John 17:20-26
Seven billion. There are now seven billion people in the world. And Jesus prays that we may be one. Over and over again, he prays. May all be one. As we are one. That they may be one. Completely one. But how? How can seven billion people become one? Completely one?
In reading about this news — this strange news that there are now seven billion people in the world — I stumbled upon a video produced by the National Geographic. With this news, National Geographic wants to know what the most typical person is. There’s a composite of this person — the most typical in person in the whole human race. Statistically, this typical person is 28 years old (the global median age), right-handed, Christian, speaks Mandarin, owns a cell phone, doesn’t have a car or bank account and earns less than $12,000 a year. Does this mean that we should all be like this person? Should we reduce ourselves to law of averages? Is this what Jesus intends when he prays that we may be one, completely one?
What is one among seven billion? What does it mean for Jesus to pray for that one among seven billion? This isn’t a teaching moment. He isn’t preaching. These are not instructions. Jesus isn’t even talking to the disciples. They may have overheard, but Jesus isn’t talking to those ones. He is talking to the One. Jesus prays to the Holy One. May all be one. As we are one. That they may be one. Completely one.
But this prayer is not about God. This prayer is not even about himself. Jesus prays for those ones — those that he has seen — for the one calling out in the wilderness, for the one that has been ill for thirty-eight years, for the one that sows while the other reaps, for the one who believes and drinks. Jesus prays for these ones. That they may be one. Completely one. These are not words you pray when looking at a whole mass of poor and hungry people. These are words that you offer because you have looked into the eyes of one. There are many others. Sure. But your vision is cast upon this one.
One like Jane. Jane was married until her husband decided to take a second wife. That’s normal in Kenya but it wasn’t OK with Jane so she left the marriage without any money or a place to go – except the slums of Nairobi. While I was in seminary, I wandered through one of these slums where women were learning to sew. Back then, they were just beginning to set up dress shops while their husbands sat a few yards away drinking. These were women that were trying to tackle the impossible – a reality that Jane knew better than I ever could with one-day visit to the slums. This is her story. Not mine. So when Janes’s marriage ended, there was only one option and she took it. She became a prostitute. But, as the New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof reports, this wasn’t the end for Jane. Soon Jane joined an anti-poverty organization and learned to sew like the women I saw years ago. Someone invested in her. It wasn’t actually a micro-loan that helped. It was micro-savings that allowed Jane to buy a sewing machine — and create a business of converting old wedding dresses into three or four new dresses. She’s moved to the suburbs and her children are soaring. Her eldest son Anthony, who will likely graduate as the valedictorian, looks forward to getting his first paycheck so that he can buy something nice for his mom.
In a world of seven billion, we pray with Jesus: As you, Creator, are in me and I am in you, may Jane also be in us. But that’s not how this New York Times columnist concludes Jane’s story. He doesn’t conclude with the power of this connection. He doesn’t conclude with Jane’s triumph – but his own. As he’s getting ready to pack up and leave Kenya, Jane’s daughter gets in an accident that rips apart her foot. And so the American takes up a collection. They’re able to help the girl with the funds raised. It’s nice that this guy does this. It’s something that you or I would do. Or so we’d like to think but this is not what Jesus means when he prays may all be one. Jesus doesn’t pray that we empty one pocket into another — even though this is exactly what we do in a disaster. When the tsunami struck Southeast Asia, we emptied our pockets generating $1.5 billion dollars for disaster relief. When the levees broke in New Orleans, Americans gave $6.5 billion dollars. And when the earthquake hit Pakistan, Americans responded with merely $150 million. It’s just what this guy did when he watched Jane’s daughter in pain. And that’s just it. He watched. We watched. We saw the devastation in Southeast Asia and New Orleans, but not in Pakistan. The tragedy in Pakistan was not televised. We didn’t see the disaster. And we responded accordingly. We gave less.
In a world of seven billion, Jesus prays: As you, Creator, are in me and I am in you, may Pakistan also be in us. These are words of deep longing. Jesus prays that we might see each other as Jesus sees us, that we might find the ability to care for each other, that we might change each other’s lives as Jesus did. This isn’t something you can teach. This isn’t something to be preached. It’s something you have to feel.
Now, you may have heard that teenagers don’t have this within them. They don’t feel this. The sociologist Christian Smith calls it moralistic therapeutic relativism – and recently it’s made news. Suddenly there seems to be great alarm that teenagers have a slightly different moral code than the so-called older generations. This is what the statistics say. We (the older generations) haven’t taught them to feel. So the typical teenager believes that God requires fairness but more importantly the typical teenager has been taught to believe that God wants him to be happy. Teenagers have learned from us that God isn’t directly involved in our world but that’s not what Jesus prays. Jesus prays that all may be one. That you may see — whether you are a teenager or a parent or a senior citizen — that Jane is in you and you are in Jane. Jesus prays that we might see that our lives are intertwined with those in Southeast Asia. Jesus prays that we might see those in Pakistan even when there are no television crews. This is not an easy thing to do – whether or not you are a teenager. It’s impossibly hard when you are challenged to imagine your life is intertwined with those that you cannot see, those that are halfway around the world, those that need to be pulled up from the depths below.
That’s what the one fisherman felt from below. A yank so hard that it could have pulled him right out of the boat. A pull so fierce that he was certain that catch might feed him for weeks. So he reels in his line gleefully imagining his neighbors delight. But there is no fish on the other end of the line. There is only the decomposing carcass of a young woman — the Skeleton Woman. As the story goes, this young woman was thrown into the sea by her angry father years ago. But the fisherman doesn’t know this. The only reality he knows is the body tugging on his fishing line. He tries to free himself of her but she gets tangled and he ends up dragging her to shore. He tries to stop this from happening. He’s more and more horrified as the blood and flesh trail in the wake but he can’t escape her. When he finally gets to shore, the fisherman drags his lines across the beach carrying the Skeleton Woman with him. He’s terrified as he realizes that she’s still alive. She’s half-eaten and ever so close to death but there’s still life in this Skeleton Woman. It’s then that he actually looks at her. Something inside him stirs. While she sleeps, he gently pulls the seaweed out of her hair. He unwinds the fishing line from around her limbs. He tries to prop her up and comforts her with a blanket. No longer afraid, he too falls asleep. And as he sleeps he cries. Perhaps his sobs awake her. The old story doesn’t say. But as the story goes, the Skeleton Woman crawls across the floor to drink the fisherman’s tears while he sleeps. And from those tears she grows a new body. She becomes young again.
In a world of seven billion, we pray with Jesus: As you, Creator, are in me and I am in you, may the Skeleton Woman also be in us. But Jesus doesn’t tell us stories like this. He tells us about the one who sowed and the one who reaped. He tells us about the one who betrayed and the one who wandered. He tells us about this one and that one in the story — and then he asks us which one we are.
Will you be the one who wanders? Will you be the one that doesn’t see? Will you be the one that can’t look? Will you be the one that makes another’s story all about you? Will you be typical? Or will you try to live into these words that Jesus prays for you?
In a world of seven billion, will you choose to see the one among the many? Will you admit that that pull from the depths below actually affects your own survival? Will you challenge your neighbors and the world as you seek God in that one? Will you see the love with which God has loved you is also in him? Will you change her life? Will you dare to believe that that love can end poverty and hunger? Will you risk the impossible so that all may be one, as Jesus prays, completely one?