6 Easter cycle b May 10, 2015
Acts 10:44-48
Ps.98
1 John 4:7-21 John 15:9-17
Sometimes it seems easier to read the Bible as a direct oracle of God rather than words which arose with a history as they were written down by people who had reason to the apply the words within a community of people.
In biblical scholarship we try to see what conditions existed when the words were written down and understand the practical ways in which the words functioned within their original community. And then we look for corresponding functions within our own time and community and so prove the eternally returning principles found in the Bible.
The reading which we have from the Acts of the Apostles bears witness to the effort of the community of Jesus to practice a new expression of love.
The words about Jesus delivered from the exuberant charisma of the Holy Spirit had the ability to evoke ecstasy within the listeners. And many of those listeners were not Jewish; they were Gentiles and members of the community of the uncircumcised. One can find in the writing in the Acts of the Apostles the evidence of a change which was occurring in the Jesus Movement. Jews and Gentiles who had formerly been enemies and practiced segregation in their religious gatherings were now being united and brought together. Peter, Paul and other Jewish leaders in the Jesus Movement were involved in a spiritualizing of the ritual practices and theology of Judaism. Circumcision was an external mark of one's Jewish faith for the men of the Jewish community; in contrast, the Holy Spirit upon the lives of Gentiles as they partook of the ecstasy of new religious experience was the authenticating mark of being a member of the faith community of Jesus Christ. Proselytes to the Jewish faith in former times had to be both circumcised, if male and baptized, but now on declaration from Peter and Paul, the presence of the ecstasy of the Holy Spirit in one's life was the sign that one could be initiated into the community of Jesus Christ through the water rite of baptism.
This great experiment in the practice of love between Jews and Gentile was a practice of love which went too far for many Jews in compromising the ritual customs of Judaism when they were no longer mandatory for Gentile followers of Jesus. When love fails between communities, community divorce happens. Community divorce took place between Judaism and the Christian movements and this divorce is evidenced throughout the New Testament writings.
Love is very difficult within a community. But love is strong enough to allow the separation in the mission that Judaism has continued to have in our world and in the mission which Christianity has had in making the faith of Jesus more accessible to more people around the world. The genius of Christianity is found in the great attempt at making love the dominant virtue of human community and we have had some great successes and some horrendous failures.
In the communities where the Gospel and Epistles of John derived, one can find this theme of love reiterated over and over again. One cannot say one loves God if one does not love one's brother or sister. So one cannot separate religious devotion to God from the selfless service to one's fellow human beings. Love is so great because it is also very difficult, at least the kind of love that Jesus refers to.
The words of Jesus sound like the words of a devoted mother to her family, on this Mother's Day. What does Mom want? She wants all of their children to get along with each other. And if her children are going to be petty and dissentious she is going say, "I command you to love each other. Not loving is not an option in this family." Jesus, also is known as one who commanded his disciple to love one another.
And because we are so inundated by the other forms of popular love, we find this command to love to be kind of tedious and not very romantic. Jesus did not say, "I command you to like each other." Jesus did not say, "I order you to be BFF's, best friends forever." Jesus did not say, "I order you to be erotically attracted to each other forever." This commandment to love is not the "luv" of a Country and Western song.
We should rejoice in this command to love one another because it is this kind of love which establishes the integrity of each human person to have the right to be fully regarded in human community. The hard nature of love of Jesus which is commanded is best expressed in what we call justice. Justice is the practice of "agape" love, divine love and justice is a very difficult but mandatory love for the excellence of human community.
Why is the love commanded by Jesus so difficult? It is difficult because it requires the laying down of one's lives. The life that we are called to lay down is not our physical life; it is "pseuche" life or soul life or the life of our ego. Love requires us checking of our egos in manifold ways so that we make room for the well being of the lives of other with whom we share the community and the world.
Jesus commanded this kind of sacrificial love because he knew it was required for the life of the community. But the reward of this kind of sacrificial love is the fellowship of friendship. If one does not know how to lay down one's ego, then one cannot know the delight of friendship love. One cannot know the fellowship of the sense of completion within a community.
Today let us remember that both Moms and Jesus have commanded love because they knew and know how good and excellent it was for us and for the achievement of friendship and fellowship within a community.
