century and early fourth century there was considerable debate over the meaning of John’s words. The debate boiled down to the question of what “nature” or “substance” was Jesus the Christ made. John Godbey, professor of theology at Meadville Lombard when I was there, said it was, in some respects amusing, because the great debate over the “nature of Christ” was actually a debate between the meaning of the Greek words homoousios and homousios. “One letter, an 'O' had them all bothered,” he said. Was the nature of Christ the same as God homoousios, or was the nature of Christ, divine, but of a lesser substance than God homousios?
The Arians, who believed Jesus was divine, but of a lesser substance than God debated Athanasians, who believed Jesus was of the same substance as God.
The story tells us the debate was settled at the Council of Nicaea in 325. This “eternal” Christ became Church doctrine in the form of ascribing to Jesus the same nature and substance as God. Soon, within about ten years, the Arians persuaded the Church and Emperor Constantine to reverse that decision. Constantine then expelled Athanasius. Athanasius, though, never gave up, and by the time Emperor Theodosius called the Council of Constantinople in 381, the Arians were outnumbered and Athanasius belief of Jesus’ nature being of the same substance as God’s nature resulted in the doctrine of the Trinity.
Theologians have for centuries tried to describe the Trinity. A Methodist minister and a Unitarian Universalist minister were talking. And UU minister asked the Methodist minister to describe the Trinity. She pointed to a car driving along the street and said, “It is as if there are three persons driving that car.” The Unitarian Universalist minister said, “Well, since there is only one steering wheel, I have to believe there are two, too many people in the driver’s seat!”
Saint Augustine at the end of the fourth century wrote several books about the Trinity and still it was difficult to understand. Finally Martin Luther wrote:
"how this …trinitarian relation is carried on is something we must believe; for even to the angels, who unceasingly behold it with delight, it is unfathomable. And all who have wanted to comprehend it have broken their necks in the effort." [Roger E. Olson and Christopher A. Hall in their book The Trinity]
It was John, chapter one, verse one, Dr. Godbey told us, that inspired Michael Servetus to publish in 1531 On the Errors of the Trinity. Servetus was only six years old when Martin Luther nailed his reformation demands on the doors of the Catholic Church and twenty-one years old when he wrote the small, controversial book which change religion's story.
He wrote On the Errors of the Trinity, because his letters did not persuade the leaders of the Reformation to accept the misunderstanding surrounding, what Servetus thought, was the incomprehensible theology of the Trinity.
Neither Luther nor Calvin wanted to consider such a radical departure from orthodox beliefs. I read somewhere that Calvin said he was afraid that some radical reformer would bring up the subject of the Trinity.
When On the Errors was published, Servetus was charged with heresy and had to flee for his life. He went to France, changed his name, and studied medicine. To support himself he became an editor and was respected as an expert in the field of geography while still in his twenties. He also prepared a seven-volume edition of Pagnini’s Bible, and scholars say, demonstrated an advanced understanding of Biblical criticism—all this while studying medicine.
Between 1532 and 1553 Servetus lived in France under the assumed name—Michael Villanovanous. Under his new name, he reopened a correspondence with Calvin, hoping to show him his errors. Calvin resented Servetus’ criticisms and came to hate him. Servetus was writing his master work, The Restoration of Christianity, which offered a plan for the complete reformation of the Christian churches—Catholic and Protestant alike—based on the teachings of Jesus.
With the publication of The Restoration Michael Villanovanous was exposed as the heretic Servetus. The French Inquisition imprisoned him, but he escaped. En route to Naples, Italy, where he would be safe with friends, he passed through Geneva. Some say he intentionally went through because of his ego! He was recognized and immediately arrested. Calvin, who had once boasted that should Servetus ever come to Geneva he would never let him get away alive...
Calvin, however, kept himself in the background as the Council of Judges in Geneva tried and convicted Servetus of heresy and burned him alive on October 27, 1553.
In his monumental work he wrote he "will not make use of the word Trinity, which is not to be found in Scripture, and only seems to perpetuate philosophical error." He said of the Trinity doctrine "that (it) cannot be understood, that [it] is impossible in the nature of things, and that it may even be looked on as blasphemous!"
Today, however, theologians look at the Bible through different lens than first century Church Fathers or fifteenth century reformers.
There are feminist theologians who look through the lens of oppression of women. They question the patriarchal mistreatment of women in the Bible. Feminist theologians look at the first chapter of John and when they read “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…” they see the Word as wisdom. And when they see wisdom they turn to the Wisdom literature of the Hebrew people of three hundred years before Jesus. Wisdom is Sophia, the feminine presence of God. Feminist theologians claim it is the Wisdom tradition that gave Jesus his character in the Gospels. Some feminist theologians claim that the Jesus tradition is a revival of the Hebrew Wisdom tradition. Some even claim Jesus as Sophia. In the Hebrew Scriptures we read:
God “brought me forth as the first of his works… I was appointed from eternity, from the beginning, before the world began. … I was there when he set the heavens in place,…when he established the clouds above … when he gave the sea its boundary …I was the craftsman at his side…
The words are very much like the words in John’s Gospel.
There are so very many ways to interpret the Bible. It is a holy word, in the sense that it has many, many stories which help us find wholeness and holiness in our lives. It is literature and poetry. It is metaphorical and musical. It is history, it is political. It is cultic and universal. It is philosophical and theological. It nourishes us, offends us, comforts us, and discomforts us.
John Chapter One is one of the most provocative and controversial passages in the Bible. There are many ways to interpret the words. Yet, there is one reality that is incontrovertible. John found a way to make God real to not only those who followed Jesus, but to us. John found a way to help us discover that God is not only transcendent, but God is also immanent. He found a way for us to understand that there is some humanity in God and some divinity in each one of us.
What an epiphany for some of us. For me, it means there is a dark side of God just as there is a dark side to us. There is light in the Cosmos, there is darkness in the Cosmos. There is rich, fecund matter within God that allows God to grow, to change, with us, and in response to us. And we, have rich, fecund matter that allows us to grow, to change, in response to God, and to be there, right along with, in, and of God.
John Chapter One is provocative and controversial but it does teach us – there is some humanity in God and some divinity in each one of us.
READING
The Gospel According to John, Chapter 1:1-13
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.
There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.
He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.