Jesus answered them, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Amen, amen, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will preserve it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there also will my servant be. The Father will honor whoever serves me.” (John 12.20-26)
Even if we are not geologists, many of us are probably familiar with the term “the Great Divide.” It has other names such as the Western Divide or the Continental Divide, but most people just call it the Great Divide. It refers to the geological divide that extends north and south, beginning near the Arctic Circle and continuing through Canada, meandering through the United States and proceeding into Mexico and South America.
The most notable feature of the Great Divide is its mountainous terrain, epitomized by the Rocky Mountains in the United States or the Andes Mountains in South America. Equally important, it marks the hydrological divide of the Americas. For Americans, that means it separates the watersheds that flow into the Pacific Ocean on the west from the rivers that flow into the Atlantic Ocean on the east. In other words, the Great Divide decides which way water is going to flow.
If we know anything about the Gospel of John, it is that he also believes in the great divide. However, he isn’t referring to a geological formation. He’s referring to the human heart, a place that is split into two parts as much as the Great Divide breaks the continental Americas into two parts. For the human heart, however, it is not a matter of which way water flows; it is a question of which way good and evil flow. As the Soviet dissident and Nobel Prize winning author Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn memorably wrote, “ The line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being.”
Having studied John for a week or so, we know that John uses opposites to emphasize his theme. We’ve seen at the start of his gospel how he likes to use the images of light and darkness. That image carries to the end when Mary Magdalene rushes to the tomb when “it was still dark.” The evangelist presents darkness as the domain of evil while he sees light as belonging to all that is good.
So, today, we find something similar in the passage from Chapter 12 that is ours to study on this Fifth Sunday of Lent. In typical Johannine fashion, it presents the great divine once again, but this time he uses another image. Here, we hear the Beloved Son say, “Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit.”
Continuing the image and expounding on it, Jesus says, “Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will preserve it for eternal life.” So, as we expect from John, we find multiple opposites at work. There is grain and there is fruit and there is life and death; also there is loss and gain and love and hate. And, of course, for John, there is always belief and unbelief that undergirds all else.
Jesus brings the point home when he next says, “Whoever serves me must follow me and where I am, there also will my servant be. The Father will honor whoever serves me.” So, again, there are opposites. There are those who serve and there are those who do not serve. It is another major theme in John’s text, summarized in Jesus’ statement about himself when he said, “The Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve.”
For our purposes, it is important to see that these words of Jesus in Chapter 12 come just a short while before the washing of the feet of the disciples that is at the start of Chapter 13. Here, he uses a practical example to bring home the same point, reminding them that “if I, therefore, the master and teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash one another’s feet. I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you should also do.”
So, the servant and master motif, another set of opposites, is front and center in these few chapters, urging us to look closely at what Jesus is saying. He clearly equates being a servant with being a disciple. Servanthood equals discipleship. If we want to understand being a disciple, then we have to become a servant.
If it is difficult for us to take to heart, imagine how difficult it must have been for the first disciples who had been schooled to believe that the promised Messiah would raise an army, drive out the Romans, and put a descendant of David back on his throne, inaugurating the second Davidic dynasty. Instead of someone powerful like a king, Jesus points to someone without power like a servant.
The very notion had to blow the mind of those disciples and, of course, was one of the chief obstacles for convincing the Jewish people that the Messiah had come. How could a suffering servant be a Messiah that saves the people from the Roman occupiers? Where was his power? Where was his army? Where was his treasury?
So, hearing Jesus today tell his followers that they must die like a grain of wheat if they want to produce a harvest, we are facing the same decision that the Jewish people and the first followers faced. This becomes the great divide for us–to follow Jesus or to follow our own will; to follow the light or to follow the darkness; to follow the good or to follow the evil.
The servant analogy that Jesus uses is a good starting point for our reflection today, uncomfortable as it may be for us. A servant, as we know, does not do his or her own will, but does the will of another. As a result, a servant’s life is centered on meeting the needs of others, not on meeting his or her own needs. A servant’s focus is outward, not inward.
Of course, the brutal contest is always fought out in the human heart, a place cleaved in half, where good and evil battle for dominion moment by moment, day by day, year after year. Like the Great Divide, good flows one way and evil flows the opposite way, the direction of the flow decided by which side of the Great Divide we choose to live in.
If we’re unsure of which side of town we live in, we can easily figure it out. We start with the basic question–is our life centered on ourselves, or is it centered on others? Do we spend our time helping ourselves to the bounty of the world, or do we spend our time helping others find some bounty in their own lives? Do we work for our achievements and advancements, or do we work to see that others, especially the powerless, the placeless, and the penniless have a fighting chance in this world? Is our first thought looking out for ourselves, or is it looking out for others?
