The message just before this one was for the good people at Atria Southpoint Walk in Durham, NC, but it was via Zoom. This message was the first one in person after COVID pandemic closures and everyone was just so happy to be together! The people at Atria, an independent living facility, had been through a particularly tough time with isolation and sorrow and disappointment. Coming out of that pain made this day all the more wonderful.
The three texts for the day are:
Holy Spirit, come to us through the distance. Bridge the gaps. Fill us with your love and connection. Amen.
Good morning! I bring you greetings from Pastor Amy and Pastor Ben, Pastor Betty and Pastor Tom, and from Pastor Rachel who has not been here before but will be leading worship next week.
Every single one of us was SO EXCITED when Eileen called and invited us back to worship. For a moment we thought we would be there in person so it was a little disappointing to learn that we can’t do that yet. But here we are, connected once again via Zoom. And all six of us are so, so happy to have this way of being with you.
And do you know why? It isn’t because we are being paid the big bucks to be here. This is a volunteer gig and we do it for only one reason. Our texts today are soaked in this reason. 14 times it occurs!
Anybody care to guess what word is in the text 14 times?
The word is LOVE.
We love you. We have missed you, and there is great rejoicing that we are able to be back and will soon (we hope) be able to be with you in person.
LOVE.
A preacher could spend a lifetime on that topic and never begin to scratch the surface because love, like God, is infinite. Love does not fail. And since God IS love – we know that God is infinite and will not fail. We like to say it this way:
God loves you.
God loves me.
Always, not matter what or where, no matter how we behave or misbehave.
God loves each of us and the way that God loves is Jesus-style.
Jesus, who came to earth to show us what it looks like to love each other. To show us how God created us to love and be loved.
In fact, in our Gospel today Jesus explicitly says… “Do you want to know how to love? Here’s how. Live like I lived!”
Jesus was telling his friends that he would LITERALLY love them to death. That his insistence on and capacity to love would ultimately lead to his death. And in the process Jesus was telling his friends (and us) that if we are going to be Jesus-followers then we will be called to love.
We don’t have to be perfect (which is good, because as you well know we are not perfect.)
We cannot save ourselves.
We can’t save anyone else.
The best – the literal, absolute best we can do – is to love each other.
Not because of who WE are but because of who GOD is. The God that is revealed to us in Jesus.
It’s in our second reading, too: Believing in Jesus is being a child of God.
We believe things all the time: it will be hot in July, it will get dark tonight. And for me, and maybe for you, that’s how we believe in God. It is such an assumed part of us that if someone asks “do you love God?” we say yes as quickly as we do if someone asks “will it get dark tonight?” And it will seem like just as silly of a question.
But sometimes it’s harder that that. Because, well, believing stuff puts demands on us. If I know it will be hot in July I have to act on that. Like I need to know that shipping chocolate in July is a dangerous thing. That putting crayons in the attic during July is a risk.
And as easy and natural as it can be to say we believe in God, are we always ready and willing to do what that belief demands of us?
If I say that I am following Jesus, and if I believe that Jesus is God, and that God is love, and that I am called to love… wow. It gets real – real fast!
Like when the crack addict shows up on the church step. Can I love them? God does.
Or when a self-proclaimed atheist says things that get under my skin… can I love them? God does.
Or when a homeless smelly person peers at me from the median at the traffic light… can I love them? God does.
Ok, yeah. But what about the woman who irritates me by breathing and when she walks into the room I want to run and hide? Do I have to love her? Well, yes, but only if I say I want to follow Jesus.
OR the man who for whatever reason can’t listen to anybody else but always has to have the loudest voice and last word, I have to love HIM TOO? Yep. If I say I am following Jesus.
Because God loves each of us: completely, utterly, unconditionally.
And sometimes I don’t like following in that path, y’know?
Loving is not for wimps.
But here is the completely mind-blowing part: There is nothing legalistic about loving. It is not actually a law. It is, in fact, kind of an anti-law.
We love, and when we get it wrong (because you know how it goes – OF COURSE we are going to get it wrong!) God loves each of us enough to fill the gaps that we leave in our wake. God does not punish us, God says... OH YOU DON'T HAVE ENOUGH LOVE? WELL HERE IS MORE! I HAVE PLENTY!
When we realize that God loves us, we are free to love as much as we can, knowing that Jesus came and took care of what we cannot do. Jesus fulfilled the law. Jesus took on the death that would be ours (if we could be perfect enough) and that death did not stick.
In the Resurrection we see that love – the loving way that Jesus lived – really is the way to complete life. And not just in eternity after we die!
Love is the way to a more complete life right now.
Loving the people we cannot stand on our own. In fact, even thinking “ah, I must love you” can change everything.
Loving the people who are least lovable: the confused and unclean, the judgey lady and the mansplaining man. We can love them. In fact, that is our primary duty in life.
To love each other.
And when we can’t do it on our own, THAT is when we turn to Jesus and know that we have the freedom to start over, to try again. Because in living the perfect life of love, dying a normal human death, but then not being held by death – that is the best and only proof I need that a life of love is the only way to go. When we turn to God to receive more from the infinite supply of love that is God.
So here we are, deep into the Easter season. We know this:
CHRIST IS RISEN!
We have the ultimate freedom because of it. Not freedom to do as we want, oh no. Our ultimate freedom allows us to do something even better:
Put away our fear and love each other through thick and thin.
Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment