For your audition, please prepare a 1-2 minute section of Scripture to present dramatically.  For anyone at a loss or unsure what to prepare, you may choose one of these segments:

JOHN:  [Sc. 1, introduction to Jesus and his followers]

The people walking in darkness have seen a great light, as the prophets foretold. For one has come to bring the fulfillment of all things.

This man. Jesus.

He was with God in the beginning. And he was God. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. We have seen it, and testify to it. We proclaim to you what we have heard with our ears, seen with our eyes, and what our hands have touched.

He came into the world, in flesh and blood, though the world was made through him.

This light shines in the darkness, but the darkness does not understand it.

 

JOHN  [Sc. 3, set up for the “Sermon on the Mount”]

Come to him, all you who are weary and burdened, and find rest. Take his yoke upon you and learn of him, for he is gentle and humble of heart; his yoke is easy and his burden light, and you will find refreshment for your souls. From the fullness of his grace we have received blessing upon blessing.

For the Law was given through Moses; grace and truth come through Jesus Christ.

 

News about Jesus- the teacher and healer- spread, and large crowds from Galilee, the Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea, and the region across the Jordan followed him.

When he saw the crowds, he went up on a hillside and began to teach.

 

JOHN  [Sc. 6, after the raising of Lazarus from the dead]

O Israel, put your hope in the Lord, for with the Lord is full redemption. He will swallow up death forever, and wipe away the tears from every face.  

Truly, Jesus said, the Son can do nothing by himself, but only what he sees the Father doing. Just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so the Son gives life, according to his good pleasure. And so, all who honor the Son honor the Father who sent him. Whoever does not receive the Son has rejected the Father.  

Whoever hears this word and believes in Him that breathed it has life beyond measure—he has crossed over from darkness into glorious light.

Many who had come that day to grieve left in gladness, and many who saw what Jesus did put their faith in him. But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what had happened.

 

JOHN  [Sc. 16, quoting the prophet Isaiah, setting up the Crucifixion of Jesus]

He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces, he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God – smitten by him and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.

We all, like sheep, have gone astray – each of us has turned to his own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth. He was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth.

 

JOHN  [Finale]

This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. This is love – not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son. How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! For the God who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” illuminated our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.