Text: John 1:43-51
I love the definition of curiosity that Dr. Nadella just offered to us.
“Curiosity is asking questions with care and diligence. It is being willing to learn and unlearn and engaging with respect and care for the relationship.”
We ask, because we care.
As I thought about all of the possible topics and scriptures that we could dive into this fall at Immanuel, this series caught my attention precisely because what this world needs is a little bit more caring and connection.
It isn’t that we don’t care.
But it has been so hard to engage in the kinds of connection that we had been used to.
And I’m not just talking about the pandemic.
Our nation is deeply divided.
We have ideological distance between us that we haven’t figured out how to overcome.
Every action, every word, puts you in a box where you are either pro- or anti- whatever today’s hot-button issue is.
We have forgotten that we are all in this together.
We have forgotten that we are all dust, formed from the earth.
We have forgotten that it is God’s spirit that breathed into us giving us life.
We have forgotten that we are all God’s children.
Earlier this week, I listened to an interview with Kenneth Feinberg, who administered the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund. He shared about the care and diligence that went into listening to the story of every victim and their loved ones as they determined how best to provide support in the aftermath of that horrific act twenty years ago.
He talked about how the entire nation and our congressional leadership rallied together to create this fund. “There wasn’t any red state, blue state; republican, democrat. This program, twenty years ago, is like time out of mind. I don’t know if we could ever do this today.” (https://www.npr.org/2021/09/07/1034914080/determining-what-a-9-11-victims-life-is-worth-climate-change-in-nigeria)
Our first instinct today is to politicize and draw lines in the sand…
To make assumptions about where someone is coming from…
And to do whatever we can to make sure whoever is the “other” in our story doesn’t win.
Which takes me back to Nathanael from our scripture reading this morning.
The scripture starts a few verses back when John the Baptist points out the Lamb of God to his own disciples. Two of them immediately walk away and start to follow Jesus.
Jesus turns around and notices them and asks what they are looking for.
Andrew and John reply: “Rabbi, where are you staying?”
Jesus’ only answer… “come and see.”
In Greek, his response literally means that if they follow him, they will understand and perceive the truth.
He is inviting them into a curiosity that “transcends superficial knowledge and requires greater investment of ones’ time and resources.” (Dr. Raj Nadella)
After just one day with Jesus… they can understand that he is not just a rabbi like John the Baptist. He truly is the Messiah.
And these disciples dive right in, investing their time and energy and indeed their whole lives.
Andrew brings along his brother Simon, nicknamed Peter…
Philip is invited on the journey as well… and like the others, he finds that curiosity is contagious.
So in our scripture for today, Philip rushes to his friend, Nathanael, to bring him news – exciting news! – about the Messiah.
But Nathanael’s first instinct is to label it as “fake news.”
He brings his own bias and assumptions into the conversation and discounts the possibility.
“Hrmph… can anything good come out of Nazareth?”
This isn’t a question asked with care and diligence.
But rather than engage in the divisiveness…
Rather than argue his own point…
Rather than get offended or huffy or unfriend his jaded companion…
Philip turns back to curiosity.
“Come and see,” is the invitation he offers.
He cares for and respects his friend’s position… but thinks perhaps there is something deeper there they both could discover.
In doing so, Philip leaves open the possibility that he might be wrong… maybe what they find will confirm Nathanael’s assumptions…
But he also creates space for Nathanael to be wrong, too.
Philip invites Nathanael to go on a journey with him…
Together, all of these disciples grow deeper in their relationship with Jesus, but they grow in their capacity to be the people God created them to be.
Curiosity gives us the space to learn and to unlearn what we thought we knew about someone.
It prioritizes the other person and their story and our relationship, rather than our judgements about them.
Which reminds me of a scene from the television show, Ted Lasso.
Ted is a wildly successful American football coach who is brought to England to lead a struggling Premier Soccer League team.
Ted knows nothing about soccer, but he’s willing to learn.
The old team owner, Rupert, lost his stake as part of a divorce settlement and is having a hard time letting go.
The two of them find themselves at a bar…
Be curious… not judgmental.
Ted Lasso expresses curiosity and care and kindness.
He wants to know more about this new culture he finds himself immersed in and is willing to share of himself.
But Rupert?
Rupert has no respect for Ted.
He sees him as the enemy and has already made a judgment about who he is and what he could possibly do.
What would happen if we all approached one another with curiosity rather than judgment?
If we asked, with care and love, where someone was coming from… rather than assume their answer?
What if as we shared our own stories, we invited people to be curious, to come and to see, and to ask their own questions… rather than to force our views down their throats?
Like the disciples, it might require us to invest time and resources in one another.
We might have to set aside some of our own prior assumptions.
But then again… we just might gain a deeper understanding of our neighbors and ourselves.
We might discover once again our common humanity.
Be curious.
Be willing to engage and ask questions out of care.
Be willing to share your own story.
And maybe… just maybe… we will also grow in our capacity to be the people that God created us to be.
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