In his seventies, the great Italian sculptor Michelangelo wrote a letter to his nephew Lionardo. Alluding to all the sculptures, paintings, and poetry that he had created, he told his nephew, “Many believe – and I believe – that I have been designated by God for this work. In spite of my old age, I do not want to give it up; I work out of the love of God in whom I put all my hope.” Inspired by his love of God, Michelangelo embodied in marble flesh the towering figures of Moses and David, the inspiring figure of Christ carrying his Cross, the heart-wrenching scene of Jesus lying across Mary’s lap in the Pietà ,. Inspired by his love of God, Michelangelo filled the ceiling of the papal Sistine chapel with glorious paintings illuminating stories from Scripture. One of the best known of these paintings is the breath-taking fresco of the Last Judgment that is behind the altar. Showing the Second Coming and the judgment that comes with it, the fresco depicts men and women without any symbols of earthly rank or status and presents them as equals now before Christ. In the center of the fresco stands a radiant Christ surrounded by the saved who rejoice in light and joy, while the damned are carried into darkness.
In creating this great art, which still inspires our own faith, Michelangelo might have felt that he was just doing a job or executing another commission. Instead, Michelangelo understood his work as a vocation, a way of life to which he was called by God for a purpose, in which his art was inspired by God, and in which he was sustained by God throughout his long life. Michelangelo knew that if the work was great, it was because God’s greatness was reflected in it. He also knew that however great his own work was, however much it was acclaimed by others, it paled in comparison to the saving work of God in Christ. In the end, drawing others into a deeper relationship with God, into a deeper understanding of what God has done for us in Christ, was the purpose for which God had called Michelangelo, the vocation to which Michelangelo remained faithful throughout his life.
John the Baptist and his two disciples, Andrew and his friend, also knew something about drawing others into a deeper relationship with God. As always John’s Gospel, the last of the Gospels to be written, gives us a different take on the events of Jesus’ ministry. Last week in our reading from Matthew’s Gospel we witnessed Jesus’ baptism. Here, we hear about Jesus’ baptism from the testimony of John the Baptizer. Still a fiery preacher of repentance who had collected many disciples and drawn many others to the Jordan for baptism, John knew that he was only a forerunner of the Messiah, God’s Anointed one, or God’s Chosen one. However, initially he did not know who that person was. Through the act of baptizing Jesus, John’s eyes were opened, and he gained a deeper understood his role: his role was to see the Spirit descend on Jesus and to proclaim the coming of the Messiah in Jesus. Thereafter John forthrightly related his own experiences to all would hear him: “I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God.” “I myself.” Called to proclaim the coming of the Messiah, called to point to his coming, called to decrease as the Messiah increased, through his declaration of his own experience, John faithfully began leading others into closer community with Jesus.
Andrew and his friend, perhaps the Beloved Disciple mentioned later in this Gospel, were among those who heard John’s proclamation. Perhaps they had been among John’s disciples. When John proclaimed, “Look, here is the Lamb of God,” they heard John’s implicit suggestion that they leave him and become a disciple of Jesus instead. They ran off in Jesus’ direction and asked where he was staying. In response to Jesus’ invitation to “Come and see,” Andrew and his friend followed Jesus, stayed with him, and listened intently to his teaching. Then they turned around and did the same thing that John the Baptizer had done: they spoke of their own experience. They went to Andrew’s brother Simon and declared, “We have found the Messiah.” And then they took one more step: they went back to where Jesus was staying, bringing Simon with them. Imagine how it might have been: Andrew and the other disciple might have said, “That was nice,” and never said another word to anyone about what they had heard from Jesus. Instead they enthusiastically proclaimed what they had seen, “We have found the Messiah,” and they brought Simon to Jesus. And thereafter lives were changed for all eternity! Simon, Andrew, and the other disciple now understood that they too had a vocation, a God-given role: to tell of their own experiences of Jesus and to bring others into closer relationship with Jesus.
Because of Simon, Andrew, and the other disciple, because of the others who heard what they said about their own experiences with Jesus, and because of the communities of faith that formed around them, people are still being drawn into deeper relationship with God and into a deeper understanding of what God has done for us in Christ. Today this is especially true in Africa, where churches are still growing rapidly, even as the churches of Europe and North America seem to be slowly dying. Can we learn anything from African Christians about how to speak of our own experiences with Jesus and how to draw others into closer relationship with him?
In 1973 Roman Catholic Christians of the Mafa ethnic group in Cameroun in western Africa began looking for ways to fulfill their own vocation to make Jesus more understandable to those around them and to bring others into closer relationship with Jesus. They formed a committee to select the stories from Scripture they knew to be most important in drawing people to Christ. Then they photographed and sketched village people living out their lives. The committee gave the photos and sketches to a French artist who created a series of 63 paintings depicting scenes from the Annunciation to Pentecost, using the lives of the rural Mafa as the context.1 You can see one painting depicting Jesus’ invitation to Andrew and his friend on your bulletin cover. Can you see how such a picture might help Mafa people understand better who Christ was? In a way, these paintings are somewhat like medieval stained glass windows or manuscripts, which show Jesus, Peter, Andrew, and others often in the context of medieval life. The Jesus Mafa paintings depict Jesus in the context of Mafa life, and so they help catechists and teachers make Christ more accessible to people as they hear the Scriptures and stories about his life. Since their initial production, the paintings have been widely distributed to Christian communities of all kinds in Africa, to catechists, churches, missionaries, schools, libraries, booksellers, and private individuals. You yourself can even buy them through the Jesus Mafa website!
Do these Jesus Mafa paintings speak to us? They speak to me. They remind me that through my commitment to Jesus, I am charged to speak of my own experiences of him in my own language, and to draw people into closer relationship with him. Indeed that responsibility belongs to all of us, by virtue of our own baptisms, not just to those who wear clerical collars. Along with John the Baptizer we too are charged with saying, “I saw it myself.” Along with Andrew and the other disciple, we too are charged with saying, “We have seen the Messiah.” How do we do that? It’s not easy. Episcopalians don’t like the e-word. We thinks of zealots spouting hell fire and brimstone, of fanatics like those of the Westboro Baptist church in Kansas who picket military and other funerals and spout their message of a hateful God.
My friends, that’s not what evangelism is. Evangelism actually means using the i-word or the w-word, “I experienced this as a disciple of Jesus. We have seen Jesus in this person or place or offering of ministry.” Evangelism means using language, images, and pictures of Jesus that come out of our own mouth, time and place, not the mouths, times and places of other centuries and countries, beloved as they may be. Let me be clear. I am most decidedly not urging that we neglect our traditions or abandon ancient forms that still nourish us. What I am talking about is understanding that the Gospel message is for us, our time, and our community too, that indeed Christ came for people of every “language, tribe and nation.” But the Gospel message is best heard through the testimony of real people speaking of their own actual experiences. When we can say, “I have experienced Jesus when…” or “I see Jesus in…” or, “Here is what Jesus looks like to me…” then we are following in the footsteps of Michelangelo, John the Baptizer, Andrew and the other disciple, and the creators of the Jesus Mafa paintings. And here is the good news: God continues to enhance our ability to make Christ known to others. God has given us models of how to speak of our experiences of Christ. When we open our mouths to begin doing so, God will be there with us, just as God was with all those who have come before us. Are you up for it? Can you open your mouth and say, “I saw…?” Can you say, “We have seen…?” May it be so!
1. More information about the Jesus Mafa paintings is available at http://www.jesusmafa.com/index.htm .
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