While Easter is over, the new creation is not. This is one of the messages the Gospel of John is telling us today. The question for us is, where am I in this story? Am I in Christ, in the new creation? Or am I stuck in the past?
John opens, like Genesis, with the words "In the beginning..." - only here, God is the Word, and with the Word. This Word assumed a human body.
Genesis takes the reader through seven days of creation. John takes us through seven signs of Jesus, starting at a wedding in Cana and ending at a funeral in Capernaum. In both creation accounts, we are led to the culmination in the sixth day, when the peak of God's creation is revealed. In Genesis, that peak is Adam, the first human. In John's gospel, it's Jesus, who is the new human. Like Adam, Jesus gives names to people, is lonely, and is tempted. Unlike Adam, Jesus does not buckle to the pressure to be like God. Unlike Adam, Jesus does not see being God as a thing to be grasped. While Adam became like God, Jesus became like us. The new creation reverses the old.
On the place of the skull are two criminals crucified. Jesus is crucified in the middle, recalling the tree of life planted in the middle of the garden. But the cross is not only the tree of life. It is also the tree of knowledge, for to know Jesus is to have life. And there, on the tree, Jesus invites us to eat the bread that is breaking, the wine that is pouring, to have life in him.
Genesis tells us "on the seventh day God finished the work." Similarly, on the end of the sixth day, Jesus tells us it is finished, signaling the end of his work. On the seventh day, God rests from his creation, and on the seventh day, Jesus rests from his. Finally, on the first day of the week, we find God walking in the garden in the cool of the morning. Jesus also walks, appearing as the gardener.
Here, the gospel might have ended. But it continues, and we must, too. As God breathed into Adam the breath of life, Jesus breathes into the disciples the holy spirit. He is starting something new. The first fruit of the new creation is multiplying.
John opens, like Genesis, with the words "In the beginning..." - only here, God is the Word, and with the Word. This Word assumed a human body.
Genesis takes the reader through seven days of creation. John takes us through seven signs of Jesus, starting at a wedding in Cana and ending at a funeral in Capernaum. In both creation accounts, we are led to the culmination in the sixth day, when the peak of God's creation is revealed. In Genesis, that peak is Adam, the first human. In John's gospel, it's Jesus, who is the new human. Like Adam, Jesus gives names to people, is lonely, and is tempted. Unlike Adam, Jesus does not buckle to the pressure to be like God. Unlike Adam, Jesus does not see being God as a thing to be grasped. While Adam became like God, Jesus became like us. The new creation reverses the old.
On the place of the skull are two criminals crucified. Jesus is crucified in the middle, recalling the tree of life planted in the middle of the garden. But the cross is not only the tree of life. It is also the tree of knowledge, for to know Jesus is to have life. And there, on the tree, Jesus invites us to eat the bread that is breaking, the wine that is pouring, to have life in him.
Genesis tells us "on the seventh day God finished the work." Similarly, on the end of the sixth day, Jesus tells us it is finished, signaling the end of his work. On the seventh day, God rests from his creation, and on the seventh day, Jesus rests from his. Finally, on the first day of the week, we find God walking in the garden in the cool of the morning. Jesus also walks, appearing as the gardener.
Here, the gospel might have ended. But it continues, and we must, too. As God breathed into Adam the breath of life, Jesus breathes into the disciples the holy spirit. He is starting something new. The first fruit of the new creation is multiplying.
