Sermon
Yesterday at our second Mission Study workshop our discussion was about the demographics of our neighborhood and the community we serve. Along the way we looked at our definitions of neighborhood and community. We talked at length about how any kind of community begins with a relationship. Defining any given community can be done by asking ourselves, “With whom do we have relationships?” Think about that for a minute for your own communities. Who do you have relationships with? Your family members. Members of your book club. Members of your band, your orchestra. People who live on the same street. People in your church. People you work with. These places are our communities.
Then we looked beyond who we have relationships with now and asked “Who do we want to have relationships with?” and “Who do we feel called to build relationships with?” One thing we didn't ask was “Who am I in a relationship with that I shouldn't be in a relationship with?” As we navigate our way through life and grow and evolve and learn we find ourselves assessing relationships that hurt us or tear us down. Untangling ourselves from those relationships is messy, layered with life stories and commitments. I'm thinking mostly of relationships that are dangerous – women trapped by abusive partners; children caught in violent households; unhoused people with limited choices having to interact with whatever and whomever is around them; employees with a manipulative or abusive senior employee boss or supervisor.
We all have layers of relationships. The text we read this morning sets the scene of Jesus with those he had the closest relationships with. His disciples. The gospel of John tells us, just before the reading for today, that as it grew closer to the time of his betrayal and death, he began to say farewell to these disciples. He knew that they would not understand. He knew that Judas would betray him that night. He knew that Peter would betray him in the next few days. Instead of choosing to break any of the relationships with these men, he reacted differently and unexpectedly. He didn't scold them, he didn't send them away, he didn't give them a speech about loyalty and honor and obligation. He didn't shame them or punish anyone. The first thing he did was wash their feet.
Jesus' first lesson was to respond by example. Jesus was a living example of the first shall be last and the last shall be first; an example of upturning notions of master and servant; He washed their feet before the meal. And then during the meal he told them that he knew that one of them would betray him. Reclining with Jesus, Peter leans over and says, “Who is it?” Jesus replies, “It is the one to whom I give this piece of bread when I have dipped it in the dish.” And then, after serving Judas, Judas leaves the room.
They say that if you want to make your point clearly you should speak as simply as possible. The text today includes Jesus' instructions to love one another. Of all of the ways that Jesus has made his point in the past, using parables, describing a scene and then explaining it, all of his teachings, or using metaphors, none has ever been this simple. There is nothing ambiguous about Jesus' instructions.
Little children, he calls them. There's a gentleness implied. Like a parent who knows their child is about to suffer a blow that the parent can't control.
I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Is this new? The simplicity is new. Certainly the disciples and Jesus would have known and lived by the 10 commandments and the life practices of the Jewish faith all of their lives. What is new is that Jesus has distilled it all down to one commandment. There's nothing to study here. Nothing to compare to anyone else, nothing to be judged, no other rules to coincide with this new commandment.
“Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.”
Simple.
You see the irony. If it's so simple, then when, when, are we going to stop hurting each other? I'll even accept that we are human, we are many, and we make bad decisions, believe things about the world that scare us into protecting ourselves – it's only human! Maybe we didn't all get the same memo. But we cannot accept the harm we do to one another with intention!
This is what frustrates us about masks. Every month the session and separately the worship committee re-evaluate our covid protocols. We ask others, we look at other communities, and we check in. Just this month we thought we'd give a new idea a try but it turned out to be too soon. How many years have we done this now? And how long will we do this. We do not want to cause harm to anyone.
This is what frustrates us about politicians. Our government does not even TRY to work together in Congress because everything revolves around being right, being in control, and having power, as if the nation right in front of the elected officials isn't right in front of their noses. Talk about not sustainable!
This is what frustrates us about world leaders who think that leading means having the most, being first, being the biggest, controlling the most, holding the lives of others in their power and diminishing or even killing anyone in their way. Leaders like these clearly do NOT have relationships with their citizens.
This is what frustrates us about powers inside our own government that become untrustworthy. How can all three branches of our government be so disconnected that our system of checks and balances is broken. How can one branch, the judicial branch alone, have the power to set precedent that will set laws in motion that will take us back 50 years and undo the fight for women's rights to their own bodies.
This is what frustrates us about gun laws that allow 10 people to be shot and killed in Buffalo, NY and 17 people to be shot and killed in Milwaukee, both on Saturday. Between gang violence that happens every night somewhere, and the huge rash of mass shootings that have become so regular, and the attacks on Asian and Pacific Islander Americans my head spins. Violence from guns, in wars, on the streets, in the mall, on the road is so unnecessary but so prevalent.
The violence of cumulative trauma of poverty, of food insecurity, of housing insecurity – when will we stop this?
This is not what it looks like to love one another as Jesus has loved us.
Loving someone can be hard. Loving someone as Jesus has loved us seems impossible. And yet, let's look at some examples of how we have done so.
Dolly Parton's Imagination Library has given 100 million free brand new books to children from birth to school age since 1995.
Weave: The Social Fabric Project at the Aspen Institute, started by David Brooks. He says, “We live in a world where technology can connect us to anyone in a blink of an eye and yet, we rarely look into each other's eyes. We don't take the time to really see, know or trust each other. And we do what humans do when we feel vulnerable and alone: we revert to tribe. It's friend/enemy, us/them, build walls, hatred, erect barriers.” “There is a better way to live.” “Weave's mission is to invite everyone to start living like a Weaver and shift our culture from one that values achievement and individual success to one that finds value in deep relationships and community success.”1
Wiley College in Texas, an historically black college was able to announce at the 2022 commencement that all of the student debt of the graduates was completely paid by an anonymous donor.2
Scientists are discovering new and different ways to take care of the earth.
My friend in Scotland is excited about No Mow May, an initiative begun in the UK 10 years ago, by a group hoping to save certain species by allowing the bees to have a leg up. Don't mow your lawn for a month and let the bees feed on the weeds that grow.3
Peter Stiehler.
All the little things you and I do every day to make the world a better place.
The news is full of all kinds of Prodigal Love that Jesus gives to us. We just don't see it as quickly as the drama that the algorithms put in front of us every time we click on a button on-line. From the smallest altruistic act by a child for a friend, to a large decisions that improve lives, these are important acts of resistance; resistance to the louder noisy norms that hit our brainwaves first. Resistance like all of the marchers all across the nation yesterday who protested on behalf of women.
The love Jesus is talking about is these things and more. The love Jesus is talking about is the unexpected kind – forgiveness instead of judgement and shame; lifting up instead of putting down; accepting instead of rejecting; hope instead of despair; life instead of death.
Elisabeth Johnson, professor of theology at Luther Theological Seminary writes, “Jesus could not be clearer: It is not by our theological correctness, not by our moral purity, not by our impressive knowledge that everyone will know that we are his disciples. It is quite simply by our loving acts—acts of service and sacrifice, acts that point to the love of God for the world made known in Jesus Christ.”4
May it be so.
Amen.
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1 Weave: The Social Fabric Project
2 Wiley College graduates have tuition balances paid off by anonymous donor
3 'No Mow May' Gives You a Reason to NOT Mow the Lawn
4 Elisabeth Johnson, Working Preacher commentary for 5/15/22