Sunday January 18th, 2026 Worship

As I was looking at our fridge this week, I was taking a moment to reflect on all the love that is evident in our lives by the Christmas cards, birthday drawings, and travel magnets that cover the entire front of our fridge. One of the things that is still there, too, is a copy of the invitation that we sent out for our wedding. From visiting the homes of our friends and family, I know we aren’t the only ones who get so much joy from seeing the faces of the people we care about in such a central place in our home. This led me to spend time thinking about the act of being invited, as we hear Jesus say to John’s two disciples, “Come and see” (John 1: 39a).
With everything else that we hear in all of our Scripture readings today, it can become easy to miss these three little words. After all, the point of John’s story today is so focused on proclaiming Jesus’ identity as the Lamb of God (John 1: 29-35). Yet, those three small words, “come and see,” is the mentality at the very heart of Jesus’ entire approach to ministry. He is always extending an invitation to come and see what God is up to and how people can be transformed by what God is doing and where God is calling them in their own lives. Jesus’ ministry is an invitation into relationship with our Triune God; our God who is still present even in times of conflict and discord (1 Corinthians 1: 1-9), who hears the cries of creation (Psalm 40: 1-11), and who offers us strength to step into our future even when it feels daunting (Isaiah 49: 1-7).
Despite all the claims that we walk by faith and not by sight, we cannot ignore the reality of all the ways that we experience our faith active and alive in the world. It is not something that is stagnant on the pages of the Bible, but it is a Living Word that is still at work transforming us today too. It is invitational; “Come and see.” Come and experience for yourself. Our faith is active, experiential, and relational. It is a faith grounded in sharing stories and inviting others along to see how their stories intermingle with our story and God’s larger story. It has been this way since the beginning when it was an oral tradition. It connects us in a larger network of creation, when we are not just the ones offering hospitality, but when we are the ones who are willing to accept the invitation into life together too. We are able to recognize that we have a lot to learn from one another along the way.
I think about all the invitations that we have received in our lives. I don’t just mean physical invitations to gatherings, but also the ways that we have been invited into a new way of being. Maybe that was an invitation of a career change through a job offer or a move across the country. Maybe it was an invitation into companionship with someone when we were least expecting it. I know that I have a tendency of saying no to a lot of invitations, not because I don’t want to spend time with people, but because it is hard to have energy required to do 5 different activities each week after working all day and tending to all the other errands and chores that being an adult requires.
Yet, I am also inspired by the response in the Psalm today, “And so I said, ‘Here I am; I come’” (Psalm 40: 7a). How are we transformed when this becomes our response, instead of the list of all the reasons why we can’t or don’t want to do something challenging that God is calling us too? This isn’t to say that we always have to say yes to every opportunity, that we no longer need to rest, and that there isn’t space for discernment regarding what is our work to step into and what might be someone else’s. But, instead of viewing these invitations as just another thing to do, another box to check on our endless list of things that also require our attention, what happens to us if take a moment to ask how God is transforming us and the world through the work that we are being called to. If we embrace the invitation of “come and see,” instead of hoping for a Cliff Notes version of the Gospel that manages to fully align with what we already choose to believe and requires nothing of us in return.
Because we are transformed by what God is doing in the world! We are transformed by the relationships that exist in our lives, in the aid we lend to one another, in the beauty of the natural world that surrounds us. We may not be as aware of how these things are shaping us, but they are. If our relationships didn’t matter, we wouldn’t have Christmas cards hanging on our fridge for months after the holiday! We wouldn’t experience the feeling of fullness that comes from sharing a meal with loved ones as we laugh and share stories; something that fills us even more than just the food itself. An example that is also central to our Sunday worship gathering when we celebrate Holy Communion. If the work that God was doing didn’t transform the world, we wouldn’t still be repeating these Gospel stories 2000 years later!
Part of what makes it so important that we have these Gospel stories is that it helps us recognize that part of this witnessing is a sending. After we have come and seen, we are sent to tell of what we have experienced in order to invite others to experience this life-giving power of God’s love too. We are all going to have different experiences with our relationship to God, which is why it matters that it isn’t just one person telling us all about the experience and how we should just trust their account. We are invited to bring our whole selves into this relationship with God, and as we share about our experiences, we get a glimpse at the diverse ways in which God relates to humanity. We share about our experiences, not to get someone to proclaim our righteousness, but to expand the way we experience God working in and through each of us in our own unique ways. This, in itself, helps to transform our understanding of who God is and who we are in relationship to God. This is what we are saying yes to when we say, “Here I am; I come,” even when the invitation feels scary and there are too many unknowns. Ultimately, our response to the invitation is going to require trust.
I know that saying yes to the invitation can be daunting. We may have doubts about who we are that God would want to be in relationship to us. We may feel overwhelmed by everything we feel we need to take on as a result of saying yes. We may want more control over what is going to happen than we are realistically going to get. My job isn’t to force any of you to say yes to these invitations, but to highlight the fact that they are there. I also know that in the reality of our world, saying yes may feel even more difficult, and we may have even more questions or anger with God. Luckily for us, God doesn’t require us to set that aside in order to begin our journey.
At the heart of Jesus’ ministry, we see a relational God who exists in and draws together community for the sake of all people. When we look at the world today, it may feel impossible to discern a next step forward. It all feels like too much; it is too heavy and is overloading our systems. Within that, may we look to the past, to Jesus’ invitation into community and the way people have rallied together throughout history as a representation of how the love God has for the world has been shared amongst community. Because this invitation that Jesus extends isn’t just personal, but it is communal, and it is relational. The challenges of our world are not wholly unique to us, and there are so many people in the past and present that have much they can teach us. So, may we risk the courage to see how we will be transformed if we accept the invitation to “come and see,” to experience together what the love of God can do, even in the midst of our broken and hurting world.