Epiphany 2 Year B

Philip found Nathanael and said to him, ‘We have found him about whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus, son of Joseph from Nazareth.’  Nathanael said to him, ‘Can anything good come out of Nazareth?’

John 1:43-51

Do you remember the commercial that ran frequently some time ago on T.V. with the slogan, we don’t live anywhere near Perfect? Well, you could have never convinced me of that in the first 12 years of my life. The neighborhood where I grew up in Southern California was wonderful! As far as I was concerned, I lived in Perfect. There was more than a lion’s share of kids to play with, and did we play.

In the summer, we kids would meet outside at the crack of dawn with our bowls of cereal in hand, dripping milk over the edge, as we would walk, and laugh, and talk.  We would play up and down that street all day and into the night. The play ended only when one of our parents dared to come out and call in the first of us.

We never could quite understand why we had to go inside; after all, between the streetlight and the moon, we could still see almost every pitch that was tossed over the diamond-shaped plate that we had painted in the middle of the street. 

Almost everybody got along and worked together to make our neighborhood a family. They told me in my catechism classes that God was good, and I had no reason to believe otherwise.

I thought it was perfectly normal for a family of five to grow up in a 950 sq. ft. home. I thought it was perfectly normal for every house to look like the one next door except for the color of paint. And I thought it was perfectly normal to have houses so close together that you almost had to turn sideways to walk between them.

I always knew there were rich and famous people living in the hills around us, and sometimes my friends and I would take long walks up there to gawk at the huge white houses with the columns on each side of the walkways or the ones that seemed to be made of glass.  But it wasn’t until after I was married and had children of my own that my mother told me that the people in the hills looked down on our compact neighborhood with some disdain. In fact, I found out that they referred to us down in the valley as Diaper Row.

Can anything good come out of Diaper Row?

Some forty years later, I lived in a county that had a five-acre rule as part of its master plan ideal, and from time to time I could be heard lamenting the fact that I could see my neighbor’s garage through the trees some two-hundred feet away. It’s true, isn’t it? Perception really does often become reality. Our attitudes really are shaped by whatever set of circumstances in which we find ourselves.

Nathanael had been seen by Jesus while sitting under a fig tree. Now from what I know of John’s Gospel, I believe it very probable that this little tidbit wasn’t just thrown in for extra measure by the author of the Gospel.

It was traditional for the Rabbis to study and teach the Torah under the fig tree. I think we’re supposed to see Nathanael portrayed as one well-schooled in his religious tradition.

His penetrating and discriminating question: Can anything good come out of Nazareth?  reflects not only his attachment to the traditions, but a predetermined expectation about what and who the Messiah would be, and Messiahs aren’t supposed to come from Diaper Row. His attitude nearly cost him an encounter with Christ! But it’s all about attitude, isn’t it?  That is why Jesus calls people to repent?

Now our penchant in the church for bad news, along with our historical distrust of humanity, has caused us to associate repentance with sack cloth and ashes . . . with penitence for our wicked, sinful, and evil ways. But what the word repent literally means is to have a change of heart. . . a change of mind. . . a 180-degree change of attitude. Unless you become like a little child, Jesus says, you will not be able to see the Kingdom of God.

What is unique about young children is that they don’t bring very many pre-determined expectations to bear. The children who lived in the hills above my neighborhood used to make their way down to join us in our street games. Why? Because it was fun. And in the world of street baseball, we were all equals.

Nathanael isn’t a prominent character in the Gospel, but his brief stage appearance here in John serves a vital purpose. He serves to remind us to take an inventory of our attitudes and how they are shaped. He serves to remind us of the importance of keeping an open mind in all matters. And he serves to remind us that our traditions, our social customs, our political ideologies, and even our religious convictions, as wonderful as they are, can be the very root causes of missed encounters with Christ!

Can anything good come out of Nazareth?

Let’s allow Nathanael to appeal to our sense of honesty as we answer these questions together:

How many times have we shut the doors of our minds and hearts to someone:

 because we know of something in their past?

because of whom they associate with?

because of what they are wearing?

because of the color of their skin?

because of their gender?

because of their sexual preference? 

because we didn’t find them interesting the last time we spoke with them?

because they’re not our type?

because of the color of their hair?

because they don’t think like we do? 

because they did something once that hurt us?

because we don’t understand them?

because they dared to disagree with us?

The list, of course, goes on and on and on.  Each of us has a bit of Nathanael in us. Each of us has a personal Nazareth or two tucked away in our minds.

And each time, we give in to it, no matter how innocent it may seem, we stand to miss an encounter with Christ. 

God speaks to us in so many ways, and we have such selective hearing.  Maybe that’s why Jesus so frequently prefaces his message with the words, for those who have ears to hear.

The story is told of a young boy of royal blood who was required to spend a night alone in the forest to prove his courage so he could become king. While he was spending the night alone, he received a sacred vision. Out of the fire appeared the Holy Grail, the greatest symbol of God’s divine grace.

A voice said to the boy, You shall be keeper of the Grail so that it may heal the hearts of many. But the boy was deafened by another voice, an inner voice, that called to him of a life filled with power and glory and beauty.

This voice convinced him that if he possessed the Holy Grail, that for which so many had searched, he could become even more than a king. He could become like a god.

So, he reached into the fire to take the grail, but it vanished,

leaving him with his hand in the fire, terribly burned.

As this boy king grew older, his wound grew deeper, until one day, life for him lost its reason. He had no faith, he couldn’t love or feel loved, and he began to wither and to die.

One day a fool wandered into the castle and found the king alone, and being a fool, he was simple of mind.  He didn’t see a king, he only saw a man alone and in pain, so he asked the king, What ails you my friend?

The king replied, I’m thirsty. I need some water to cool my throat.

The fool then took a cup from beside his bed, filled it with water and handed it to the king.

As the king began to drink, he realized his wound was healed. He looked in his hands and there was the Holy Grail, that which he sought all his life.  The King turned to the fool and said with amazement, How can you find that which my brightest and bravest could not?   

And the fool replied, I don’t know. I only saw that you were thirsty.

I suppose there’s something to that old bumper sticker that says, Become a fool for Christ! It really is about repentance. It really is about a change of attitude.

Can anything good come out of Nazareth?

It’s not a stupid question, but for the Christian it’s the wrong question. As fools for Christ, our question should be, 

What good will we find in Nazareth today?

As Christians we should be assuming that we will find Christ in all the Nazareths we encounter.

When the people in Jerusalem and the people in Nazareth begin to look for the good in each other…

When the people who live in the hills and the people who live on Diaper Row, begin to see each other as living in the same neighborhood…

When the people who live in Great Britain, Europe, and the United States, and the People who live in Iran, Iraq, Palestine and Korea, and you may add whatever countries you like, when they begin to understand that everybody hungers and thirsts, that everybody longs for the truth, and when we all begin to see each other as members of the same human family, only then will we live anywhere near Perfect.