Love One  Another

Some people have some strange ideas about loving one another don’t they? A grandfather was talking to his six year old grandson, the little boy asked. Grandad, can you make a noise like a frog? No Tommy, I can’t. Oh go on Grandad, make a noise like a frog. I’m sorry Tommy I can’t. Oh please Grandad, make a noise like a frog. Tommy, I told you that I can’t, anyway, why do you want me to make a noise like a frog? Well! Mummy said that when you croak we can all go to Disneyland.

When we were very young we used to call our fathers “Daddy” and the shortest prayer in the New Testament is exactly the same.

Because you are children, says St. Paul, God sent the spirit of his Son into our hearts, the spirit who calls out, Abba, Father.

It is the joint ministry of both Jesus and the Spirit to bring us closer to the Father.

Sometimes, we tend to think that our missionary task is to bring people to a faith in Jesus, and this is true, but we forget that bringing people to Jesus is not an end in itself, but a means to the end of bringing people into a new and intimate relationship with God the Father.

It is important to note that Jesus did not say, “No one comes to God except through me”. He emphatically says, “No one comes to the Father except through me”..

Many people have a faith in God, but they do not know God as their Father, simply because they do not know Jesus.

The uniqueness of Jesus lies in his atoning work  on the Cross, which makes it possible for us to come close, and know God as our Father.

Every prayer that Jesus addressed to God in the Gospels, begins with him calling God Father, every one except that cry from the cross, when he cries out, “My God why have you forsaken me.”

In that moment of taking to himself all the sins of the world, Jesus denies himself his eternal right to call God Father, so that we, who through our selfish waywardness, have no such right, may now say when we pray, Our Father.

It is in the Lord’s prayer that we find the virtues of a good father, he’s the one who provides forgiveness and protects. But it is forgiveness that is the central Christian experience.                                                                                                     

Many religions point optimistically to God as the one who will one day have mercy on his creatures.

The bold and extravagant claim of the followers of Jesus is, that forgiveness is not just a future hope, but a present experience.

The scriptures proclaim it , our liturgies celebrate it. Your sins are forgiven, is the absolution in the present tense, that we hear from Jesus through the word and the sacrament.

Some time ago a Sunday colour supplement carried a feature on guilt. Different people wrote about their experiences and how they coped with them.

One woman wrote about the agonising decision which she had made to have an abortion. She then wrote, Ten years on I’m still waiting for forgiveness to arrive.

The Christian faith is a celebration of the truth that in Jesus, God’s forgiveness has already arrived.

How do we get this message across to people like that poor woman, who for all I know is still waiting for forgiveness.

In our gospel reading this morning, Jesus commands us to “Love one another” as he has loved us. Is it an impossible demand? I think not, not if we remember that our ultimate goal is to occupy a room in our Father’s house, and the only way we can do that is to become like Jesus as much as we possibly can.

We can never be Jesus, but we can grow into a likeness of Jesus.

So, what are the rules that we must follow, what law must we obey?

According to St. Paul we don’t need a law, only faith. He says, Before the time for faith came, the law kept us all locked up as prisoners, until the coming faith should be revealed.

Modern family life is much occupied with the fetching and carrying children. Parents are understandably concerned about what might happen to them if they went to school or to the swimming pool on their own.

In that respect, our modern life is more like the ancient world than of fifty years ago.

St Paul takes the analogy of the slave in a moderately affluent Greek family, whose job is to take the boys to school, as an analogy of the law.

The function of the law was, he thought, was to take us to Christ. The law had done it’s  work, so, is there a place for law in the Christian life?

Not so long back in Anglican history, people spoke of “A rule of life”. In the seventeenth century Jeremy Taylor published , “The rules and exercises of Holy Living.”

In the eighteenth century the Methodists were so named because they lived by a method, and so do many well known religious orders.

There remains a need for simple rules about worship, Bible study, personal prayer and giving. The idea is strange to many people, but if we rely on everyone doing things when and if they feel like it, we are not likely  to make much progress in Christian Discipleship.

Of course , there are dangers in rules. Obedience to them can induce a smugness and self satisfaction, and we can become slaves to them.

History is full of instances of people who have turned the Christian religion into legalism, however, Christian freedom does not mean that life has no constraints and the Way no signposts..

 The place of law , or a rule of life is to make us more attentive, more open and more obedient to Jesus. Rules and law are not ends in themselves, but ways to Christ.

 But sadly, so many people today would rather put their reliance in masses of rules and regulations instead of living by the simple command, “Love one another.”

 St. Paul, the converted Saul had the appropriate experience to see, that in Christ there is freedom from the law, and this freedom is not without bounds.

 Another word for freedom is liberty. But what kind of freedom, what kind of liberty? Are there any bounds?

 Long ago Edmund Burke wrote; “Liberty too, must be limited in order to be possessed.” One person’s freedom, one person’s liberty, may intrude on the liberty or freedom of another.

 The freedom of the children of God, is a freedom to be enjoyed within the bounds of the church as the people of God.

 Outside the bounds of the church we must live like those who are at home in daylight, for where light is, there all goodness springs up, and all justice and truth are evident.                                                                                                                                                

 This theme of darkness and light is a continuing experience of being human, and it is within this theme, that we have the difficult task of loving one another as Jesus loves us.

 And we can only do this, and we must do it, if we are to bring people into a relationship with Jesus, and so make it possible for them to know the Father’s love.

 If we are to allow Jesus to be “The Way, the Truth and the Life.”  In our lives, then we must come to him empty and repentant. We must give our whole selves to him, the good, the bad and the ugly, and allow him to pour his Holy Spirit into us and shower the gifts of the Holy Spirit upon us.

 Most of you will remember Fred Rapley, well, he said one Sunday morning, “A church without  the gifts of the Holy Spirit loses it’s credibility in the world.”

 Remember also, that without the Holy Spirit we cannot exibit the fruits of the Spirit, “Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness and Self control. And the greatest of these is Love.

 We must allow Jesus to fill us with his love, because it is only in his love that we can love the unloveable  and show them that Jesus is “The Way, The Truth and The Life” by which they can come to the Father.

                                                             Amen.