“What are you looking for?” We read in the Gospel today that the Lord Jesus put this question to two men who had been disciples of John the Baptist but who began to follow a new master after John said of Jesus following his Baptism: “Behold, the Lamb of God.”
So after the two men began to follow Jesus, he asked them: What are you looking for? And, friends, we are all looking for something. For love, for friendship, for good health, for wisdom, for peace and prosperity, for release from suffering, for transcendent meaning and purpose, for mercy, for the hope of eternal life and perfect happiness. And we seek those very same blessings for all the people we love.
“What are you looking for?” Or as other translations have it, “What do you seek?” Every human person is a seeker, and however confusedly, we are all seeking that which is good, and true, and beautiful. But where and how can we find these things?
“What do you seek?” the Lord Jesus asked them, and the two men responded, “Rabbi, where are you staying?” Notice, they answered his question with a question, suggesting that they were not exactly sure what they were seeking, but in asking their question they also acknowledged Jesus to be a teacher, a rabbi, someone from whom they were willing to learn.
At this point they were willing to receive Jesus as a teacher based on the testimony of someone else they trusted, John the Baptist. And this is the way with all teachers and students. There must be trust and respect between teacher and student, and students must be willing to be taught by someone who knows what they do not, which also means that students must know there are things they do not yet know.
“Rabbi, where are you staying,” they asked him, and Christ answered them, “Come, and you will see.” To be together with the Lord in trust and respect, to follow him, to abide with him, to wait upon his Word, and to receive his teaching with faith, hope, and love - this is the beginning of authentic fellowship or communion with the living God. And so they went and stayed with him that day, and he taught them. Imagine the grace of being taught personally by the Word made flesh, and yet we are, every time we open the sacred page of Holy Scripture!
Near the end of this passage from John’s Gospel we at last learn the identity of one of the two men who stayed with Christ that day. He was Andrew, the brother of Simon bar Jonah. And having found the Messiah, Andrew could not wait to tell his brother, and so another seeker was drawn that day into communion with the Lord Jesus.
Here John’s Gospel anticipates something we read at greater length in Matthew’s Gospel: at the word of Christ, Simon will become Cephas, Peter, and in due course the rock of Peter’s faith will draw countless others to saving faith in Jesus Christ and lead the Church to begin fulfilling the Great Commission of teaching the Gospel to all nations. But two millennia on from the Resurrection, that work is in many ways just beginning.
We live in a time of great confusion and chaos, both in the Church and in the world. We live during a great apostasy or falling away from Christ, a turning away from faith, in part because the Church is not trusted or respected, because the authority of all teachers is rejected in cynicism and irony, and because authentic fellowship with God and friendship with others is made nearly impossible by our willful incapacity to distinguish truth from falsehood, good from evil, and beauty from formlessness.
But even in this storm of unbelief and incivility, we are called by our Baptism, called by name to follow the Savior, just as surely as the Prophet Samuel was called by name into the service of the Lord. We are called by our Baptism to be witnesses to Christ and to lead others to him by grace through faith.
And we fulfill our baptismal vocation by being centered on Christ, by abiding with him and in his Word, by being honest and authentic, by being peaceful and grateful, by being respectful and trustworthy, and by being faithful and true. In a word, we fulfill our baptismal vocation by being disciples of the Lord Jesus from whom others are willing to learn of the Way, the Truth, and the Life.
Most of you do not remember the day of your Baptism, but I do. I was baptized 42 years ago this Wednesday when I was 19 years old. And I was led to the Lord Jesus by others, just as Andrew was led to Jesus by John the Baptist and Simon was led to Jesus by Andrew. In my case, I was led to Christ primarily by other college kids.
They were friends of mine who already knew that Jesus Christ is Lord, and they bore witness to him for me. They spoke to me of their faith and their friendship with Christ. They taught me to read Holy Scripture with reverence as the Word of God, and they showed me how to pray by lifting up my heart and mind to the Throne of Grace. By the witness of their lives, they opened in my heart a yearning to find what I was seeking and an understanding that I could find it only in Christ.
To be such instruments of grace for others, we should each know the exact date of our Baptism and keep it every year as a feast in commemoration of the day on which we were born again by water and the Holy Spirit.
Speaking of the effects of Holy Baptism, Saint Paul writes to the Corinthians in our second lesson today: “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been purchased at a price.” And that price is the broken Body and precious Blood of Jesus Christ.
Friends, at our Baptism we were made members of Christ, children of God, and heirs to the Kingdom of Heaven. At our Baptism, God called us by name to be his disciples just as he called Samuel to be his prophet. And because of our Baptism and by virtue of the grace of our second birth, we should strive every day to know the Gospel, to live the Gospel, and to share the Gospel with others.
“What do you seek?” The Lord Jesus asks that question of every human person. It is our high privilege and sacred duty to help others answer that question for themselves by telling them with our words and showing them with our lives that, like John, Andrew, and Simon, we have found the Messiah, the Lamb of God, the Savior of the world, the Lord Jesus Christ.
This is the text of my homily for 14 January 2024, the Second Sunday of the Year, at Saint Mary’s Church in Greenville, South Carolina.
Fr Jay Scott Newman
Thank you for your insightful homily. Well said.
Happy Anniversary of your Baptism , Father Newman! What wonderful friends you had to introduce you to life everlasting. Glad you continue to introduce that sacrament to others . Have a beautiful day of reflection and thanksgiving as we all give thanks for being saved from ourselves. With Gratitude in abundance in our hearts for becoming heirs of the Lord our God. Also for being granted mercy and grace from Our Father and having the ability to be graceful and merciful to others . I love that you use Faith ,Hope and Love as focal points in most of your writings. Without those perfect God given ingredients of faith ,hope and love combined with mercy and grace measured in never ending chalices ,we all would be lost . Thank you Lord Jesus Christ for your mercy upon all. We all need it. Blessings of hope and happiness to you on this your special day. In Gratitude- CKB