In
the first, particular points are emphasized by affirming, as we read today, “I
am.” “I am the bread of life, the light of the world, the good shepherd, the true vine.”
In
the book of Revelation particular points are emphasized with bizarre and more
importantly, memorable, images—for example: Christ is the light that lights the
city of God, and is a multi-horned, multi-eyed slain lamb that is also a lion,
and there is found by the water of life a tree with leaves that heal the
nations.
And
then there is the letters of John. It makes its points through repetition.
It makes its point through staccato snarled
sentences squished together and snagging up against the soul of the reader.
It repeats points again and again
with slightly different jabs and punches until it knocks out its audience.
If you haven’t heard me yet, I’ll say
it a fourth time, it wears you down with repetition going at you again and
again with a wrestler’s prowess, holding onto you heavily and hoping to grapple
and grab onto the listener’s whole person and pull you down to the mat.
Today,
if you prune, separate out, and poke at, the messy message found in the 4th
chapter of the 1st letter of John—you come up with this fairly straightforward
message:
Love one another.
Love one another, because it reveals God.
Love one another, because it connects us to God.
Love one another, because of Christ’s love.
Love one another, because God first loved us.
Prayer.
Love one another. Agape, in the Greek.
Agape one
another.
Love
one another in an active way—This
isn’t sentiment or internal stuff, it’s loving action—it’s the kind of love you
can do whether or not you like the other person.
Love
one another in a sacrificial way—love
like Christ loved us, all the way. Love while running on empty, love out of
your weakness, love so it overflows.
Love
one another in a way motivated by God—there
are other compasses that can point us to active sacrificial love, but the one
that motivates us Christians has both it’s essence and origins in the God
revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Love one another, because it reveals God.
When
we love in active, sacrificial, Godly ways, we often have aha! Moments. Moments when we glimpse God.
There
is a long tradition of Christian saints having aha! moments—moments of glimpsing God while loving in an Agape kind of way.
It
is said Francis of Assisi knelt down and kissed a leper, and he realized he had
in fact kissed Christ.
Similarly,
the mythical St. Christopher took a small child upon his back in order to ferry
him across a deep river—and half way through he recognized this child to be
Jesus, and his strength gave out and he was pressed down into the water and
rose up a Baptized man.
Or
think of Luther, who had an Aha! moment
that continues to shape how Lutherans talk about the connection between God and
societal roles…
While changing his son’s
diapers—Luther realized that act of service was just as holy—served God by
serving neighbor—just as holy as his entire time in the monastery.
Or
think about the hard but needed task of listening to sisters and brothers with whom
we disagree—in doing so we might see the face of God—after all, upon the cross
Christ seemed ungodly too—just as those holding opposite opinions to us so
often do.
Yes,
we glimpse God when we love one another.
Love one another, because it connects us to
God.
When
we love one another that aha! moment
can become something more—it is not a one-time event
—it’s like birth—it takes a while.
It’s motherly embrace—that doesn’t
just happen once
It’s becoming family.
It’s knowing from experience, knowing
it in your bones and in your soul.
It’s abiding—that is living,
dwelling, being in it. Moving into the presence of God.
Think
about it, practicing love and becoming connected to the One Who Loves.
Think
about anything you’ve practiced.
Not
every moment on the baseball field is home runs and Gatorade on your head—it’s
callouses, blisters, and sore muscles, time taken out of your day, and commitment…
and yet in doing that you become
something else,
you become part of something else
—and
it is glorious.
So
too, loving one another shapes us, sticks with us, becomes part of us, we
become part of it, we’re being reborn.
Yes,
we are changed and connected to God by loving one another.
Love one another, because of Christ’s love.
Christ’s
command to love one another, is told while he demonstrates that very thing. He
kneels and holds onto his disciples feet, washing the dirt and the dust from
those feet, as he says, “Love one another.”
Those
feet trampling along, following after him to worried parents, outcast women, blind
men, and faithful Centurions—serving with feet and hands—loving in a
sacrificial way, following his Father’s calling upon his life.
Loving
to the end—loving with arms outstretched upon the cross, outstretched for you
and for me.
Loving
too beyond the end—opening the tomb so that he might abide with us, bearing and
birthing us out into the world, meeting us in our acts of service—that we might
entertain him unaware that we do those things.
Yes,
Jesus loves us so deeply and we can show that love by loving one another.
Love one another, because God first loved
us.
It’s
reasonable to fear loving one another in an Agape
way.
There’s
a lot to lose, potentially—it’s risky.
The
tension between emotion and action might be too much
—the hard ongoing outpouring of love
drains you and does nothing to the recalcitrant heart of the beloved, they
never love back
—and you grow bitter.
The
sacrifices might be too much
—you give and give and never see the
results of your labor. You plant and another reaps.
Perhaps
even the actions become ends in and of themselves, the compass is lost, the
north star of God is obscured.
But
beloved, it’s worth the risk!
It’s
worth loosing too much love, because the
loving has already been done.
God
first loved us, and so we respond by loving our neighbor in need and loving our
sisters and brothers in Christ.
God
acted first, God loved first.
The
entirety of the Acts of the Apostles could be read as God acting first and the
Church catching up.
God acted first,
God welcomed first,
God loved first.
Pentecost fire showed God’s love for
Gentiles—then the early Christians had to spend time and treasure on them.
They
made the Gentiles table servers, but God acted first and made them powerful
preachers of the Gospel.
And
as we see today in Acts, God is already acting with this rich and powerful
Ethiopian Eunuch before Phillip can do a thing—Phillip has to catch up and
love.
And
that’s the story—God loved us when yet sinners and oppressed, sending his son.
God
loved us when we clung to an unjust society, by sending the prophets.
God
loved us when we blamed each other for our sufferings, by sending the wise ones
who wrote the book of Job and Ecclesiastes and short-circuited that attitude.
God
loved us when we were in slavery and crying out with deepest need, by bringing
us through the sea and on to freedom.
God
loved us before we even existed, calling forth over the deep, Spirit calling
all things, seen and unseen, into being, that they might be loved.
Yes,
God first loved us, let us love one another.
Love one another, because it reveals God and connects us to God.
Love one another, because God, in Christ Jesus, first loved us.
Love one another.
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