Mentored into Steadfast Love
Let your steadfast love come to us, O Lord.
Save us as you promised;
we will trust your word.
With these words our congregation greets the gospel proclamation. The three clauses in this refrain are related. The means by which God’s steadfast love comes to us is through the announcement of God’s saving promise and this word awakens trust in us. When we attend to the proclamation of God’s Word, we do not receive a general, abstract discourse on divine love, but rather an event by means of which God’s love itself comes to abide with us. This is the way that God chooses to save: through an announcement on God’s behalf, authorized by the revelation of Jesus Christ, for the sake of the world’s salvation, to the particular people who are gathered.
Steadfast Love and John
The composer of the Gospel of John was well-versed in the witness of Israel. So he would know of the traditions regarding God’s “steadfast love.” He never uses the Greek equivalent of the Hebrew word hesed, but I could imagine him joining two of his favorite words to create its equivalent: abiding love. This abiding love comes over and over again in the word and ministry of Jesus to sustain the beloved community. Jesus’ crucifixion threatened this abiding love, cutting it off at the source. Mary wept by the tomb, other followers were locked up in fear, and all of them knew that love had died. They doubted that it would ever abide with them again. In this desperation, perhaps the Spirit whispered a prayer much deeper than their hopeless sighs: Let your steadfast love come to us, O Lord. Save us as you promised, we will trust your word.
Narrative Interpretation of John 20:19–31
This story takes place right after Mary Magdalene’s announcement, “I have seen the Lord.” She had an unexpected encounter with Jesus that picked her up out of her grief and put her down in a new place of abiding love. She shares this news with the disciples, but there is no sign that they trusted her proclamation. The narrator brings the reader into a room that is locked up with grief, fear, and doubt. They had known the abiding love of Jesus in their life, but they feel that dead men love no one. They are stuck in their own disappoints and failures.
Then Jesus comes and locked doors do not stop him. Jesus does not address them with resentment, rather he says, “Peace be with you” repeatedly. The peace he offers them does not pretend that there is no brokenness or betrayal; in fact he shows the scars that testify to their betrayal. Yet the one whom they betrayed comes to love again. He releases them, and they find themselves abiding again in love. This release is not for them alone. The gift becomes a call. Jesus breathes on them and offers the Spirit. He empowers them to speak on his behalf, extending to others the release that they themselves have just experienced. Divine love will be steadfast through their declaration.
The disciples immediately act on this commission, announcing to Thomas, “We have seen the Lord!” But Thomas’ response is emphatic. Stuck in his doubt, there “ is no way” he will not trust this word unless the crucified himself appears. This second episode resembles the first. The place and time are the same. The only shift is that Thomas is locked up with them. As Jesus met the other disciples, now he meets Thomas. “Peace be with you.” Jesus addresses Thomas’s concerns with wounds once again framing his message. The peace offered takes Thomas out of the doubting place in which he was stuck. A new world opens before him, a world created, defined, and sustained by active abiding love. Thomas confesses faith in the one who has broken into his life one more time. Jesus responds, “Have you believed because you have seen? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.”
The Performance of John 20
The developing field of Performance Criticism makes clear that the vast majority of the people in the ancient world were illiterate and could not read. They encountered the word through performance. What new dynamics of this story arise when the text is performed? Two things become very clear. First, those hearing the text performed are drawn into the story and become characters addressed within the story world. Second, the storyteller’s eye contact with the gathered community radically shapes this event.
Twice Jesus enters the room. In the narrative interpretation I stated, “The narrator brings the reader into a room…” In a performance of this text in a house church, the dynamic is reversed. The storyteller brings the narrative into the audience’s room, merging narrative with three dimensionalspace; the room of the house church contains the narrative. This merging of settings is reinforced as the storyteller situates the story on the first day of the week, the same day on which house churches gathered. With a simple gesture toward the audience as he says “where the disciples had met,” the storyteller completes the merging of context with narrative. The past becomes present. The contemporary audience is invited to connect with their own fear, grief, and doubt since the storyteller puts the audience into the role of the disciples. The storyteller takes on the role of any character that speaks. So in this liminal moment, the storyteller becomes Jesus and says what Jesus said to the disciples on that first Easter, “Peace be with you.” Jesus takes on flesh again in, with, under, and through this proclamation. The bringing of the past into the present is reinforced by the historical present “says” to introduce Jesus’ first offer of peace. This grammatical construction supports other storytelling techniques in order to merge the two different periods and places. The love that Jesus offered those first disciples becomes steadfastly present for a later community. The storyteller, still playing the role of Jesus, breathes on the community gathered. Again the historical present launches Jesus’ explanation of this act making it contemporary.
Thomas’ doubt is dealt with according to similar dynamics. However, since it is not a group that Jesus addresses but rather an individual, the technique is different. The storyteller playing Jesus imaginatively assigns Thomas a place in the room and directs Jesus’ speech there. The audience continues to play the role of Jesus’ other disciples observing his conversation with Thomas. At the climax of this dialog, a final shift occurs that rounds out the performance in a surprising way. Looking at the assigned place for Thomas, the storyteller embodies Jesus saying, “Have you believed because you have seen me?” But then the storyteller’s eyes move to the assembled community, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.” In this moment, the gathered community no longer hears Jesus address them as the first disciples; he shows up to offer a blessing that is particularly theirs. In effect he says, “You did not receive the blessing that others did of building their faith on what they saw; so I am hear to give you another blessing.”
The dynamics that come out in performance are striking. The story becomes a means through which Jesus speaks directly to a new congregation as if they were his first disciples. Through identification with the disciples, the house church members are lifted out of their brokenness by Jesus’ words. Finally, they hear Jesus offer a particular, present tense proclamation through which he blesses them in their own persona. The one whose love was not stopped by the deadly space of the tomb is not confined by normal limits of time. In the proclamation of this gospel, another generation of believers is picked up and put down in the place where love abides.
Authorizing Our Proclamation
Proclamation still depends on these same dynamics. Authorized by God’s Word, proclaimers enter into the gathered community’s most profoundly locked places in order to envelope them with God’s abiding love. In the midst of grief, fear, and doubt, Jesus’ steadfast love comes again to save us as he promised. In this speaking of peace on Jesus’ behalf, trust is borne once again. Such faithful proclamation is an art as well as a gift of the Spirit. The best way I have found to learn this craft is to apprentice myself to the Word by internalizing its words and embodying them in performance. The Word abiding in my heart and enfleshed in my body mentors me into faithfully proclamation so that one more generation might find themselves in God’s abiding love. The prayer is answered; God saves us as we trust God’s steadfast promise.
