Love Speaks

 

Text: John 17:20-26

Focus: The power of love

Function: to help people see how love points to God.

²⁰“I ask not only on behalf of these but also on behalf of those who believe in me through their word, ²¹that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. ²²The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one, ²³I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. ²⁴Father, I desire that those also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory, which you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.

²⁵“Righteous Father, the world does not know you, but I know you, and these know that you have sent me. ²⁶I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them and I in them.”

Good morning to the people who are the beloved of God!

The passage of scripture this morning is taken from what theologians call the High Priestly prayer of Jesus. It is the first of two prayers that Jesus makes on Maundy Thursday evening. This prayer is for the disciples right before he is arrested, crucified and risen.

He prays this prayer not only for the 11 who are still with him in the upper room that night, but as it says in verse 1, also us who trust in Christ because of what they say. He is praying for us.

His second prayer is in the garden where he focuses on himself to have the strength to face the torture he is about to experience.

Skeptics would ask the question: why would Jesus pray if he was divine?

And I answer with the proposition that he was both God and man. The Spirit of God possessed him in a mighty way and as he says in this prayer, has made him one with the God to the point where he dwells in constant fellowship with God, whom he calls Father.

Both of these prayers come from the human side of Jesus.

And he has a focus in this prayer that we are looking at today. And that focus is on Christian unity.

His prayer is that we too, be caught up in the power of God’s love permeating us through the infilling of the Holy Spirit.

When we go against the spirit of this world that endorses self centered living and allow the leading of God’s Spirit to help us love others without judgment, we too, are letting the Christ Spirit radiate God’s love to the world around us.

God shows their love to the world through us.

The main point of last weeks message was that we reveal whom God is to the world through the way that we show love. This prayer gives us the power to do just that.

We are the body of Christ, the manifestation of Christ’s love to the world entire.

There is a biblical connection to love and God. Look at 1 John 4:16b: God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them.

I love the way that John the disciple who heard these words from Jesus, and is reminded of them by the Holy Spirit, explains it in this letter that makes it into the canon of Holy Scripture.

The second time, when he is teaching on love in his letter to all the Churches, he explains that oneness with God is abiding in God’s love since God is love.

So, when I read from Jesus’ prayer for us recorded in today’s text and I begin to wonder at the mystery and symbolism of what it means to be “One with God” I get the answer here from John’s explanation of it in his letter to us.

To be one with God is to abide in God’s love.

I am reminded that at the core of my teaching and preaching is this simple but clear and concise description of God: God is love.

When we love we are walking in God and when we don’t love we do not walk with God.

But I don’t want to focus on our failures. Instead, I want to focus on the enduring love of God for us.

With my son having open heart surgery, I had a stressful week, but we really sensed your love and prayers covering us and our son this entire week.

Instead of fear, we rested in the peace of Christ. To me, that is a miracle since so much was at risk.

I mention this because I am reminded that God is the power inside of us to do the love we are called to do as we are being led by the Spirit.

I am reminded of that every time I give a dollar to the homeless on the street corner. When I look into their eyes, I see love there and I let them see my love for them. It always seems to be a spiritual transaction, at least it is for me.

If we want to love and to be known as the disciples of Christ by the love we have for others, then that is enough, our willingness is compounded by God’s power inside of us. This urge to care for others, to love others, comes to us from God. It is the Spirit of God and it is different than the spirit of worldly notions.

I could get dismayed when I see the current culture of the world celebrate greed instead of the community generated by the idea of E Pluribus Unim: out of many, one. I could get dismayed when I see a culture that calls insulting others a moral good. If I live by those values, I am not representing Christ’s love.

However, the promise is the power the Spirit inside of us that wants to resist these worldly notions that keep people from loving others.

Jesus, and Paul later on, both said that loving others fulfills entire commands of the bible.

God is love and we are walking in God when we walk in love.

I used to wear that band on my wrist with WWJD? And the idea is to respond to every situation by asking oneself the question first, what would Jesus do?

Of course, Jesus might perform a miracle which we generally cannot do, so one of my Seminary profs changed it to “What Would Jesus Have ME Do?”

But since God is love according to scripture, I would ask the question this way: What Would Love Have ME Do?”

Jesus said love means we treat others as well as we want to people to treat us.

What I would need in that situation is what they need at that moment.

We all need security and safety. We all need to be loved. We all need a supportive community because we cannot make it on our own. We all need to thrive.

And Jesus came to give us that thriving life.

My experience is that this walking in love is rewarding because we are walking in partnership with God.