Hating Our (False) Selves

'Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. Jesus answered them, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.

“Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say—‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name.” Then a voice came from heaven, “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.” The crowd standing there heard it and said that it was thunder. Others said, “An angel has spoken to him.” Jesus answered, “This voice has come for your sake, not for mine. Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die.'

--John 12: 20-33

“We wish to see Jesus.”  They were a group of Greeks.  Maybe they were converts to Judaism.  Maybe they weren’t.  Maybe, because the Greeks have always been regarded as seekers of truth, they were just plain curious about this carpenter-turned-rabbi whose fame was spreading throughout their corner of the world.  We may never know the reason for their request, but we can sure understand it, can’t we?

Who among us does not wish to see Jesus?  Whether you’re in-person or online, you join your worship community each week, in part, because you wish to see Jesus. Truth is, there’s a whole world out there that wishes to see Jesus. They don’t always say so because they’ve been hurt by the institutional Church, but they love Jesus, and they want to meet him and know him. What does it mean, then, for the Church, which is the Body of Christ in the world, to show Jesus to the world?

The best way we can do that is to model our lives on his. This exchange we hear in the Fourth Gospel today gives us a clue to what Jesus’ life was about and what was at the heart for people who were hoping to inherit what he called the Kingdom of Heaven – not a prize for folks to receive when they die but a present reality that is in their hands to cultivate right now. He responds to the request from those Greeks with a metaphor about a grain of wheat, and how if it abides by itself it’s pointless, but if it lets go of its singular existence, if it commits itself into the deep soil, joining with other microbial organisms and, essentially, dying, then new fruit can be born from it. In the same way, Jesus says, those who love their singular existence will lose it, but if they hate it, then they will gain that eternal life they’ve waited for.

At first hearing Jesus say that folks need to “hate their lives” sounds pretty harsh, The Greek here is miseo, which implies active ill will and is the opposite of agape, which is Jesus’ word for love. The “life” he says to hate is not the same as “eternal life"; in fact, they are two different words in the original Greek. The first is the psuche, which is more akin to the false self or the ego, the version of ourselves that we project out onto the world – it’s the root for “psyche” -  but the second is zoe, a kind of life that is perfect and the abiding antithesis to death. Jesus isn’t saying that we must literally be filled with self-loathing or, God-forbid, harm ourselves, but he is saying that the kind of life we’re really looking for, is one that is not found by abiding in ourselves exclusively but by abiding with others, including God. This is scary, especially if we’ve been hurt by others – it’s sometimes called the Hedgehog’s Dilemma, the closer two hedgehogs get to one another, the more they hurt one another. It’s true for humans too, often the closer we get we the more we hurt, but the alternative is akin to nonexistence; it’s only when we are willing to give everything up that keeps us living solely for ourselves, including the need for self-preservation, that we can receive the kind of life that Jesus has to offer.

The Hedgehog's Dilemma

That’s the example Jesus sets as the one willing to give up everything, even his life, for the sake of the other – in his case, for the sake of the whole world. “Eternal life,” then, is declaring that paradoxical statement that it is only in giving up ourselves that we find ourselves. This is not only about Jesus’ sacrifice but it’s an invitation he issues to his followers to put the Kingdom of Heaven first, the love of the other, which starts with God and extends out to the people of God. But there’s one thing that tends to get in the way of us living into this example, and thereby showing Jesus to others, and that is the fear of death.

Our culture is overwhelmingly concerned with self-identity and self-preservation at all costs.  Every aspect of living tries to cater itself to our individual needs, which, of course, makes it easier to ignore the needs of others. But what would it truly mean to live for God and for others? Here we find Jesus, in the last days of his life, knowing what is about to happen, rhetorically asking, “What I should say? ‘Father, save me from this hour?’ No, Father, glorify your name!” And when he says this a voice from heaven speaks – and in John’s Gospel this is the first time we hear this voice because those other two times, his baptism and transfiguration, don’t happen in John’s Gospel – and the voice replies that the Father’s name has been glorified once already – in Jesus coming into the world – and will be glorified again – in Jesus’ death and resurrection that tears away the veil that separates us from one another and makes it possible for us to live no longer for ourselves but for one another, making the Kingdom of Heaven truly a present reality. 

What would it mean for us to move beyond our fear of death, of loss and change of all kinds – from “save me from this hour” to “glorify your name”? What if we, who are the grain of wheat, let ourselves go and be buried deep in the soil of God’s grace and love? What kind of amazing fruit might be born from that so-called “death”?

That grace and love have already been written on our hearts by the covenant that God has made with us. The prophet Jeremiah spoke of a "new covenant" (Jeremiah 31: 31-34), and when he did so he wasn't saying that the old one on Sinai was now null and void, nor was he thinking of Jesus, but he was proclaiming a hope that the people would know that God had written God’s very self onto their hearts, and we still live into that covenant today. Because of that truth, we know that anything the world defines as loss, as death, is folly in the eyes of God;  just an opportunity for something new, some fresh fruit, to be born. 

To let go of our false selves, our egos and psyches, is the beginning of embracing eternal life. This is the reason we have come to "this hour" each Sunday morning.  That’s why we are go to church.  We see Jesus pouring himself out in the bread of life and cup of salvation, so that we can be poured out. What we experience in church is the dress rehearsal for the rest of our lives. And if we are willing to let go and lose our so-called lives, we will find them, and we will not only know that Good News for ourselves but we will show others, as well.  Brothers and sisters, the world wishes to see Jesus.  Will you show them?