Friends - May 9th, 2021

Friends May 9, 2021
Rev. Dr. Kelly Grimes
Associate Pastor and Director of Hospitality and Congregational Care

John 15:9-17
“15:9 As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love.

15:10 If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love.

15:11 I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. 15:12 "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.
15:13 No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends.
15:14 You are my friends if you do what I command you.

15:15 I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father.

15:16 You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name.

15:17 I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.” 

 

Kelly: GREETINGS FRIENDS!! On this day, I acknowledge the one who I call Mother, Susan Grimes, Daughter of Artie Mae. For those of you who are just tuning in, you’ll find links for fully engaging in our service in our Facebook and YouTube comments or on our website www.foundryumc.org. If you are in need ASL interpretation, we invite you to join us at www.foundryumc.org/asl.

"In every community, there is work to be done. In every nation, there are wounds to heal. In every heart, there is the power to do it. – Marianne Williamson
We continue in Jesus’s farewell speech to those whom he loves. Last week we talked about vines and branches connectivity and how the connectivity was god’s plan that we should move into beloved community. Jesus continues this discussion by calling on the listeners to abide and keep. “15:9 As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love.15:10 If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love. 15:11 I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. Abiding is best described as staying in a place Long enough to soak it in. Jesus wants us to do just that in his love. To be covered and surrounded by it that it is our main focus. There’s an iconic picture of Muhammad Ali as he is preparing for his next boxing match. He is submerged in water and he is in a boxer’s stance. He is not fighting the water he is not attempting to tell the water what to do. He is simply abiding in the water. If you can abide in something, it stands to reason that it’s very nature is too big for any of us to control. That’s this love that God offers to us. It can be shared but it cannot be controlled by humanity. And it’s not the warm and fuzzy ideas of love but it is “agape” love. It is God’s love. It’s important that we set the tone for what does love looks like because we can treat it like it’s a vacation - only on special occasions, only at certain times, and only for a certain span of time.

The people of the Christian community near the end of the first century CE that, in addition to growing oppression by the Roman Empire, was experiencing serious conflict with the Jewish synagogue is the context in which this message is given. We cannot separate the context from the message. And so, they are political and community implications for this call to love. Some would say that politics has nothing to do with the message Jesus is offering us today. Let me remind you that the person speaking, namely Jesus, was resurrected from his political assassination based on the attempt to control oppressed people. And so how we care for those who are oppressed in 2021 is directly connected with that. How we vote, what are community state and national budgets pay for, who we exclude from receiving justice, what we teach our children about the institutions in our country and our world. Because as followers of Christ, this was a call to love is the very core of the community. Abiding in the love Jesus offers us is at the core of what will be able to community for us. 1 John 4:16b, 19, “God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them.... We love because he first loved us.” No shade to warm and fuzzy love. Jesus is calling us to go deeper than that.

It’s the love that will make everywhere we look be through the eyes of this love we are surrounded and covered by. It is like your skin on your body – covering everything.
It sounds easy doesn’t it? The love that God gives to Jesus, Jesus gives to us. Sounds great wonderful terrific! Will take it! Thanks Jesus! Now here comes the hard part: the command that will cause us to go from just receiving to giving. The command that will cause us to have to think of others and not just ourselves. We have to love one another as Jesus loves us.

15:12 "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. 15:13 No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends.
15:14 You are my friends if you do what I command you.
Oh good grief Jesus! We were doing great! That’s great agape love that you have received you have shared with us. And now you’re calling us to share that same love with each other? And there are no other parameters for who gets to receive that love? When you say one another, exactly who are we talking about? Now may be easy to respond, “everyone!”. Of course, Jesus means everyone. They are times when it looks easy and sometimes it’s very hard. In the question that I always propose to myself and I propose to you is, “When it’s time to live in the hardest of circumstances are we quick to erase certain people from the list of everyone?”

What, then, does it mean for us today to be Christ’s friends? Bonhoeffer states it this way: “The more genuine and the deeper our community becomes, the more will everything else between us recede, the more clearly and purely will Jesus Christ and his work become the one and only thing that is vital between us”.

15:15 I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father.
15:16 You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. 15:17 I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.”

I have a younger brother. His name is Alan. We are nearly 10 months apart. When we were little the night before December 25 we will always charge to go to bed because our chimney would be occupied by someone who would come to do things that would make us happy on December 25. One year I heard one of my parental’s attempting to assemble something on December 24 a peek through the door and realized the true givers of the gifts. My day I was trying to put together my Barbie dream house. Upon this Epiphany, I went right to my brother and shared this new information that I had regarding this season. Some people may say, oh you spoiled it for your brother. I like to look at it as sharing the wealth of information so that we’re all on the same page.

Jesus has shown us who the giver of the gift are. Because he sees us as friends. If we see ourselves Jesus’ servants, we may be attempting to avoid the greater mutuality that Christ seeks with us as his friends. In other words, there may be something in us that says I don’t want to know, I don’t want to see what you see. I want to take the gifts without the responsibility.

And for us living in a culture that celebrates self-autonomy and choice, these words may call us back to an awareness of God’s initiative in seeking us out, gathering us into a community, and sending us into the world.
“If you want to go quickly, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” – African Proverb

We’ve got miles to go, friends! Let’s go together. Let us pray... Dear God, Thank you for your love!

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