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“The
New Commandment”
a sermon by
Thomas L. Jenkins
Text: John 13:31-35
“I give you a new commandment, that you love one another.
Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.”
Dear Sisters and Brothers, the
new order that our Lord Jesus Christ is giving us, to always remember,
is to love each other the same way that he has loved us and still does
love us. If all the truth
of the Holy Scriptures, and all the truth of the world’s historical
and largest community of faith in God, could be simplified down to one
word, one spirit, one aspect of faith, and one commandment to remember,
that would be “love.” God
is love. And now
faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is
love. Our lives are all about love.
We should never stop learning about love. Love is the one class for which there is no final expertise
in this life.
Last Saturday, at Sunflower park, we taught each other that when we are
attracted to faith, grace, and spirituality in other people, we are
actually being attracted to, and therefore, loving God in them.
Yes, we do love God. This
morning we are being given, again, the greatest order from God, to
always remember. We are to
love one another, sisters and brothers, in the Christian faith in the
same way exemplified in Christ’s death on the cross.
Obviously, many times, the last thing that comes out of a person’s
mouth before he or she is going to die, are considered by all of us as
what he or she is ultimately about.
I imagine the earliest disciples felt this way about these words
for the rest of their lives. These may have been the most important words that ever come
out of the heart of Christ.
And there is another beautiful aspect of this situation I want to show
forth. Jesus spoke these
words after Satan had entered into Judas, and Judas had left.
Christ spoke these words to his first disciples at the time and
place, finally, where there was no evil presence.
Christ dealt with the temptations of Satan after 40 days and 40 nights
in the wilderness. Through
Christ’s three years of ministry, he was continuously casting out
demons, and demons were actually speaking to him out of other people.
But, here and now, there is NO evil present.
What does this mean for us? When
we are truly hearing Christ’s command to us, in our hearts, to truly
love one another as he loves us, it is at this time in our souls where
there is absolutely no evil present with us in our being.
You, as a Christian cannot be possessed by a demon.
The Holy Spirit has sealed you.
But, there can still be the real presence of the worst type of
pain source at times in your life.
However, not when you are hearing Christ in your soul ordering
you to love another disciple in his way, and as you obey his Word to
you.
We are being told to love one another.
Yes, we are to love everyone, even our enemies.
But, these words are directed to us as Christians because there
is an experience of love at a very deep and real level among us who
trust our lives with God in Jesus Christ.
St. Augustine taught that the way to love one another as Christ does is
to relate to each other at loving time in a very focused, individual
way. When Jesus was
involved with someone at a personal level his whole being was engaged
with that person. At the
time you love one another do so in such a way, that at the time you give
all your attention to your deeds of love.
Yes, Jesus sacrificed himself out of love for us.
He did this because he knew that was the will of God the Father.
That is how we may apply this command of Christ in our lives as he is
ordering us to love one another in the same way he loves us.
We may choose someone in our congregation whom we want to show
love to. They may have an
issue in their lives we are concerned about.
They may be on our minds and in our prayers quite often.
Or, we may desire to show our love within and to an aspect of the
church. As an elder, we may
want to know how we may love the church as Christ loved us. As a committee member, we may seek to know how we may love
the church through the committee we serve on.
There will always be personal involvement with other sisters and
brothers of Christ in each of these cases.
The ultimate nature of the way Christ loves us, is he does what he knows
is the will of God. If we
are hearing Christ telling us in a new way, the most free and joyful
order anyone could receive, then as we seek to love someone in the
church, or love the church through a service to someone or more than
one, we are to seek the will of God.
We should pray to God: “Dear Lord and Father please show me your will
for showing love to…” As
we grow in discerning God’s will for how to show love and then do as
we are taught, we are then obeying the new command of Jesus Christ.
The theologian Karl Bart once said, “Jesus is the name of our species,
in relation to whom we are still subhuman but, nonetheless, called
ultimately to become.” Jesus
would not have given us this new commandment if it had not been
possible.
You and I, with the help of God’s unfailing grace, can grow into the
wonder of loving each one by the very will of God that we have discerned
by the Holy Spirit in our bodies.
Let us pray…
Amen
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