(Homily for Gayton Road Christian Church's Sunday Worship on Apr 17, 2016, Easter IV)
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The Parable of the Anonymous Music
Once upon a time, in a city that was famous for its music, there was discovered on the steps of the city concert hall a composition of a beautiful symphony. It had been left there anonymously. But the city organized to have it played as soon as possible. An orchestra was assembled. They practiced day and night. And then the city declared a public holiday, and everyone went to the concert hall to hear the music. They were enraptured. It brought smiles of wonder to everyone’s face. Never before had they heard something so…divine. And that’s what people started saying: whoever composed this music must have been sent from God.
Not long later, a stranger with a violin appeared on the city streets, playing wherever she walked. Her playing enchanted whoever stood within hearing distance, drawing smiles from the depths of their otherwise serious faces. Soon people began to speculate: perhaps this stranger was the composer of the divine music. Perhaps she was sent from God.
Now some of the speculators became consumed with this question. They argued—“Yes, she is the divine composer!” “No, she isn’t!” Their smiles gave way to locked jaws and heavy brows. This was a most serious matter. If they could prove that she was indeed the divine composer, then their city could legitimately claim its musical superiority. Her power would become theirs. So when she played in the streets, they interrupted her music: “Are you the composer sent from God?” Her response was always the same. Meeting the question with a gracious smile and a bemused blink of the eye, she picked up her violin and resumed her music from the point of interruption.
There were others, however, whose delight in her music prevailed over their curiosity in her identity. Instead of seeking to establish her musical prowess, and through it their own, instead of interrupting her with questions—they only listened and smiled. And when a song ended, they would cry with all their hearts, “Encore!”
“Tell Us Plainly…”
Today we find a similar story in our gospel, where Jesus is walking in the temple during the festival of the Dedication—or what we today call Hanukkah. The air in that temple would have been heavy with memory and pride. Hanukkah was Independence Day for the Jews of Jesus’ time. People would have been remembering the way their ancestors fought for the freedom of Jerusalem and the temple. They would have been singing songs of power and triumph over their old enemies, the Seleucids. Of course, at that time they had a new enemy: Rome. And so the air would also have been thick with hope for a future king who would grab power in his hands, stand up to Rome, and bring them victory once more.
We can read between the lines, then, when the crowd demands Jesus to tell them “plainly” if he is the Messiah or not (10:24). They’re really asking, “Are you the leader who will defeat the Romans? Are you the king who will lead us to victory? Are you the real thing, Jesus?”
From “Was That the Real Thing?” to “Encore!”
This question—“Are you the real thing?”—is no stranger to us today. We are just as preoccupied with verifying the identity of things. To us, a name carries power. A name assigns value. Whether a painting is a “real” Picasso or not is the difference between millions of dollars. Whether a concert stars the “real” Bob Dylan or just a cover artist is the difference between thousands of attendants. Whether a race is NASCAR or just a local shindig is the difference between national coverage or not.
And yet…Jesus’ frustrated response to his inquisitors suggest that this kind of attitude—this “are-you-the-real-thing” outlook on life—is somehow mistaken.
When I was in England, my good friend Stephen, a born-and-bred Liverpudlian, once showed me around his city. In the evening, he took me to the Cavern—an underground cellar that was turned into a club in the 1950s. Before the Beatles became an international success, they played hundreds of shows at the Cavern. Stephen told me when we entered that there would probably be a Beatles cover band playing. To be honest, I was less than excited. Who wants to hear a bunch of knock-offs?
And yet…that night ended up becoming one of my favorite concert experiences. The four guys on stage looked nothing like the Beatles. In fact, they weren’t even English. But that didn’t matter. What mattered is that they captured the spirit of the music, that they played with real energy and swagger. What mattered is the smiles they brought to our faces, the songs they brought to our lips.
When they finished their set, no one cared about whether they were the real Beatles or not. To have asked, “Was that the real thing?” would have been to miss the point. All we cared about was hearing more. All we could say was “Encore!”
Listening beyond the Name
When the crowd in the temple ask Jesus if he is the Messiah, they completely miss the point. When they press him to just tell them “plainly,” they’re dreaming of power and prestige more than they are the kingdom of God. They’re dreaming the dream of this-beats-that, this-trumps-that, this-is-better-than-that. By their logic, if Jesus is indeed the Messiah, then his power is theirs. It’s the logic of entitlement. Which ultimately is a logic of violence, a logic that leads to one name taking up arms against another.
Which is why, when Jesus responds to the crowd, he says he wishes that they heard not his name but his way of life. As he says, his way speaks for itself (10:25). What he desires is that people focus not on him but on the kingdom of God that he lives and proclaims. What he desires is that his love speak for itself, that his spirit catch on in others. He doesn’t want mobs who worship him as we do pop idols and world leaders, as we do the brand names that are the most popular or expensive. Jesus only desires that we at marvel his music and join in the dance, that we follow in the way of abundant life.
How to Respond to the Messiah
If the crowds that demanded Jesus’ identity were mistaken in their line of questioning, then it’s only natural to wonder: What should they have said?
I’ve already offered one suggestion. They could simply have wondered at the works he had done and said with gusto, “Encore!”
An old Jewish tale offers another suggestion. According to one rabbi, the appropriate question to ask the Messiah when he or she comes, is, “When are you coming?” On the face of it, such a question seems foolish. If the Messiah has already come, then why in the world would you ask, “When are you coming?”
As it happens, the seventeen-month-old daughter of a couple close friends has helped me to see the wisdom in this foolishness. Not long ago, my friends began reading their daughter a Pride and Prejudice book of numbers: one manor, two carriages, three horses, four butlers, and so on. And as befits the book, they read in a British accent. To their delight, their daughter has responded in kind. Lately, whenever she sees one of them enter the room, she lights up and says in a British singsong, “Come on, Dada! Come on, Mommy!”
On the face of it, you might say her expression is redundant. Dada and Mommy are already there in the room. Why call for them to “come”? But of course, that’s not what she’s really saying. She’s not saying “Come here” as though they aren’t already there. She’s calling for repeat performances: she’s inviting them to keep doing what Dada does, what Mommy does.
And that, I believe, is what the old rabbi was getting at. The point is not that the Messiah will come with a powerful name that will settle all claims once and for all, so that life is finished and done, so that there’s nothing left to say. The point is that the Messiah eternally comes bringing life, more life—so that it’s always appropriate to ask “When are you coming?” or even better, just to say, “Come on!”
An Easter Prayer
I can think of no better prayer for this Easter season. When we listen closely to our world and hear the divine symphony of resurrection and redemption in all things, what better to say than, “When will we hear it again?” What better to say than, “Come on, Jesus, again, again!” The point of Easter is to get caught up—not in names and identities and claims to power, but simply in life itself, in the divine symphony we hear.
There is no reason to demand of one thing or another, “Is this the real thing? Tell us plainly, God!” Deep in our bodies, we know the real thing. Beyond all names, we know the real thing. That’s what our smiles say. That’s what our laughter says. That’s even what our tears say, when they speak to us of the goodness that is missing in our lives, the goodness we so desire. We know the real thing. Daily we hear the divine music of our Messiah. And every breath that we take, every gasp for more life, proclaims, “Encore!”
Or perhaps, like a child, “Come on, Jesus!”
Prayer
God whose music fills our hearts with joy,
Whose goodness plays in all things
And makes us smile.
Come on!
Encore!
May we join in your song:
Not because of a name of power,
But because of its strains of goodness, truth, and beauty—
Which we believe are even now redeeming our world.
In the name of our Shepherd, whose voice we strain to hear everywhere.
Amen.
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