Love one another... Seriously, love one another....

A mother was preparing pancakes for her two sons one day. The boys began to argue over who would get the first pancake. Their mother saw the opportunity for a moral lesson. "If Jesus were sitting here," she said, "he would say, 'Let my brother have the first pancake. I can wait.'" The older brother turned to his younger brother and said, "OK, you be Jesus!"

John’s gospel from which we heard this morning (15:9-17) is a powerful evangelistic gospel. Throughout, the writer encourages its readers to go out and witness to God – John backs up his writing by describing the public miracles that Jesus did – it is John also who gives us the famous ‘I am’ sayings of Jesus – I am the bread of life; the light of the world; the door; the good shepherd; the resurrection and the life; the way, the truth and the life and the vine.

The miracles and these sayings of Jesus point us to the fact that we are to be confident in God – we can trust that Jesus came into the world to change our lives forever, and we can be confident in sharing that message with others.

The section of the gospel we heard this morning is part of a farewell message from Jesus to his disciples – John’s gospel spends a long time going through the last days and hours of Jesus’ life, and he does so because what he is sharing with the disciples then, he is sharing as a valuable lesson and inspiration for us today…

And so, Mary has anointed Jesus’ feet, he has spoken about his impending death, he has washed the disciples feet, predicted his betrayal by Judas and Peter’s denial of him and he has promised the gift of the Holy Spirit. Still to come there is the lessons about the work and power of the Holy Spirit, the assurance that sorrow will turn to joy, and that the disciples, remaining faithful, may go through pain, but will always know peace…

But this section we have heard is incredibly important – it comes immediately after Jesus has talked about being the vine and his Father being the vinegrower – of the need to continually keep trusting in and following God for our nourishment…

And then Jesus moves from the almost poetic language of the vine and vinegrower to a very practical speech – ‘as the Father has loved me, so I have loved you’. This is powerful unbreakable love, this is love that would go to the cross for any one of us… And because he loves us so much he wants us to enjoy a full life – he wants ‘our joy to be complete’…

He talks of there being no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends – and we are his friends. We are not servants or slaves, we are friends – we have been called, we are chosen… It is incredible – the strength of God’s love should make us feel good ! His love is unchanging, unbreakable…

But this section isn’t all about God’s love for us – it’s not all about us receiving from him as I’ve missed out a couple of bits -  and they revolve around the command to ‘love one another’.

A usually irate parishioner is said to have tackled the Vicar after church one Sunday morning. "I'm so glad you preached an interesting historical sermon with lots of facts today," she said… The Vicar, shocked by this unusual praise beamed thanks. The parishioner continued, "Yes, because I am sick and tired of hearing about love all the time."

There is no getting away from the fact that the central part of the gospel is about love – everything that we have and are revolves around love – the love of God, love in our relationships with others, love for ourselves…

Called by God, we are called to be like Jesus – loving as he loves… all the historical interest that we may find in the gospels, all the poetic language which some may enjoy, all the inspirational stories, actually mean nothing unless we know God’s love and we share God’s love indiscriminately as he shares it… 

That is the relationship changer – a great book may encourage us to do something differently, an interesting historical fact may enthuse us to find out more, but what none of these things will do is change our lives so completely that every part of our lives will be different… that is the relationship God is calling us to enjoy.

Sometimes we can look at church and be confused or even frustrated by the problems of buildings or money; sometimes we can look at congregations, even in worship, or whilst listening to wonderful sermons, and they can look sleepy or not overly interested – and maybe it’s because we’ve failed to remember that we are chosen by God – we are his friends – we are leading an exciting purposeful life, a life committed to sharing a wonderful gospel that, just as Jesus loves us, he loves others too !

The Christian journey may have frustrations, it may have obstacles, it won’t always be easy, but it is exciting because we are doing God’s work… we are his Ambassadors… we are his people…

And we must reflect that, and perhaps the most important thing we can do other than trust God is to love – not just those we love already, not just those who we quite like, but those we don’t like at all as well… It’s a powerful and difficult command of Jesus, but its non-negotiable !

And we love as we seek to build up the family of the Church – here and everywhere… We love as we greet people with a smile, as we offer prayers for those who are troubled in any way, as we share the peace of God, as we offer our praises to God, as we remember in communion his love for us… That is why the family of the church is so important – people must feel welcome, people must feel part of a family, people must enjoy being part of church…

And as we go out from the church buildings, we continue to show love in all the ways I’ve mentioned and others – recently I heard someone say that ‘we need to really love people, not just love people for what we can get from them’. I don’t think it’s really true in most cases, but the church has a bad reputation at times for wanting people to be part of church for what we can get from them…. There is absolutely nothing that we can ever get from a person that is more important than having the opportunity to share the love of God with them…

Jesus’ love was and is powerful – it is love that burdens him with a care for people everywhere. It is love like that that we are called to replicate ....

It’s a good thing to do, because it’s what Jesus told us to do –  we show love in all kinds of ways. It may be in supporting a charity but sometimes giving money is easy and because of that it’s only one way of showing love – love sometimes hurts, and, like Jesus, we are challenged to be burdened with concerns for those around us – those we know and those we don’t, those we like and those we don’t…

Philip Yancey tells a story in his book ‘What’s so amazing about grace’ – he writes,  “Not long ago I received in the mail a postcard from a friend that had on it only six words, "I am the one Jesus loves." I smiled when I saw the sender, for my strange friend excels at these pious slogans. When I called him, though, he told me the slogan came from the author and speaker Brennan Manning. At a seminar, Manning referred to Jesus' closest friend on earth, the disciple named John, identified in the Gospels as "the one Jesus loved." Manning said, "If John were to be asked, 'What is your primary identity in life?' he would not reply, 'I am a disciple, an apostle, an evangelist, an author of one of the four Gospels,' but rather, 'I am the one Jesus loves.'"

Yancey continues, “I believe that if nothing else, every parishioner in our congregations should leave every worship service knowing : "I am someone Jesus loves.””

I heard a joke yesterday about a man walking with his girlfriend. As they passed a restaurant she said the smell from the restaurant was amazing, and so he decided to treat her – by walking past it again... 

When we talk about love, when we hear of Jesus’ command to love one another, it’s easy to stand on the outside – but it’s a challenge to us all – to love one another, to immerse ourselves in the love of God and love for all his people...

May each one of us be confident in the fact we are loved and respond to that love by offering in our thoughts, words and actions a transforming, challenging and powerful love for all people…  AMEN