Heights, Sandals, Belief, and Eternal Life

John 3.16-21  ‘For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

¹⁷ ‘Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. ¹⁸Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. ¹⁹And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. ²⁰For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. ²¹But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.’ (NRSV)

I am not a big fan of heights.  It is not necessarily all heights, but some heights.  For example, I had no problem going to the top floor of the Sears Tower (or whatever it is called now) and looking out over the city and Lake Michigan.  On a clear day the view is almost limitless.  Or walking across the glass floor in the CN Tower in Toronto and where you can look straight down 1,100 ft. But take me to the Grand Canyon or Black Canyon and I will admire the view from hundreds of feet from the edge.  Heck I don’t even like to climb the ladder to get to the loft in the back of the church (10-15 ft off the ground).  And I have yet to figure out that TV credit card commercial where the woman is climbing on top of a tall rock spire, barely wide enough for her to walk on.  The inconsistency in my dislike of heights has led me to think that it is not so much a fear of heights, as it is a trust in gravity. 

I know enough physics to know how gravity works, and enough experience to know what happens when you fail to properly trust gravity.  My trust in gravity changes how I live.  I have never looked for a job that involved ascending to great heights, while on vacation I don’t go climbing or get close to the edge of a cliff, and I would probably pass on a call that required me to climb up a pulpit that stands 10 or 15 ft off the ground, the kind seen occasionally in old churches out East or in England.  My trust in gravity changes how I live my life.  It is this understanding of trust that underlies the Greek word commonly translated as belief. 

When we talk about belief or believing, we often think of doctrine or dogma.  I believe this or that about God.  Doctrine and dogma are the things the church has been fighting over for 2,000 years or so.  It is the reason we have so many denominations, with more popping up every day.  But this is not what John is talking about when he says “everyone who believes in [Jesus].”  For John, belief is more about trust than doctrine.  Whether you believe Jesus to be a tall, fair skinned, blue eyed man or a short, stout, dark skinned, brown eyed man doesn’t matter to John.  That is not what John means by belief, but trust is.  To trust in Jesus means to trust in the way that Jesus lived.  This trust changes how we live.  To trust that Jesus’ way is also the way for our lives as well means to change how we live.  Now I am not talking about taking Jesus’ life directly over into ours, as though 2,000 years haven’t passed between us and him.  It doesn’t mean to start wearing sandals, although sandals are a very comfortable footwear, winter or summer.  It does mean to begin to look at how Jesus lived in his time and place, how he healed the sick and lame, fed the hungry, clothed the naked, restored people to the fullness of their humanity and spoke out against injustice.  In living the way he did, he brought eternal life to all those whose life he touched. 

For John, eternal life isn’t something that just begins after our current life is over, but is something that was begun with Jesus, himself.  People, through being healed, fed, clothed, and restored, experience eternal life.  Our trust in Jesus calls us to continue to live in the way of Jesus, feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, restoring people to the fullness of their humanity, and speaking out against injustice.  We forget that eternal life is not just a gift for us alone, but is a gift for the entirety of creation. 

Rather than thinking of eternal life as the next life, think of it as God’s way (or desire) for the world, a way that means the eradication of hunger, illness, homelessness, and injustice.  It is a gift that is meant to be received in this life, as well as for eternity.