In Act 5 of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, the character Macbeth has heard that the queen is dead and he knows his own death is imminent. At this time, he delivers his famous soliloquy:
Tomorrow, and tomorrow and tomorrow
creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, Out, brief candle.
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
and then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot. Full of sound and fury signifying nothing.
Is Macbeth right? Is life nothing but a shadow having no substance, no meaning? Writers and philosophers have tried to answer the question. Someone once said that “Trying to speak about the ultimate reality is like sending a kiss through a messenger.” Something of its truth is lost in the translation.
What is the meaning of life? A philosophical question to be sure. (Yet) it is a genuinely human question and therefore a question that we all ask…It is our most basic and fundamental question.
And so it comes as no surprise that Jesus deals with this question and answers it… (Sermons.com)
Let’s set the scene. Jesus is at table with his disciples. They shared their final meal together. Jesus has washed their feet and then they settle in for a long conversation. A conversation about connection, unity and love. Jesus gives them a new command to love one another. Then Jesus is the vine and we are the branches. Finally, Jesus sends the Holy Spirit to sustain the connection between us and Jesus. Now, in today’s lesson, Jesus prays with them. This is John’s version of the Lord’s prayer which is personal and unifying. READ John 17:1-11
In a scene from Shadowlands, a film based on the life of C.S. Lewis, Lewis has returned to Oxford from London, where he has just been married to Joy Gresham, an American woman, in a private ceremony performed at her hospital bedside. She is dying from cancer, and, through the struggle with her illness, she and Lewis have been discovering the depth of their love for each other. As Lewis arrives at the college where he teaches, he is met by Harry Harrington, an Episcopal priest, who asks what news there is. Lewis hesitates; then, deciding to speak of the marriage and not the cancer, he says, “Ah, good news, I think, Harry. Yes, good news.”
Harrington, not aware of the marriage and thinking that Lewis is referring to Joy’s medical situation, replies, “I know how hard you’ve been praying …. Now, God is answering your prayer.”
“That’s not why I pray, Harry,” Lewis responds. “I pray because I can’t help myself. I pray because I’m helpless. I pray because the need flows out of me all the time, waking and sleeping. It doesn’t change God; it changes me.” (Sermons.com, Thomas G. Long).
Jesus just prayed to God. He wasn’t trying to change God, rather it felt like Jesus was having a conversation with God. He starts with his reality. You see Jesus is about to die, and he speaks of that in prayer as being glorified by God. He talks about his work which God sent him to do, showing God’s love. Then Jesus talks about relationships. Relationships formed by Jesus sharing God’s word with us. If you only take one thing from this sermon, I hope it is this: you pray like you are having a conversation with God. Start with where you are, share how work is going, and talk to God about your relationships. Because that is really what prayer is all about.
Jesus also spoke about eternal life in a beautiful way. He didn’t talk about heaven, or what happens when we die, or living forever. He did not ask if you are saved, or when you gave your life to Christ. What Jesus did say about eternal life is that Jesus has the authority to give it. God gave Jesus the authority to give you eternal life. To give us eternal life. But even more profound than that, Jesus tells us what eternal life is. Eternal life is knowing the only true God and Jesus Christ. Eternal life IS knowing God and Christ. What if eternal life was that simple. That straight forward. “How would that change what (you) imagine in this life? How would it affect (your) thoughts about and beliefs in (your) future life with God? How does this alter even our picture of God? Of course, what it means to ‘know’ God is key, and to know God in (John’s) Gospel has no connection to (what we believe or how we think) or specified knowledge about God. Rather, knowing God is synonymous with being in a relationship with God” (Working Preacher, Karoline Lewis).
Eternal life is our relationship with God and Jesus. Our life has meaning because of God’s love for us and our connection and communion with God and Jesus. David Ford writes, “I have read the whole Gospel as an invitation to enter into a relationship of trusting Jesus, desiring, learning, praying, and loving in community, for the sake of God’s love for the world” (The Gospel of John: A Theological Commentary 337). This relationship with God and Jesus is also expressed in our relationship with others. We are God’s and God gave us to Jesus, and then Jesus asked God to protect the disciples, to protect us, so that they may be one, as Jesus and God are one (11). Unity and relationship. We are one, as God and Jesus are one. Not relationship in name only, but a real relationship.
There was a tavern near a college campus, and it was a favorite hangout for many of the students. As Parents’ Weekend approached, they posted a sign that said, “Bring your parents to lunch. We’ll pretend we don’t know you.”
One of the local churches countered with a signboard that read, “Bring your parents to church. We’ll pretend we do know you” (Sermons.com, David Canada).
Eternal life is not found in pretending to know God or Jesus, but in our deep connection and relationship we have with the divine. That’s why Jesus speaks of those who know him as “mine.” Jesus prays to God, “All mine are yours, and yours are mine.” That is our community, the one we share with Jesus and each other. Eternal life is our relationship with God and Jesus and in that we are united with each other in a shared community. As the body of Christ, we are one, just as Jesus and God are one. That is unity. We experience unity at a church potluck, in shared music during worship, in working side by side in mission. Unity is that cohesive force that binds us together in our faith, in our shared relationship with Jesus and God. Henri Nouwen writes, “Discipleship is giving expression to God’s love.” “Community creates a rich variety of people (for) whom the love of God becomes incarnate in very different ways” (Following Jesus, 49,48). We unite in love and unity, but we do not all have to be the same.
What is the meaning of life? I would say our relationship with God and each other. Maybe that is why Jesus gave us the new commandment to love one another. We will be known as Jesus’ disciples if we love one another (Jn. 13:34-35).
And yet, “I think Jesus’ prayer should be accepted for what it was — a sincere petition asking for the help that his loved ones needed at that time and would need in the future. This (prayer) certainly showed (Jesus’) humanity and his continued relevance to real, flesh and blood people…(Since) the emphasis on unity can be seen in Jesus’ prayer, then we can conclude that he was aware that keeping his beloved united was a challenge. Without cohesion, they would not survive. A prayer from Jesus asking for protection via unity of the church, provides a great source of comfort to his followers” (Working Preacher, Samuel Cruz). So now we come to table, coming full circle to Jesus sitting at table with his disciples enacting love and unity. We unite in the breaking of the bread and sharing the cup. We unite in mission being the hands and feet of Christ to a broken world. We unite in fellowship and discipleship expressing God’s love to the world. Amen.