The Gospel for us today is that we can know that we belong as friends within a fellowship of people because we have learned the excellence of laying down our ego lives for the practice of justice in our community. Love as Justice is the most beautiful form of love of all and let us be grateful for this most necessary command to love another. Amen.
In biblical scholarship we try to see what conditions existed when the words were written down and understand the practical ways in which the words functioned within their original community. And then we look for corresponding functions within our own time and community and so prove the eternally returning principles found in the Bible.
The reading which we have from the Acts of the Apostles bears witness to the effort of the community of Jesus to practice a new expression of love.
The words about Jesus delivered from the exuberant charisma of the Holy Spirit had the ability to evoke ecstasy within the listeners. And many of those listeners were not Jewish; they were Gentiles and members of the community of the uncircumcised. One can find in the writing in the Acts of the Apostles the evidence of a change which was occurring in the Jesus Movement. Jews and Gentiles who had formerly been enemies and practiced segregation in their religious gatherings were now being united and brought together. Peter, Paul and other Jewish leaders in the Jesus Movement were involved in a spiritualizing of the ritual practices and theology of Judaism. Circumcision was an external mark of one's Jewish faith for the men of the Jewish community; in contrast, the Holy Spirit upon the lives of Gentiles as they partook of the ecstasy of new religious experience was the authenticating mark of being a member of the faith community of Jesus Christ. Proselytes to the Jewish faith in former times had to be both circumcised, if male and baptized, but now on declaration from Peter and Paul, the presence of the ecstasy of the Holy Spirit in one's life was the sign that one could be initiated into the community of Jesus Christ through the water rite of baptism.
This great experiment in the practice of love between Jews and Gentile was a practice of love which went too far for many Jews in compromising the ritual customs of Judaism when they were no longer mandatory for Gentile followers of Jesus. When love fails between communities, community divorce happens. Community divorce took place between Judaism and the Christian movements and this divorce is evidenced throughout the New Testament writings.
Love is very difficult within a community. But love is strong enough to allow the separation in the mission that Judaism has continued to have in our world and in the mission which Christianity has had in making the faith of Jesus more accessible to more people around the world. The genius of Christianity is found in the great attempt at making love the dominant virtue of human community and we have had some great successes and some horrendous failures.
In the communities where the Gospel and Epistles of John derived, one can find this theme of love reiterated over and over again. One cannot say one loves God if one does not love one's brother or sister. So one cannot separate religious devotion to God from the selfless service to one's fellow human beings. Love is so great because it is also very difficult, at least the kind of love that Jesus refers to.
The words of Jesus sound like the words of a devoted mother to her family, on this Mother's Day. What does Mom want? She wants all of their children to get along with each other. And if her children are going to be petty and dissentious she is going say, "I command you to love each other. Not loving is not an option in this family." Jesus, also is known as one who commanded his disciple to love one another.
And because we are so inundated by the other forms of popular love, we find this command to love to be kind of tedious and not very romantic. Jesus did not say, "I command you to like each other." Jesus did not say, "I order you to be BFF's, best friends forever." Jesus did not say, "I order you to be erotically attracted to each other forever." This commandment to love is not the "luv" of a Country and Western song.
We should rejoice in this command to love one another because it is this kind of love which establishes the integrity of each human person to have the right to be fully regarded in human community. The hard nature of love of Jesus which is commanded is best expressed in what we call justice. Justice is the practice of "agape" love, divine love and justice is a very difficult but mandatory love for the excellence of human community.
Why is the love commanded by Jesus so difficult? It is difficult because it requires the laying down of one's lives. The life that we are called to lay down is not our physical life; it is "pseuche" life or soul life or the life of our ego. Love requires us checking of our egos in manifold ways so that we make room for the well being of the lives of other with whom we share the community and the world.
Jesus commanded this kind of sacrificial love because he knew it was required for the life of the community. But the reward of this kind of sacrificial love is the fellowship of friendship. If one does not know how to lay down one's ego, then one cannot know the delight of friendship love. One cannot know the fellowship of the sense of completion within a community.
Today let us remember that both Moms and Jesus have commanded love because they knew and know how good and excellent it was for us and for the achievement of friendship and fellowship within a community.
The Gospel for us today is that we can know that we belong as friends within a fellowship of people because we have learned the excellence of laying down our ego lives for the practice of justice in our community. Love as Justice is the most beautiful form of love of all and let us be grateful for this most necessary command to love another. Amen.
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