Easter 5, Year C
The Rev. Dena Cleaver-Bartholomew
Jesus gave us a tremendous challenge at the Last Supper. “I give you a new commandment, that you love another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.” Consider the context of this new commandment: Judas had just left the room to betray him and Jesus knew his death was imminent. Yet he spoke of love. There was good reason he chose to focus on love.
Ever since sin entered the world, people have been separated from God. From the very first humans on, we have struggled in our broken relationship with God. God reached out in love and gave the Israelites the Law, so that through it we could know how to live rightly and be reconciled to God. Only we couldn’t do it. God tried giving us a king to rule as God’s representative. Some were better than others. Then God sent prophets who shared the words and visions of God with us, to call us back into loving relationship with God. While it sometimes worked for a while, it never lasted. Finally, God came in Person. That Person was Jesus. In Jesus, God chose to do the hard part for us. Because God had made us as people who could choose freely, God did not eliminate the realities of sin and death. They come as consequences of choosing to turn away from God. Instead God chose to make a way through the power of sin and death so that we are not enslaved by them. To create this way Jesus walked willingly into death—not eagerly, but as a free choice. Then in the Resurrection God shattered the power of sin and death and created new life. The Atonement, the theological name for what God did in Jesus’ death and resurrection, literally means the at-one-ment. We can be “at one” with God again because God built a bridge for us over the separation caused by sin. God is not only loving, but tenacious and creative as well.
If God can go to all this trouble to bring us into loving relationship, how are we to respond? We are asked to live out this same kind of inviting love. We are to share the truth of God’s love as we know it and we are to demonstrate that love in how we treat one another.
There
was an old episode of the Twilight Zone in which a man found himself walking
along a road with his dog. The man
suddenly realized that he was dead and that the dog beside him had died several
years before. He followed the road until
he came to a high, white stone wall with pearly gates that were locked. Behind the gates were streets of gold. Off to the side he saw a man at a desk. The traveler said, “Excuse me, where are we?” “This
is heaven,” came the reply. “Wow!
Would you happen to have some water?” the man asked. “Of
course, sir, come right in, and I’ll have some ice water brought right up.” “Can my friend come in too?” the traveler
asked, gesturing toward the dog. “I’m sorry sir, but we don’t accept pets.” The man thought a moment and then walked
further down the road. He eventually
came to a dirt road that went through a farm gate which stood open. There was a man inside leaning against a tree
reading a book. “Excuse me,” he called, “do
you have any water?” “Sure, there’s a
pump over there,” the man pointed off around the gate, “come on in.” “How about my
friend?” the traveler gestured to the dog.
“There should be a bowl by the
pump.” The two went in, found a hand
pump, and had some water. The traveler
then turned to the other man and asked “What
do you call this place?” “This is
heaven,” came the answer. “Well, that’s confusing,” said the
traveler. “The man down the road said that was heaven too.” “Oh, you mean the place with the gold streets
and the pearly gates? Nope. That’s hell.”
“Doesn’t it make you mad for them to use your name like that?” “No. I
can see how you might think so, but we’re just happy that they screen out the
folks who’ll leave their best friends behind.”
Love invites. Love includes. God has gone to a great deal of effort not to leave us sitting outside the gates. In return, God expects to lead lives that show this same kind of real, measurable love. As we heard in the reading from Acts this morning, not everyone will believe in the Good News of Jesus Christ. An invitation to love can, after all, be declined. But life is full of surprises. Some people will change whom we might least expect. People like Paul himself, the primary persecutor of early Christians, can become powerful witnesses to the inviting love of Jesus.
For those of us who are believers, we are challenged to put our beliefs into action with simple, straightforward, everyday acts of love. God created us out of love. Jesus redeemed us out of love. We are called to show that love in our own lives. How do we invite? How do we include? How do we show the love of God? Today we celebrate a baptism, confirmations, receptions and a reaffirmation, all of which are centered on making and living into our baptismal vows. It is these vows that mark our plunge into new life in Jesus Christ. On this day and every day to come we are to show we are Christians by our love.
Amen