In the past few weeks I’ve come face to face with my own
vanity. I’ve been hiding sermons that I didn’t think were as good as some of
the ones I posted earlier. However, after reading this post on Jamie the Very
Worst Missionary’s blog, I’m trying to be a little bit more open, and get back
into posting. This was my Mother’s Day Sermon, from almost a month ago. It
includes one of my favorite images for God, that of a mother hen sheltering her
chicks through a fire. Hopefully we will be reminded that the love we get from
our mothers is Godly, and our mothers and fathers are both Godly when they
reflect God’s love for us.
A Mother’s Love
The
passage previous to this one, in John 15: 1-8, is one of the 7 famous, “I am”
statements in John. “I am the true vine,” Jesus says, and my Father is the
vinegrower” “Abide in me,” he says, as I abide in you. Just as the branch
cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you
unless you abide in me.”
In
our passage for today, which begins with verse 9, Jesus builds on these verses,
helping us understand what it means to abide in him, and to be rooted in
Christ.
We’ve
talked a bit before about the community to whom the Gospel of John and the
letters of John were written. There are two major conflicts that define this
community. The first is a conflict with the authorities in the synagogue. They
had been thrown out of their synagogue for claiming that Jesus was the Messiah.
The second conflict is an internal one. It’s nature is unclear, perhaps it was
people giving into the persecution from other people in their community and
abandoning the face. Or it may have been a theological disagreement, on whether
or not Jesus was truly human, or a purely spiritual being. Nevertheless, the
letters of John seem to make it clear that there are strong disagreements
within the community. When we read today’s passage in the context of these
conflicts, Jesus’ commandments take on new meaning.
See,
Jesus discusses in verses 1-8 that He is the true vine and abiding in him will
lead us to bear good fruit. The implication of course is that there are other
vines to which we can attach ourselves, and there are. Vines of ideology, vines
of selfishness, fear, and pride, all have the ability to lead us down pathways
that do not bear fruit. Jesus makes some contrasts between those who bear good
fruit and those who do not.
And
then beginning in verse 9, Jesus talks a little bit more about what it means to
bear good fruit, what it means to abide in him. In verse 9 Jesus explains what
it means to abide in him, what it means to be connected to the true vine and
bear fruit. “Abide in my love,” he says. He continues, by saying that to abide
in his love you must obey his commandments. And then he gives us a commandment.
“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.”
Now
we seem to live in an era of unprecedented polarization. The rhetoric of the
pundit class has become nearly unconscionable, as they seek to tar the other
side with broad strokes and cruel words. And I don’t know about you, but I get
caught up in all of this very easily.
And
we have this problem in Church as well. One of the things I love about
Presbyterians is that we are a very diverse bunch theologically, and
historically we have tended to trust each other. One of the essential tenets of
our system of governance is that “God alone is Lord of conscience,” which
proclaims that unlike some churches that force a rigid adherence to the
doctrines of whose in charge right now, Presbyterians are encouraged to study
and understand the Scriptures, and believe them as they understand it, trusting
that their understanding is guided by the Holy Spirit. We’re not called to some
blind obedience to doctrines that don’t make sense, and we’re not kicked out of
the church if we disagree with the pastor. But what that means is that on
occasion, things can get a little tense. Indeed it is only the Presbyterian
love for decency and order that has kept some of the Presbytery meetings in the
last decade or so from turning into shouting matches.
With the intensity of our
disagreements, it is no wonder that sometimes people outside of the church
don’t want to come in. As Gail O’Day puts it, “The world is not likely to be
impressed by Christian love for outsiders, however expansive, nor compelled to
join the company of believers, if those who call themselves Christians exhibit
hatred for one another.” (O’Day, Gail. “John.” The Women’s Bible Commentary, ed. C. A. Newsom and S. H. Ringe. Louisville:
Westminster John Knox, 1992. p. 302)
Now
as I mentioned before the evangelist wrote this Gospel with a particular
community in mind, a community that was experiencing serious disagreements,
even, perhaps schism, over issues of theology and behavior. A community a lot
like ours. And of all the things that Jesus had said and done in his three year
ministry, the evangelist chose this one to record for us, in which Jesus,
calling us to abide in him, and to live by his commandments gives us this one
commandment, to love one another as He loves us.
The
other Gospels give us the Golden Rule, when talking about how we should treat
our neighbors. You should love your neighbor as yourself. But the Gospel of
John goes far beyond that. “This is my commandment, that you love one another
as I have loved you.” Christ loved us so much more deeply than we can love
ourselves. As we read about elsewhere, Christ, the good shepherd, loves us so
much that he lays down his life for us. He chooses death, that we might have
life. Jesus loved us so much that he mourns when we make bad choices.
“Jerusalem, Jerusalem,” he cries (that’s us) “the city that kills the prophets
and stones those who are sent to it! how often have I desired to gather your
children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not
willing!”
This
is the kind of love that we are called to have for each other. The love of a
hen for her chicks. The love of a mother for her child. This love that seeks to
shelter us, to protect us, to care for us even when we do not want to be cared
for. We could use a little bit more of that love in our world right now.
Tom
Wright, in talking about God’s love, tells the story of a fire in the barnyard.
Fires are scary for us, but for animals penned or trapped in, it can be
difficult to survive. But in the
midst of the danger all around, a mother hen gathers her chicks beneath her
wings, shelters them, comforts them, and loves them. After the fires die down,
people sifting through the wreckage find the mother hen, scorched and
blackened. And beneath her wings, chicks, still alive, protected by the mother
hen who laid down her life. We
don’t often find better metaphors for what Jesus love for us is like than this.
He lay down his life for us.
Jesus’
love for us is like this mother’s love. And we could stand to remember that in
the midst of our conflicts and disagreements, Jesus’ commandment is this, that
you love one another as He loved you. Not only with the people on the other
side of the aisle, or country, or theological spectrum, but with the people we
see every day as well. It can almost be easier to get along with our enemies
who we don’t see very often than the ones with whom we rub shoulders every day.
With everyone, we’re called to love as He loved us, to love as a hen loves her
chicks, as a mother loves her child.
This
Mother’s Day as we seek to honor the mothers among us, I’m reminded of the many
ways in which mother’s sacrifice to take care of their families every day, and
how God’s love is reflected in that. Our society encourages this in our
mothers, to the point that self-sacrificing can come very naturally, almost to
the point that we can lose ourselves. It is more difficult for those of us who
were not so encouraged or well-trained. For men, it can be easy to let the
women get all the self-sacrificing glory. We become, to use blood type
terminology, universal receivers, accepting the sacrifices of the women around
us, the universal donors, in our lives. So for those of us who are not as
traditionally encouraged to lay themselves down for others, it can be even more
of a challenge, to love others as deeply as Christ loves us. We’ve been wired to let others do
the sacrificing, because that’s how those roles have traditionally worked. But Jesus encourages all of us to love
with the love that he has for us, a love that shelters us, protects us,
welcomes us, saves us and redeems us, through laying down his life.
Let
all of us, mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers, sons and daughters,
Christians, friends, are all called to share with each other the love that
Christ has given us. We’re called to lay down our lives for each other, to live
and die for each other, that each of us may abide in Jesus’ love, may abide in
Jesus’, connected to the true vine which gives us all life, and leads us to
bear good fruit. For no one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life
for one’s friends.
