Leave-Taking Eucharist for the Side Chapel at St Faith's, Landport
Tuesday 22nd March 2005
Readings: Col 3: 9-15; John 14: 8-21
We are in the Upper Room: well not literally, nor is it Maundy Thursday, quite yet. The Tuesday before Easter is a kind of ‘no persons land’ – a day of waiting for it all to happen. But we are in the Upper Room, not just because we are here to celebrate the Eucharist, but because of that stunning gospel-passage just read to us. It is taken from what is sometimes called the ‘Farewell Discourses’ of Jesus that appear in John’s Gospel, in Chapters 14 – 16. They are introduced by the foot-washing at the Last Supper (Chapter 13) and they end with Jesus’ own prayer of self-offering (Chapter 17), before he goes out to be betrayed and arrested (Chapter 18).
Here in Chapter 14, Philip comes to the fore. He is the disciple who pops us now and again in John’s Gospel as a kind of go-between figure. He is one of the first disciples to be called, and make sure that Nathaniel the Sceptic, is brought to meet Jesus as well (John 1:43-48). Then, Philip is the one to whom Jesus asks the question when faced with 5,000 people in the wilderness, ‘how are we to buy bread?’ (John 6:5). And then it is to Philip that the Greek-speaking outsiders come, when they want to ‘see Jesus’ (John 12:21-22), and he takes Andrew with him to pass on the message. Then, finally, it is Philip, here, the least exasperated of the disciples (look at his patient, perceptive and approachable track-record so far) who tells Jesus in the seclusion of the Upper Room, as we have just read ‘Lord show us the Father, and we will be satisfied’ (John 14:8).
Philip is that attractive figure who is no great shakes like Peter or John, but always making enough of a gentle impact in the context of other people. Yet he still does not understand what is really going on: but this Jesus is the human face of God, who will leave behind him enough sustenance for the journey of faith, as we sometimes call it these days. Philip, along with the other disciples, has just shared a meal with Jesus, but turns out to be his last supper, and has had his feet washed by Jesus (John 13). Now he has to start on a harder and deeper pilgrimage, which will doubtless make him recollect those unique experiences of his life of faith so far, namely his readiness to draw in Nathaniel at the start of Jesus’ ministry; his readiness to tell Jesus that there isn’t enough bread for the crowd (perhaps the twinkle in the eye); and his being available for those outsiders who want to see Jesus.
To take leave – not of Jesus – but of a sacred space, is a bit of a wrench, particularly if you have special associations with certain events here, such as the watch on Maundy Thursday evening. A bishops life is an isolated one, and I would not like to be without my Chapel. The nearest thing was last Easter, when the hanging pyx with the reserved sacrament fell down, and I had to wait for what seemed like an age for it to be repaired. But the Leaving-taking is good for us: because it presses us back on our basic spiritual resources. Of course we stand in the place of Philip, and tell Jesus to show us the Father, and then we will be satisfied. Yet Jesus throws it all gently back in our faces. And here, perhaps, there is equally direct warnings in this morning’s epistle (Col 3:9-15), about living up to our calling, and not relying on special experiences as a kind of cover-up for who we really are. Jesus here tells us that an Advocate a Companion on our behalf, the Spirit of Truth, will always be with us to show us the way, a way that we must never expect will always be transparently clear, or particularly obvious. And just to make exactly that point, I don’t think its by chance that among those disciples named at the start of the resurrection fishing expedition (John 21:2), we don’t come across and do it all. It’s as if, having been such a good and faithful go-between disciple, he makes way for the second and only time we come across Nathaniel, whom Philip brought to Jesus in the first place. Philip has faded away into the background, doubtless with his faith deepened, and ready to be part of the Easter community.
+ Kenneth Portsmouth
