Love one another…
A number of people were kind enough to ‘drop in’ yesterday morning, and expressed their interest about how the sermon turned out. Would it have the charm and creative dissonance of Annalise Brady’s little video? Of course, I can’t answer the latter. However, I can give an outline of ‘where it went’ and leave you to decide for yourselves…
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Just about every world faith, from Animism to Zoroastrianism, sets high store by loving one another. Christianity’s unique contribution is its injunction to love our enemies – those with neither ability nor inclination to love us back. However, in John 15 v.1 – 17, Christ urges his disciples to love each other. In other words, this is a command to which the church should pay particular heed. How can we do such a thing?
This is a love already demonstrated, by the Father to the son, and the son to the disciples.
Since these words are spoken before the crucifixion, they refer to the myriad ways he had already shown that love – from healing the leper to choosing the disciples. Instructing them to do the same is like asking a child to learn to form their letters by copying ours.
Sometimes, simply copying the work or following the example of a person who excels simply discourages us. We need further direction. Not only that, but when it comes to love most of us want something to do, rather than just something to say. This is a principle on which florists rely! Here, once again, Christ comes to our aid, by saying that obeying commands provides proof our love: “If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love” (John 15 v. 10). This is a love not only demonstrated but directed.
None of this can be fully appreciated, though, unless we recognize how highly this love may be priced. Fulfilling Christ’s command may mean everything up to and including our very lives. As an inveterate Ebay enthusiast, I know that I must have a maximum bid – the highest level to which I am prepared to go to secure that particular item.
Christ’s maximum bid is life itself, and between here and there may be many little deaths on the disciple’s road – death to self, to pride and to ambition.
When the Roman Empire was haemorrhaging good pagans to the upstart religion of Christianity, Julian the Apostate declared that the only way to win the people back was to love one another and care for each other as the Christians did. He saw it as the church’s U.S.P, and it scared him.
Is it seen that way today, I wonder?
