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May 13, 2012

A Friend Who Loves

Preacher: Rev. Jack Meehan Series: Lectionary Category: Biblical Scripture: John 15:9–15:17

The Sixth Sunday of Easter
May 12-13, 2012
John 15:9-17

“A Friend Who Loves”

It’s Mother’s Day – a day to honor and show our appreciation to the one who loves us like no one else: our moms. A local radio station asked listeners to call in one day last week to share phrases that their moms used while they were growing up. It was interesting to hear the responses: “I brought you into this world, and I can take you out of it!” “If mama ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy!” But of all the phrases we’ve heard our mothers speak, the most important is this: “I love you.” Whether mom is someone close by or far away, someone with us still or who has gone before us in the faith, we remember and give thanks for our mothers. Mom’s love is not just a syrupy sentimental thing, but can also be tough love: telling us what we don’t want to hear but need to hear; loving us enough to challenge and confront us for our own good. In today’s Gospel lesson, Jesus uses the word “love” nine times in those nine verses. That kind of repetition means we ought to sit up and take notice. Our Lord’s new commandment, to love one another as he has loved us, is easier said than done. It’s easy to talk the talk of love, but can we walk the walk? Can we translate words about love into actions that demonstrate what love looks like? Love is such an overused word, that it can be difficult to get a grip on what love really means – not as the world defines it, but as God does. Perhaps our Lord’s love is particularly difficult to get a handle on because of the preconceived notions we may have about him. Images of the mild and gentle Jesus: never a harsh word spoken, always a smile on his face, a sweet spirit ready to tend to every one of our needs. This image of Jesus leaves out not only the challenging nature found in the way Jesus loves individuals, it also tends to overlook the sacrificial nature of where this love would lead him – to a cross outside Jerusalem where he stretched out his arms to give his life to love the world, for the sake of the world. Besides “love,” there’s another word that crops up in today’s Gospel lesson: “friend.” You gotta have friends! We have friends we laugh with, friends we cry with, even friends that we can totally be ourselves with. Jesus calls his disciples then and now “friends.” He tells us: “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you” (John 15:13-14). The message for this day, based on these two concepts of “love” and “friend,” is entitled “A Friend Who Loves.” May the Lord’s rich and abundant blessing rest upon the preaching, the hearing, and the living of his Word, for Jesus’ sake.

The Jesus-kind of love that’s described here in the Gospel is not your regular, run-of-the-mill kind of love. The original language of the New Testament describes different kinds of love: love between family members, love between friends, love between husband and wife. But the love of God has its own special word: agape. It refers to God’s self-giving, sacrificial love made known in Jesus. Even in the best of circumstances, our own love is tainted with some not very noble things: not wanting to be inconvenienced or being made to move outside our comfort zone. We contend with motives that focus on self rather than others. We want to know “What’s in this for me?” Sound familiar? From corporate greed and corruption right down to each and every one of us: “We have met the enemy, and he is us.” All of this, Scripture calls sin – turning in on self, missing the mark, veering off-course from God’s design and purpose. We need to be set right again, and that is something only God can do. This is why Jesus came into our world: to do for us what we could not do for ourselves. As the Son of God, he came to live that perfect and sinless life we could not. As the Son of man, he came to die the death we rightly deserved. He came to befriend us and to love us with God’s own agape love. He came to be that Friend who loves us.

On August 10, 1886, a man drowned in Lake Ontario, Canada. Such tragic events happen all the time, but in this case the tragedy recalled an earlier accident. When this man was younger and living in his native Ireland, on the night before his wedding, his fiancé drowned. Devastated and despondent, the man moved to Canada at the age of 26. As time passed, he fell in love again and a wedding date was set. But tragedy struck once more. His bride-to-be came down with pneumonia and died. After this, the man became something of an eccentric. He worked only for people who could not afford to pay him. He cut and hauled wood for poor people, took care of people in prison, and similar acts of love. He determined to live a life that reflected the love of Jesus Christ. When his aged mother back in Ireland fell sick, he had no money to visit her. So he wrote her a poem, which he hoped would comfort her. In that poem he encouraged his mother to take her problems – both physical and spiritual – to the Savior in prayer. In Jesus’ arms, he said, she would find her comfort and her solace. This man would probably have been forgotten by the world except for this poem. If you travel to Bailieboro Cemetery in Bailieboro, Ontario, you will find this poem engraved upon his tombstone. If you don’t want to travel that far, all you have to do is open almost any hymnal and read his poem. You can find that in our hymnal, The Lutheran Book of Worship, #439, and I invite you to turn to this now. The author of this poem – the man whose story I’ve just shared – was named Joseph Scriven, and his poem is that familiar and much-loved hymn, “What a Friend We Have in Jesus” (taken from Lifelight John-Part 2 Enrichment Magazine, p. 20). As Joseph Scriven reminds us, we have a true friend in Jesus – a friend who really does love us; not just in words, but in action. He is a friend who has laid down his life for us. That’s how much we are loved by Jesus, who died and rose again.

All that Jesus our true Friend has heard from the Father, he has made known to us. We did not choose him – quite the opposite. He chose us! And he appointed us that we should go and bear fruit; fruit that will last. As Jesus’ friends, we’re called to walk the walk of love, demonstrating by our words and actions the love of Christ. And when all is said and done, it is this agape love of God in Christ that transforms people’s lives. It transformed Joseph Scriven’s life. Despite the many hardships and tragedies he endured, his legacy is that hymn which points people to our Savior and Friend, Jesus Christ, inviting us to come to him in prayer. And so on this Sixth Sunday of Easter, the question I leave you with is this: what will be your legacy? When we leave this world, how will we be remembered? What will be our legacy? May the Holy Spirit work in each one of us so that our legacy may be one that gives glory and praise to the One who laid down his life for his friends, our crucified and risen Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

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