Canter Bridge

One might imagine that knowing Jesus were a matter of mastering certain details. His antecedents, his persona, his intentions, his purpose.

Contrary to subjectivity’s noisy heralds—for they are legion—these matters are indeed essential to knowing him, to knowing anyone. The elevation of ‘relationship’ and ‘experience’ as self-evident and absolute priorities is, one hopes, a passing fad. Yet it will cause heavy casualties before its demise. One must know some facts if one is to truly know a person. This once did not require statement and we’ll get there again or civilization will have passed us by entirely.

Yet John’s gospel reminds us of the relational, moral character of knowing Jesus. Revelation, though it bears myriad and critical facts, is not an abstract process. It occurs as Jesus and his followers relate responsibly and—in our case—obediently to each other.

‘They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me; and those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them.’ Judas (not Iscariot) said to him, ‘Lord, how is it that you will reveal yourself to us, and not to the world?’ Jesus answered him, ‘Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words; and the word that you hear is not mine, but is from the Father who sent me.’

Judas, not Jesus’ betrayer, wondered about the potentially esoteric nature of Jesus’ self-revelation if this was to take place only among the tight circle of his friends and not ‘out there’ among ‘the world’. Jesus’ response to this honest and well-advised query is to underscore that true revelation of Jesus’ person can only occur among those who manifest their love for him by ‘keeping his word’.

This responsive, obedient interrelationship with one who is our master triggers not only the self-revelation of Jesus, John’s gospel tells us. It also creates the context in which both Jesus and his Father approach and reside among those who respond to Jesus in just this way.

Judas and we are right to worry about spiritual relationship that lurches in the direction of secret societies, esoterica, private piety, and clannishness. Yet we do well also to occupy ourselves with that critical piece of the learning process that consists in keeping the word that we have already received, of obeying the dicta that came early to us, of loving that portion of Jesus’ persona that we know.

More, in time, will come to us.