Embedded Files
Bible, New Testament
John
Chapter 1
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1 2 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
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He was in the beginning with God.
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3 All things came to be through him, and without him nothing came to be. What came to be
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through him was life, and this life was the light of the human race;
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4 the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
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5 A man named John was sent from God.
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He came for testimony, 6 to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him.
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He was not the light, but came to testify to the light.
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The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.
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He was in the world, and the world came to be through him, but the world did not know him.
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He came to what was his own, but his own people 7 did not accept him.
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But to those who did accept him he gave power to become children of God, to those who believe in his name,
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8 who were born not by natural generation nor by human choice nor by a man's decision but of God.
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And the Word became flesh 9 and made his dwelling among us, and we saw his glory, the glory as of the Father's only Son, full of grace and truth.
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10 John testified to him and cried out, saying, "This was he of whom I said, 'The one who is coming after me ranks ahead of me because he existed before me.'"
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From his fullness we have all received, grace in place of grace, 11
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because while the law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
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No one has ever seen God. The only Son, God, 12 who is at the Father's side, has revealed him.
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13 14 And this is the testimony of John. When the Jews from Jerusalem sent priests and Levites (to him) to ask him, "Who are you?"
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15 he admitted and did not deny it, but admitted, "I am not the Messiah."
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So they asked him, "What are you then? Are you Elijah?" 16 And he said, "I am not." "Are you the Prophet?" He answered, "No."
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So they said to him, "Who are you, so we can give an answer to those who sent us? What do you have to say for yourself?"
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He said: "I am 'the voice of one crying out in the desert, "Make straight the way of the Lord,"' 17 as Isaiah the prophet said."
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Some Pharisees 18 were also sent.
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They asked him, "Why then do you baptize if you are not the Messiah or Elijah or the Prophet?"
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John answered them, "I baptize with water; 19 but there is one among you whom you do not recognize,
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the one who is coming after me, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to untie."
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This happened in Bethany across the Jordan, 20 where John was baptizing.
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The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God, 21 who takes away the sin of the world.
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22 He is the one of whom I said, 'A man is coming after me who ranks ahead of me because he existed before me.'
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I did not know him, 23 but the reason why I came baptizing with water was that he might be made known to Israel."
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John testified further, saying, "I saw the Spirit come down like a dove 24 from the sky and remain upon him.
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I did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water told me, 'On whomever you see the Spirit come down and remain, he is the one who will baptize with the holy Spirit.'
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25 Now I have seen and testified that he is the Son of God."
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The next day John was there again with two of his disciples,
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and as he watched Jesus walk by, he said, "Behold, the Lamb of God." 26
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The two disciples 27 heard what he said and followed Jesus.
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Jesus turned and saw them following him and said to them, "What are you looking for?" They said to him, "Rabbi" (which translated means Teacher), "where are you staying?"
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He said to them,"Come, and you will see." So they went and saw where he was staying, and they stayed with him that day. It was about four in the afternoon. 28
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Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter, was one of the two who heard John and followed Jesus.
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He first found his own brother Simon and told him, "We have found the Messiah" 29 (which is translated Anointed).
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Then he brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, "You are Simon the son of John; 30 you will be called Cephas" (which is translated Peter).
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The next day he 31 decided to go to Galilee, and he found Philip. And Jesus said to him, "Follow me."
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Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the town of Andrew and Peter.
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Philip found Nathanael and told him, "We have found the one about whom Moses wrote in the law, and also the prophets, Jesus, son of Joseph, from Nazareth."
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But Nathanael said to him, "Can anything good come from Nazareth?" Philip said to him, "Come and see."
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Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said of him, "Here is a true Israelite. 32 There is no duplicity in him."
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33 Nathanael said to him, "How do you know me?" Jesus answered and said to him, "Before Philip called you, I saw you under the fig tree."
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Nathanael answered him, "Rabbi, you are the Son of God; 34 you are the King of Israel."
