For Sunday, May 10, 2015 – John 15:9-17
What’s love got to do with it? Apparently, everything.
Abide in my love, Jesus says.
Hmm . . . how do we do that?
By keeping my commandments.
Ah-ha . . . I knew there had to be a catch. So “abiding in love” is about duty and commitment and obligation.
Yes, the duty of letting my joy be in you, letting my joy be complete in you.
What? Your commandments are for the sake of joy? Maybe I need to hear that again.
Yes, you do need to hear this again. I realize it is a bit simple for your busy mind to comprehend. It can be difficult to take in, but it is true: the purpose of my central commandment is for you to know my joy. Joy is the by-product of loving one another as I have loved you. It is the consequence of laying down one’s life for the sake of one’s friends. Joy, then, is to be my friend, and the friend of my friends, to love them as I love you. To love you as I love you.
Everything begins in love. Everything ends in love. And in between all the beginnings and endings, is love.
Maybe it’s time to stop over-complicating and over-compensating and to hand ourselves over to love. The kind of love that is not a theory but a practice, not a wish but a will. The kind that is willing even to die. It is the only safe passage through life’s dangers. When you are brought down, love will raise you up. Release your obligations to everything and everyone, except for the obligations of love. Expand your capacity to manifest love, to breathe love, to speak love, to be love. It is a simple way, and you can trust it. You can trust it. You can trust it with your life.
