A lectionary reflection for the people of Thankful Memorial, Chattanooga
for worship from home, May 17, 2020, Year A, Easter 6

Acts 17:22-31
Psalm 66:7-18
1 Peter 3:13-22
John 14:15-21

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

One of my family’s silver linings to the covid pandemic is that my children are spending a lot of time together; they’re getting to know and love one another – with both the blessings and the hardships that entails – forming new and special bonds of relationship.  So Fred has been reading aloud to his siblings now and then, something that rarely happened before. 

The other day, Fred opened a book and (because, unlike grown-ups, children tend to take their time looking at every single page) he read aloud the author’s dedication to his son, Christian.  Fred paused, puzzled, and looked up at me.  “Christian?” he asked.  “Is that really someone’s name?” 

I told him yes, it was.  But, the truth is, it’s not just the author’s son.  All of us who are baptized into Christ are given that name, too.  “You are sealed by the Holy Spirit and marked as Christ’s own forever,” we say to the one who has come out of the baptismal waters.  In other words, each of us, at our baptisms, is given an additional name: “Christian.”

And with that new name comes a new family.  In the first letter of Peter, the author writes to Christians who are just beginning to figure out what it means to share this name, to be part of a new kin-group, the kin-dom of God.  The letter-writer is full of advice to this family of Christians, advice on how to behave and how to defend themselves, how to treat one another and how to understand their roles in the family.  Together, those early Christian communities did the work of building sibling-relationships with each other as surely as my own three kids are doing now! 

And we Christians today must continue to do that kin-dom work of relationship-building with one another in this family of Christ. 

But, at times, there are some significant challenges to being part of this kin-dom.  Like in all families, in this Christian family, just because you’re related to someone doesn’t mean you agree with them all the time – far from it!  Just because you’re related to someone doesn’t mean you never fight with them, or confront them, or hurt them, or get hurt by them, or take them for granted, or lose your patience with them, or hold them to high standards, or fail to meet theirs. 

But, when you are a part of a good family, in spite of it all you love the other members of it.  And they love you.  This is what defines the family of God.

“I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.” (John 13:34)  So says Jesus just a few verses before the portion of John’s gospel we read for today, where he goes on: “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” And again: “They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me; and those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them.”  

Jesus’ words may sound uncomfortably transactional; indeed, some might interpret them, wrongly, as though God’s love is the reward we get for obeying Christ’s commandments.  But that’s not what Jesus is saying at all.  Rather, Jesus emphasizes what it means to be his brothers and sisters, part of his family: in the end, it is all about love.  For that is the commandment that Jesus has just given his disciples, that we love each other just as we are loved. 

But as one New Testament scholar puts it: “this new command is simple enough for a toddler to memorize and appreciate, and yet it is profound enough that the most mature believers are repeatedly embarrassed at how poorly they comprehend it and put it into practice.”[i]

That’s because love is not always an emotion.  Sometimes, it’s a fulfillment of duty.  Sometimes, it’s a commitment to another despite our feelings for them.  Sometimes, it’s seeking to do what is good and right for them even when they don’t want that.  Sometimes – often, even – it’s seeking to do what is good and right for another even when that means putting our own needs and desires aside. 

And Jesus commands us to love each other, to love all those in God’s kin-dom, with this kind of love.  And that is hard.

And it’s about to get harder.  Because I don’t think Jesus’ commandment to love others is meant to limit us to loving only those who are also named “Christian.”  After all, as 1 Peter points out, baptism is our “appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.”  Baptism is the Church’s sign of the love that God has for each of us and for all humanity.  But what baptism marks for us as individuals is our commitment to love, to participate in God’s love for creation, to follow Jesus’ commandment to love others, to love all others, in the whole wide kin-dom of God.

Which brings us to Paul’s words in the Acts of the Apostles.  Speaking to Greeks in Athens who know little about Jesus’ Way, Paul tells his audience about God the Creator and the Son, who was raised from the dead.  And, he points to the traces of the one God already embedded in their culture – the altar to “an unknown god” and the Greek poets who have groped for and grasped at knowledge of their Creator.  Paul quotes from these poets, recognizing that all humans are bound together as siblings, “offspring” of the same Mother God “in [whom] we live and move and have our being.”

Paul’s words in the Acts of the Apostles reveal the true Christian interpretation of Jesus’ commandment to love one another.  We are not to limit our love to certain folks, to the ones who share our same background and culture, our political leanings and our patriotism, our race or even our religion.  Rather, we are to understand all human beings as God’s beloved children, our sisters and brothers in God’s kin-dom.  And we are to love them as such, with the challenging love that demands we put our desires behind the needs of others, that we examine our own biases and work to overcome them, that we seek for justice for those who are victimized and protection for the weakest and most vulnerable among all of God’s creation. 

In other words, Jesus’ commandment that we love one another requires us to do the same work intentionally with all people that my own children are doing right now unconsciously – to build bonds of relationship with others, to acknowledge all people as God’s beloved children, and, as best we can, with the help of God’s Spirit that abides within us, to know and love others as members of our family, for that is what exactly what they are.  Amen.

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[i] D.A. Carson as quoted by Debie Thomas in “Love and Obedience.”  https://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/2640-love-and-obedience