In John Grisham’s short story, “Funny Boy,” he tells about a young man from a wealthy family named Adrian Keane who comes back home to Ford County Mississippi to die. He left Clanton as soon as he could, since everyone considered him a “funny boy” because of his sexual orientation. Now, a decade later–the year is 1989–he is dying of AIDS and returns to the place that never had any use for him.
When the rumors start to hit town, the townsfolk talk. “They say he’s real sick, on his last leg, and ain’t nobody in the big city to take care of him.” Others are quick to point out, “Well, he won’t be living’ in the big house, that’s for sure. The family got together and decided he couldn’t stay there. So they’re puttin’ him in one of Isaac’s old houses in Lowtown.”
Another asks, “He’s livin’ with the coloreds?” Answer–”That’s what they say.” Grisham writes, “This took a while to sink in, but it began to make sense. The thought of a Keane living across the railroad tracks in the black section was hard to accept, but then it seemed logical that anyone with AIDS should not be allowed on the white side of town.”
Next we learn that Adrian’s aunt Leona Keane, called Leona the Lion to some, had strong-armed a black woman named Miss Emporia, seventy-five years old and unmarried, to take on the job of taking care of her dying nephew. Since the Keane family owned the house Emporia had been renting for twenty-five years, it took little negotiation on the part of Leona. Emporia would care for the nephew and when he died she would get the deed to the house.
When Adrian arrived home, Aunt Leona arranged for her gardener to drive the boy over and deliver him to his final destination, since, after all, Aunt Leona would never think of being seen on the other side of the tracks. When they arrive at Emporia’s small house, the front yard full of flowers and rocking chairs and welcoming doors, Adrian decided he’d rather die there any day than in the miserable mansion he had just left, less than a mile away.
And so begins the relationship between Adrian and Emporia, a friendship that develops into a close bond. When Emporia asks Adrian if he planned to stay in Lowtown, he answers, “Believe me, Emporia, I’d much rather be here. They didn’t want me back in Clanton. For years they paid me to stay away. They disowned me, cut me out of their wills, refused to speak my name.”
Soon enough, Emporia suffers for more than being a black woman in the South. The taxi cab driver won’t let Adrian in the car. “Oh no! No way in hell you’re gettin’ in my taxi! I’ve heard about you!” he shouts at Adrian. It’s just a matter of time before the preacher asks Emporia to come by his office at 3:00 in the afternoon. He confronts Emporia with the question, “There’s a rumor you’ve invited him to worship with us.”
Emporia answers, “I invite everyone to worship with us, Reverend. That’s what you want. That’s what the Bible says.” To which the preacher answers, “Well, this is a little different.” Emporia responds, “Don’t worry. He ain’t comin’.” The preacher, relieved, announces, “Praise the Lord. The wages of sin is death, Emporia, and this young man is paying for his sins.”
The preacher isn’t done. Before the meeting ends, he has told Emporia that she should take a leave of absence from the church until Adrian passes away. “My concern is my church,” he tells her. As Emporia gets up to go to the door, he says to her, “Don’t overreact, Emporia. We all love you.” To which she answers, “I feel the love.” “And we’ll be prayin’ for you, and for him.” Emperia, without looking back, says, “I’m sure he’ll be pleased to hear that.”
Adrian dies in a short while. Emporia finds him on his bed, neatly dressed, still smiling, eternally at rest. There is a hand-written note on his chest addressed to Emporia. The first line asks her to destroy the letter after she reads it. Then he tells her that he has instructed his attorney to bury his remains in the black section of the cemetery, as far away from his family plot as possible. “When my ashes are buried,” he writes, “I’d be honored if you would offer a silent word or two. And feel free to stop by my little spot occasionally and leave some flowers.”
He ends his letter, “Thank you so much for your kindness. You’ve made my last days bearable, even enjoyable at times. You’re a wonderful human being, and you deserve to be what you are. Love, Adrian.”
Grishman ends the story with these two sentences, “Emporia sat on the edge of the bed for a long time, wiping her eyes and even patting his knee. Then she collected herself and went into the kitchen, where she threw the letter in the trash and picked up the phone.”
Grisham’s story reminds us yet again there is a great divide in every human heart. On one side is evil and on the other side is good. On one side, goodness flows outward with a love that embraces one and all, generosity is extended without a single thought of oneself, and serving others in whatever way possible is front and center.
On the other side of the heart is evil. It also flows outwardly, but its waters are nasty and murky, full of vileness and ugliness. It sees no one but itself, cares for no one but itself, and serves no one but itself. It’s only thought is grasping more–more power, more prestige, more pennies–and giving less–less love, less concern, less service. Today, we hear Jesus tell his followers, “If anyone serves me, let him follow me.” The story of whether or not we follow him is always found in the great divide in our hearts.
–Jeremy Myers
Sunday Brunch 