BibleWorm

This week BibleWorm reads John 20:19-31, the last text we will read together in the book of John. We sit for a long while with the question - what does it mean for the disciples to be sent into the world by Jesus in the way that Jesus was sent into the world by the Father? We give doubting Thomas some love, lifting up his bravery … and really seeing the bravery it takes to hang in there through moments of doubt and to speak what you need out loud. And we step back to look at the role this gospel might imagine itself to have in someone else’s life of faith – it is not the beginning and the end, but more like a starter pack, or a reserve to tap when you need it. Because we will all have our own story.

This week BibleWorm reads the story of Easter resurrection as told in John 20:1-18. We compare Mary’s mournful lingering at the tomb to Peter’s footrace with the Beloved Disciple, and we notice how the story unfolds a little more for each of them: Peter sees the clothes, the Beloved Disciple believes, Mary encounters the risen Lord. And we think, however you come to the tomb it is enough, whether lingering in your grief or racing in your urgency. It takes all of us together to recognize new life taking shape in the midst of death. You can come to the tomb just as you are.

On this Good Friday special episode, BibleWorm reads John 20:23-42, the account of the crucifixion. The intermingling here of cruelty and love, of care and humiliation, creates such a rich and complicated story - and mostly, we just try to hold it all. We raise up the way that even on the cross, Jesus is helping his people find new ways to love each other. We hold tenderly the fact that after he has died, his body is afforded the honor that was absent in his last hours of life. And we wonder what it means for John to cite scripture about how God protects for the righteous in this moment, even this one.

This week BibleWorm is pairing the Palm Sunday story in John 12:12-19 with the continuation of the crucifixion story in John 19:16b-22. We wrestle with the image of kingship in John’s Gospel, with the crowds hailing Jesus as “king of the Jews” even as Pilate sneeringly executes him as king of the Jews. We contrast Rome’s militant view of kingship with Zechariah’s vision of an anti-militarist king ultimately embodied in Jesus. We talk about the Empire’s way of violence and Jesus’s way of self-giving love that refuses to exercise power over others but instead lifts up even the ones who have betrayed him. And we discuss the danger these texts have posed throughout the centuries, especially for our Jewish siblings, and recognize the urgency of biblical interpretation that brings more love to the world rather than more violence.

This week BibleWorm reads John 19:1-16a, a continuation of Jesus’s trial, if one can even call it that. Despite the fact that Pilate repeatedly says he finds no charge against Jesus, the machinery of this human penal system is now in motion, and Pilate seems unwilling to stop it. We pull out our hair watching the web of forces that seem to hold sway over the characters – both the religious authorities and the empire’s authorities – many of which are based in fear, and none of which are based in speaking and acting upon what one actually believes to be true.  And we see pretty clearly that indeed the empire would lose its power if it could not hold the fear of death over its people. Good heavens, humans are a disaster.

This week BibleWorm reads the story of Jesus’s trial before the Roman governor Pilate as told in John 18:28-40. We talk about the complex interaction of religious authority and political authority and the ways they often operate to avoid taking responsibility for their actions. We discuss the concept of truth and what truth even means in an age of misinformation, disinformation, and propaganda. And we wrestle with what it means to follow a king who refuses to wield the power of death over and against the enemy but instead submits to death in self-giving love, giving witness to the ultimate power of life. Can the kingdoms of the earth follow this path of love? According to this text, they cannot. But can we? That is the question.

This week BibleWorm reads John 18:12-27, the story of Jesus being taken into custody by the religious authorities. We try to climb into the character of Paul - the one disciple who defends Jesus with the sword, one of only 2 who chooses to follow him into the next dangerous place, who then unravels in his loyalty and denies him. We think about this in light of Jesus’s attempt to send the disciples home once he has been arrested – Jesus’s recognition, maybe, that humans won’t have the strength to be with him as his story unfolds. We reflect on how both of our faiths, Jewish and Christian, are built with the understanding that humans can strive and strive and have the very best of intentions, and we will still have gaps where we will just need grace and forgiveness. It is a wretching thing to fall into the gaps.

This week we’re reading the story of Jesus washing the disciples’ feet as told in John 13:1-17. We talk about the profound way Jesus’s actions destabilize the social hierarchy, envisioning a community in which everyone honors and lifts up the other regardless of social status. We marvel at the idea that the incarnation seems to have made God’s relationship with humans more intimate—from God loving the world in John 3:16 to Jesus loving us as his own in this text. And we wrestle with the presence of Judas the betrayer at this intimate encounter. If Jesus chooses to wash even Judas’s feet, what does that mean for the way we treat those we suspect of betraying us today?

This week we read John 11:1-44, the story of Lazarus being resurrected from the dead. We see the fully human Jesus unfold and bloom in this story – a Jesus who must hold back from healing someone for whom he holds a particular love, a Jesus who weeps for a man’s death before he calls him back to life. We hear this Jesus say “I am the resurrection” – the light, the word, and now even the resurrection. In just one chapter, he embodies the biggest and most abstract realities, and also walks into the depths and particularities of human suffering.

On this special Ash Wednesday episode we’re discussing the image of Jesus as both the shepherd and the gate in John 10:1-18. We talk about what it means to be gathered into the sheep pen and why, according to this text, you can’t simply stay there. Somebody is going to lead you back out into a dangerous world—what matters is who you follow. We think about Jesus as the gate, who keeps out the thieves and outlaws and lets only the good shepherd in. And we think about Jesus as the good shepherd, who knows our names and is willing to lay down his life to keep us safe. And, on this Ash Wednesday, we ask what it means for us to be people of faith willing to go forth into a dangerous world, leaving the safe confines of our spiritual enclaves to bring abundant life to the world.