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Jesus answered and said to him, "Do you believe because I told you that I saw you under the fig tree? 35 You will see greater things than this."
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And he said to him, "Amen, amen, 36 I say to you, you will see the sky opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man."
Introduction
I was born and have lived most of my life in Ingria. With her wounds and scars she is embedded deeply and permanently in my heart and mind. The familiar scenery, the native Finnish-Ingrian dialect, and the kindness and unselfish friendship of those who use this language are a powerful medicine for the weary and depressed of Ingria.
The deep feelings and inner struggles of Korpelainen, the main character of my poems, are largely my own. While writing the poem I had to face re-peatedly the questions of how long the Finnish language would continue to be heard in our villages and how long hymns would be sung and sermons preached in Finnish in our churches. At that time there was but one church. As an Ingrian pastor in the 1980s I had buried many of my elderly countrymen; with them our Ingrian spiritual culture was disappearing. Most of these old timers had gone through the very experiences that Korpelainen had to endure.
My life as an Ingrian pastor was becoming increasingly that of an orphan. I was terrified as I watched the oasis of my own immediate family gradually growing smaller and smaller in the foreign Russian desert; the Red sand was slowly but surely drifting across our land and buring our oases one by one. The hot desert winds of the Soviet system continued to blow relentlessly and oasis after oasis was disappearing .
I wrote the poems in 1987. A few months later the wonderful work of God became evident, as one after another the churches, the most important of the oases, began to push their steeples through the sand as they reached toward the heavens. And all of us in Ingria had assumed that they were lost forever! When I saw my own church of Kupanitsa rising as the first of those that had been destroyed, I felt that my questions were being answered.
In the beginning I worked with the gray and graying congregation to raise the church out of the rubble. As a remnant of our people, we felt, as we labored to resurrect the church, Like Isaac, of whom the Bible says movingly, "Isaac reopened the wells that had been dug in the time of his father Abraham, which the Philistines had stopped up after Abraham died, and he gave them the same names his father had given them" (Gen. 26:18 NIV).
My poems begin with a lamentation over Ingria's present condition. The same theme is picked up later by the main character Korpelainen, who was born in one of the most beautiful villages of our land. The destruction of this village began in the period of collectivization; the war finally finished it off as the houses were burned and the people massacred. Korpelainen, who years earlier had escaped from the collectives, was dwelling in the depths of the forest when it happened and was spared. The destruction of the village and his family was a devastating and bitter blow. His pain vvas somewhat ameliorated by his discovering in the forest a fatherless family distantly related to him, which became his special responsibility.
Years have passed. The children have grown up and gone their own separate ways. The now gray-haired man is once again alone in the forest, his heart filled with bitterness and hatred toward the whole Soviet system, which he mistakenly identifies with Russianism as such. Faith in God and an inborn sense of mercy prove, however, stronger than blind and unbending hatred. Divine providence directs his affairs, so that before his death the gray-haired man is freed from his hatred of all things Russian and falls asleep a free man. He had found the freedom he had sought as a young man when he fled into the dark depths of the forest to escape the inevitable collectives.
My admiration for the famous speech of the Indian Chief Seattle prompted me to put it into the mouth of Korpelainen. In the speech the paths of the Ingrians and the Indians run together. In other ways, too, Seattle and Korpelainen have much in common. The lamentations over Ingria conclude with a poem about the bitter tears of our weeping land being collected into God's palms there to become a rich source of comfort and joy for our pitiful people.
Much has happened since 1987. The tears of the Ingrians have watered the new growth of the church "to the joy of the forsaken people and the glory of almighty God."
For the publication of my poems I am especially and etemally grateful to teacher Kaarina Poyhtari, who put them into their final form. My sincere thanks also to teacher Heikki Poyhtari, to senior pastor Leino Hassinen, and to teacher Pentti Kähkönen for their help in the publication of this volume.
Kupanitsa, Ingria
August 21,1992
Arvo Survo
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