I have to say, the highlight of this Sunday at St. Peter for me was going with the Sunday School teachers and students to Valley View Care Center and watching them first sing for the residents there, and then bless them.
We’d just hosted a workshop on Cross+Gen ministry and Faith5 on Saturday, and it was awesome to watch the teachers who had been at the workshop apply it right away on Sunday by teaching the kids how to give a blessing.
Although they weren’t quite as exciting as the kids at the nursing home, we did still have worship services this weekend, and therefore, I wrote a sermon. My sermon texts for this fourth Sunday of Easter in Year B are 1 John 3:16-24 and John 10:11-18.
How do you know what love looks like?
I was a little disappointed when we had to cancel our confirmation service project this week, both because we didn’t get to do our project, and because supper was going to be pizza and I love pizza.
Also, this was an odd week at the parsonage, because I was at a synod retreat for first call pastors from Sunday to Tuesday, and then my wife Christin was gone at a youth leader’s retreat Thursday and Friday. I love my wife and we miss each other when we’re not together. That’s a different kind of love than pizza.
This summer, we’re going for a few days to see my grandparents in Vancouver and Washington state, who I only see about every two years or so. I love them, even though I rarely get to be with them. I love Star Wars movies – there’s one coming up in a few weeks.
Between services today, our Sunday School kids are going over to the nursing home to sing for the residents to remind them Jesus loves them. Again, a very different form of love.
What does love look like?
This is the question our readings today are considering, and hint, it’s not talking about the pizza or Star Wars movie kind of love.
First, a historical sidenote: When the books and letters of the Bible were written, they didn’t have chapter or verse numbers. Did you know that? Chapters were added in the 1200’s and verses in the 1500’s. They’re not part of the actual Bible text.
Anyway, this is one of those strange coincidences with chapters and verses. Probably the most famous verse in the Bible is John 3:16, right? “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” God so loved the world.
Today’s reading isn’t from the Gospel of John, it’s from 1st John, this quick little letter at the back of the Bible, and First John 3:16 says this: “We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us—and we ought to lay down our lives for one another.”
John 3:16 tells us God loved the world enough to give his son for it, and 1 John 3:16 tells us what that giving looks like and how we should respond.
Love involves sacrifice. It involves putting someone else’s interests ahead of yourself. We know Jesus loves us because he gave up his life for us. Love is putting someone else in front of yourself. It’s giving up money that you’ve worked hard to earn so someone you’ll never meet on the other side of the world gets to eat. It’s taking the time to reach out to a friend going through a tough time to let them know you care. It’s sacrificing some of your time to take care of an elderly parent, or to allow a child to move back into your house.
The forms of love I mentioned at the beginning are related, at least some of them. Love for pizza is still pretty different than love for God, but there are similarities between the love a parent has for a child and God’s love for us, or between the way we love God and the way people who are married love their wife or husband.
This could almost be a wedding sermon, because the idea of a marriage is two people committing to love one another with their whole lives. We talk about two people becoming one flesh in marriage, coming together to form something new.
Marriage isn’t about ceasing to be who you were before, because you bring your whole self into the relationship, but there are sacrifices that need to be made. How many of you know someone who gave up their motorcycle when before the wedding? My dad did. Or when two people each have a house, someone needs to sell when the marriage begins.
Loving someone else means respecting their priorities, sometimes above your own. Committing yourself to someone means giving up some of your freedom to be there for them. The rewards of love ought to outweigh the sacrifices, but there are sacrifices.
Tragically, in marriage or dating this idea can get misused to say one person should do all the sacrificing, even putting up with violence or abuse. That’s not ok. That’s not love, it’s power and selfishness. Love in a marriage needs to be mutual. There’s always give and take, and different seasons in a lifetime together, but for a marriage to work, it needs to involve mutual sacrifice.
As Christians, we understand marriage as a reflection of God’s love, an imitation of God’s perfect love for us. And it is only an imitation, because we’re not capable of the kind of perfect love God has. God loves us more fully than we can comprehend.
Even when it’s not at all mutual, even when we don’t love back, when we completely fail to lay down our lives for one another, when we ignore the command to love one another, even then God’s love remains. God’s love for us comes before we receive it, before we believe it. “God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us.” Romans 5:8
In the gospel reading, Jesus describes love by talking about the good shepherd being the one who will lay down his life for the sheep. Others who are not the good shepherd will seem to love the sheep, but when real sacrifice is required, they’ll bail and run away. They’ll abandon the sheep. But Jesus, the good shepherd, will never do that. He will make whatever sacrifice is needed for love.
Of course the shepherd cares how the sheep feel. The shepherd wants to be in mutual relationship with the sheep, to be loved by the sheep. But when it comes down to it, the good shepherd will lay down his life for them regardless of how the sheep feel.
Have you ever taken someone to show them something you know they’ll love, but they’re not convinced?
I’m picturing a child on the way to Disney World, asking, “Are we there yet?” “I’m tired of the car.” “Let’s get out.” “I want to walk around.” And the parents saying, “No, we’re not there yet; it’ll be great when we get there. Come on, you’ll like it.” Because the parents know what’s ahead.
That’s how I think of the good shepherd leading the sheep in the 23rd Psalm. The shepherd knows the destination. The shepherd knows the beauty of the path, even though the sheep might not see it. The Lord, our shepherd, makes us lie down in green pastures. He leads us beside still waters and on right paths.
Isn’t that a fascinating picture of God’s relationship with us? Think about how God must feel as the shepherd who loves and cares for us more than any parent cares for their children, more than anyone cares for their spouse, certainly more than any actual shepherd cares for their sheep.
God sees our potential for love and good, yet God also gives us the freedom to live how we choose. God never stops loving us and gently leading us, yet we continually turn off the path we’re called to. The shepherd tells the sheep the destination, but so often we disbelieve.
As I talked about last week, we think it’s too good to be true, or that we’re not good enough. Over and over we try to turn back, to go somewhere else, or give up before we reach the destination where God is leading us.
We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us—and we ought to lay down our lives for one another.
We can’t make the same sacrifice God’s made for us. We’re not called to save people; Jesus has already done that. But we are called to show love in our lives. We’re called to love our neighbors, to help our brothers and sisters in need. We’re called to love like Jesus, and that involves some sacrifice.
The kind of love God commands for us is not always easy. Loving in truth and action rather than just in word or speech costs something. It might be time, or money, or energy, or vulnerability. Sometimes it’s uncomfortable.
In a marriage, loving your spouse can be hard. In a family, loving your siblings or parents or children can be hard. But when we understand God’s love for us, the sacrifices made for us, we can’t help loving people in need, loving our neighbors.
Let’s pray.
Lord Jesus, you love us more than we can possibly imagine. Our ability to love is so small next to your love for us. But we want to love others. We want to live the way you call us to, sacrificing, laying down our lives for one another. By your Holy Spirit, help us to abide in you. Show us who you would have us love and serve. Thank you for your love for us.
Amen