WHAT TO DO, WHAT TO DO

John 3:14-21
And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15 that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.
16 For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.
17 Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. 18 Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. 19 And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. 20 For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. 21 But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God."

I wonder if - part of the problem of preaching on a text like this, is that we don’t know what the heck to do with it. . .
Yes, the text is to do it’s thing with us, THEN we do something with it.
But, texts this familiar are easy to keep at arms length. It is easy to skip the “text working on me” step altogether.
Another thing I wonder: Can ANYONE preach this text WITHOUT mentioning placards at ball games? (Not that there’s anything wrong with that!)
I find myself thinking of a rich line by DJ Hall, in The Cross in Our Context, page 55. Concluding the opening of his chapter “Engaging the World” - Hall says,

Faith, if is faith in the God revealed in “Jesus Christ and him crucified,” is a journey toward the world; if it said that such a definition confuses God with God’s creation, confuses theo-centrism with geocentrism, one must answer, as a Christian, that that confusion seems to have been introduced by God himself, who will be loved only as one who loves the world.”

If like me, this leaves you confused, I suspect the confusion is worth engaging, and we might consider the “geocentrism” which Hall finds in Christ crucified. Makes one wonder at the disconnect, that this Word from John - which points to God’s great love for the world - that this Word has been appropriated in such a frighteningly individualistic - shall we say? - solipsistic manner.
For God so loved. . .
I have to quote more from this chapter (a bit earlier)

That suffering will accompany discipleship, that one will have to become a participant in the suffering of the crucified one - this is inevitable, in one form or another. Why, asks the writer of the first epistle general of Peter, should any Christian be surprised at the “fiery ordeal” that accompanies the companioning of the crucified? (1 Peter 4:12) All the same suffering is not the object of disipleship, only its consequence. The object is greater and ever greater solidarity with the creation that God loves and, in Jesus Christ, seeks to redeem from within. pg 55

While I have no idea what to do with that - I suspect there is the possibility that it might help our text do its thing to me, and then. . . .