Come and see.
I have a picture book around the house (can’t find it without excavating a closet buried deep in stuff out of our past) which shows the 15th century cathedral of Florence, Italy in three dimensions – that is, when you open the book the cathedral does not lie there flatly printed upon the page but stands straight up like a miniature model of the church.
The episode written upon the pages of today’s Gospel can do the same thing. The text is about John the Baptist recognizing in Jesus someone special – and (if you follow today’s text into the following verses of chapters 1 and 2) you will read of John’s calling this Jesus to the attention of some of his followers. But, as I have said, the account need not remain flat upon the pages of the Gospel book. Indeed all the characters are meant to rise from the pages – to stand and walk erect, to populate the sanctuary of St. Leo’s as if as physically present to our eyes as everyone else in our congregation.
And so what do we behold? John, referring to Jesus, says to each of these characters and to each of us: “Behold, look, there’s the Lamb of God . . . who ranks ahead of me because he existed before me.” And even as we notice two of John’s disciples (including Andrew) draw closer to this Jesus, we move with them – curious ourselves as to who this Jesus is (because so often we have only a pious or superficial understanding of him). And Jesus notices us, turns on us and says, “What are you looking for?” And we along with those two other fellows who have risen out of the pages of the book, knowing Jesus to be at least a rabbi (a teacher) ask, “Rabbi, where are you staying?”
If we mean “What’s your current address?” it’s obvious we don’t fully know what we are asking for. Nor when Jesus says seductively, possibly even beckoning with his forefinger, “Come and see,” do we realize how far he will lead us into a profound awareness of where he dwells (or wishes to dwell) which is ultimately within ourselves as so much more than a rabbi – but as the very breath of God, revitalizing us, causing us to breathe, to think, to imagine more deeply than we ever have.
And so now along with this Andrew and Simon and Philip and Nathanael, each standing erect right off the open Gospel page (each disciple reflective of the phases of growing awareness we experience as our lives advance) we follow this Jesus right into a wedding banquet in the town of Cana (which again pops up from the pages of the Gospel to encompass our table right here in St. Leo’s, Cana crowding the scene, transforming our location – for him and her who have the eyes to see).
And there (here?), mingled shoulder to shoulder as we are with the guests of that ancient yet ever current Cana banquet, we see Jesus change water into wine! We see a sign of what he is all about – about our changing from insipid folk into people alive with spirit, the world around us changing from opaque and gray to a lively, ruby, blood red creation of God. We are introduced to a realm of mystery, the mystery of faith that, like this curious procession that initiates John’s Gospel and initiates this New Year, can escalate spiritually and ethically from week to week beyond our wildest “surmise”.