Sermons from Mission Hills UCC San Diego, California Rev. Dr. David Bahr [email protected] May 14, 2023 “No Ordinary Love” John 14: 15-21 – Common English Bible “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 16 I will ask the Father, and he will send another Companion,[a] who will be with you forever. 17 This Companion is the Spirit of Truth, whom the world can’t receive because it neither sees him nor recognizes him. You know him, because he lives with you and will be with you. 18 “I won’t leave you as orphans. I will come to you. 19 Soon the world will no longer see me, but you will see me. Because I live, you will live too. 20 On that day you will know that I am in my Father, you are in me, and I am in you. 21 Whoever has my commandments and keeps them loves me. Whoever loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them.” Some people find it easy to say “I love you” and some people find it very hard. My mom was the latter. I knew she loved me but much more because of her actions than her words. I have no doubt. I felt loved, cared for. She prayed for me, she sacrificed for me, but the words didn’t come easily. They were more like the last few words as the car door shuts before driving away for another six months – almost like, I should say that. She wasn’t a big hugger either. My mom loved me – even though it wasn’t easy for her to say it. The question came up on Thursday, did Jesus ever say “I love you?” Not really. Love was a frequent topic, but like my mother, Jesus showed it more directly than he spoke it directly. He got close. In the next chapter, chapter 15, verse 9, he said: “As the Father loved me, I too have loved you. Remain in my love.” “I too have loved you” doesn’t quite qualify as “I love you,” but it’s consistent with John’s circular logic. In John, Jesus doesn’t tell the kinds of stories and parables we are more accustomed to in the other gospels. Instead, it’s such circular speech as, “Because God loves me, I love you too.” But, wait. What if God didn’t love him, would he also likewise not love his disciples? It sounds conditional. Except. Except that “God loves” or “God is love” is not a question. God is love – period. Unless, of course, you do not believe that God is literally love. And I would understand. We weren’t all raised with a theology of God’s love but rather an angry punishing God whose love was very much conditional on your behavior. Just like many of us were raised by parents whose love was very much conditional and could be revoked. As I implied earlier in my prayer, nothing about motherhood is simple, surely not as simple as saying, “I love you.” Love is not primarily an emotion that rises out of our chest, a tear from the eye, a feeling, an attachment. Love is an action. A series of actions that are consistent. A series of actions that are consistent because they are not about how you feel about it but because they are based on something else. For example, the commandments of Jesus, “If you love me.” On the one hand, that sounds very much like conditional love. I will only love you if you do what I say. But that’s not what Jesus has been saying. He has been talking a lot about a “way.” A way of life. And not just talking about it, but showing us a way of life that is based on loving one another. Whether or not we feel like loving. Something we can keep doing, day in and day out, because the commandments are the path. They are the way to love. We’ve all heard it before. Jesus said all the law and prophets are summed up into two commandments: To love God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. And to love your neighbor as yourself. Every neighbor as confounding and difficult as they may be. And to love ourselves, as doubtful as we may be that we are worthy of love. But again, it’s not the emotion of love – heart pounding, sweaty palms, face turning red. It’s not the words “I love you” or the lack of them that matter the most. It’s the consistent actions of love. But Jesus knows that’s not easy, so he promises to send another in his absence. In these chapters, Jesus has been preparing his disciples for his death, which, in fact, will happen the very next day. How will they keep following in his way when he isn’t there to show them? So, Jesus promises to send a “paraclete.” Paraclete is a Greek word that doesn’t have a precise translation into English. Various translations include comforter. Counselor. Encourager. Helper. The Common English Bible uses the word Companion. Literally though, a paraclete is “one who comes alongside you.” I agree with the scholars who translate the word as Advocate: one who pleads your case, who understands, takes your side, who intercedes for you, and who stands up for you.[1] It kind of reminds me of the work of Just in Time for Foster Youth. After a life of being shuffled from home to another with your belongings in garbage bags, or as Tasha spoke of last week, spending her childhood in one home with adults who kept trying to demoralize her and minimize her and even stole from her, Just in Time comes alongside and helps build a life with educational supports, mental health counseling, help to find a first home, and people to just love you unconditionally. I’ve rarely seen an organization quite as focused on its mission as closely to this biblical word paraclete. In fact, Jesus immediately follows these words with, “I will not leave you as orphans.” Like, I will not leave you alone as an 18-year-old who has “graduated” from the system to figure it out on your own. I will send you an advocate. Did my father love me? Yes, of course, though as a child I didn’t quite see it that way. After church most weeks, we had roast for dinner. Not the food my mother put in the oven as we drove off for Sunday School, but roast preacher. My dad would find something about which to comment, or rather criticize, except on those Sundays when the preacher and his wife were actually guests for dinner. Therefore, it wasn’t a surprise when I became the flavor of roast on Sundays, mostly having to do with my playing the piano or organ. Or on the way home from a school concert. I was certain to get a lecture on what I had done wrong and how I could have improved it. My mother was the paraclete. She would stand up for me. She would intercede as both advocate and comforter. I assume my father thought criticism was loving. Increasingly it became “Don’t get a big head.” I can’t tell you how many times I heard “don’t get a big head.” Which, not until adulthood, did I realize meant he couldn’t find something to criticize – not that I was perfect, but I was certainly getting better. Nearer the end of his life, however, he switched gears completely. I don’t know what happened, but he couldn’t stop telling me how proud he was. Often with tears. I would respond, I know, I know. But he was determined that no matter how often he must say it, I would know his last words for me were of his pride. We all have our own stories like this – painful and joyful. Jesus said, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” Love in practice is so often conditional. But let’s be clear: he didn’t say “If you keep my commandments, then I will love you.” Instead, he was describing a way of life. A path. Follow my teachings. But even better, follow my example, like this one: “There is no greater love than to lay one’s life down for a friend.” Jesus not only said it, he did it. As he told his disciples, the world doesn’t understand this, they don’t see this. In a world where every man is supposed to be out for himself, no matter how often he lies, cheats, or steals to get ahead – that’s no ordinary love. Jesus had compassion on the crowds, so he told the disciples, “You feed them.” In a world that sends people off with thoughts and prayers – that’s no ordinary love. When he saw a group of men ganging up on a woman, ready to stone her, enforcing laws on her they didn’t apply to themselves, Jesus stepped in and said, let the one without sin cast the first stone. In our world out for blood – that’s no ordinary love. Jesus had mercy upon those who begged for healing, Jesus affirmed them by saying your faith has made you well. In a world where people with no shoes are told to pull up your own bootstraps – that’s no ordinary love. Jesus told stories about leaving the 99 behind to go find the just the one. In a world where the odd-one-out is thrown out for being different, Jesus has no ordinary love. Did he say I love you? Which is more important: To say “I love you” or consistently do the Jesus kind of unconditional, transformational, healing, feeding, lay-down-your-life sacrificial love? If you love me. [1] David Lose, Working Preacher
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