Anything? Really?

It's a reckless, extravagant promise, isn't it. "I will do whatever you ask in my name ... If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it." Reckless, extravagant; how about broken, unkept? Ill considered. Incompatible with the nature of Creation, to which, evidently, even the Creator submits. Now we know why 90-year-old Sarah laughed. Now maybe we know how Abraham must have felt waiting twenty-five years for God to honor his side of their covenant. And every living being who's ever raised desperate, fervent prayer to heaven "in Jesus' name, Amen" has known the disappointment of resounding silence.

Notice that, unlike the almost identical but equivocal promise at Mark 11:22-24, where belief without doubt is required, faith is needed to empower prayer to move a mountain to throw itself into the sea, here in Gospel John, the promise is unconditional, absolute. 

Comes to mind Jesus' anecdotal assurance at Luke 11:5-10, of The Friend at Midnight. A friend eventually agrees to help his neighbor, not because they are buddies, but due to his persistent demands, and the promise following, that God will respond: knock and the door will be opened. 

And Luke 18:1-8, the Parable of the Unjust Judge, aka the Parable of the Persistent Widow, where the judge says because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice. It's not very assuring, is it.

The absence of God? knock knock knock bam bam knock knock bam bam, anybody home? The earnest but pious cop-out "sometimes God says No" is absurd, skybalon, childish nonsense, rationalization to let God off the hook, to cover one's disappointment, to hide one's tears. "Sometimes God says No" is not scriptural, is not part of the Creed, is not Christian doctrine. It's pietistic sentimentality. So, Hey up there! oh no you don't, a promise is a promise, Hey! what gives up there?

It's daunting sermon material, challenging. How to explain, or explain away, the silence of God. And not by ignoring this part and preaching on mansions, which cannot be disproved; or by avoiding John altogether and drawing attention away from the gospel by preaching on the martyrdom of poor Stephen. Or, God help us, on First Peter, someone will surely do that this morning. I'm not preaching this morning and this is not a sermon, but somebody's obliged to say something. So here goes.

This is Adult Sunday School, where we keep reminding ourselves that we are adults who are not offended by irreverent questions and cannot be shocked by unholy suggestions. Just so then! Remember that this event was not recorded, was not filmed, was not written on the spot like a court stenographer taking verbatim, nor even later by someone who was there. It was written sixty to maybe ninety? years after that last night when Jesus had supper with his friends. It was written by an unknown (yes, I know, my story is that it was Lazarus and I can prove it!!) evangelist who had an agenda: so convincingly to tell his story about Jesus God the Son, that his audience (hearers, readers) will see, perceive, realize, know, understand, have faith, will be persuaded, by the signs Jesus does and by Jesus's own testimony, that Jesus is the one promised by Moses, that Jesus is One with God. That Jesus, whose place is in heaven, must return to heaven, and will come and get each of us believers at our Time. 

Then there's our usual Sunday School question: Did Jesus really say this? And my shaky metaphor: what did Tom Sawyer say? Tom Sawyer said whatever Mark Twain writes that Tom Sawyer said. Just so, Jesus says whatever the evangelist says Jesus says. Including that each of our four canonized evangelists recalls Jesus saying different things and we are okay with that.

None of this explains why it's necessary to the gospel writer, that Jesus make such a startlingly unequivocal promise where the power of prayer in his name is absolute. And it is not satisfactory for us simply to concede and leave it, that it wasn't Jesus but the evangelist who said it, wrote it. That still begs the question of why the evangelist recorded Jesus saying it, when it's so counter to human experience with prayer.

Nor does it do to rationalize that Jesus meant only if we ask for things that accord with God's will, because that's not what it says. It says (scroll down and look at it) "anything". It says "whatever".

Even competent scholars whom I respect do not have satisfactory answers. So remember what I keep saying. (i) If I don't know, I admit it, I say so. (ii) in the Episcopal Church, we have learned to accept that we may end with more questions than answers. 

Maybe it's meant to apply only to Jesus' friends who were there that night? But if that's the case, what about the mansions?

Maybe what seems doubtful to us was entirely credible to those who were there that holy night, or to Gospel John's audience two or three generations later? 

Maybe the evangelist didn't remember and report it exactly as it actually happened?

Remember, this is Jesus' farewell discourse: maybe Jesus himself said it in haste that night, knowing and nervously dreading what lay ahead for himself? And after all, he does open by saying assuringly, "Let not your hearts be troubled" - - maybe he made this promise to reassure his friends in their fear?

Still and nevertheless, what about us? Maybe he loved us so much that in haste that night he carelessly promised more than he could deliver? IDK.

At any event, I'll go with Rabbi Harold Kushner, who said that if he must choose between, he prefers a God who is all loving to a God who is all powerful. Who, when my heart is breaking, longs to help me, even if the best he can do is weep with me.

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John 14:1-14

Jesus said, “Let not your hearts be troubled. Ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many mansions. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am, there ye may be also. And you know the way to the place where I am going.” Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” Jesus said to him, “I AM the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves. Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it.”

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Picture pinched online. It may be a Salvation Army reimaging of the Last Supper, I don't recall. TW+