MUMC Sermon-05/07/06

You may not immediately realize it, but our reading from Acts is quite a dramatic scene. Jesus’ disciples are beginning to find their voice. He is risen and ascended, and they’re living that reality with a new boldness and determination.

In the scene we read from earlier, Peter and John stand accused before the same council that charged Jesus. They had been jailed the day before for teaching about Jesus, and they had drawn attention to themselves because through their prayers people had been healed. This was both suspicious and threatening to the religious elite.

Peter, the same Peter who had denied Jesus a few weeks earlier, now stands before his accusers once more. They ask him, “By what power do you do such things?” This is a moment of great redemption for Peter for he can now speak quite openly what before he had cowardly denied. “We do this in the name of Jesus Christ.”

But what is it that they did? What is it that caught the authorities’ attention and ultimately disturbed them so? What led them to ask almost in amazement, “By what powers do you such things?”

We can speak of the healings, of the way the early Christians chose to live in community, and of how no one among them was in need. But each of those realities speaks to an even deeper reality. Essentially, the disciples were being accused of love. They were determined to love as Jesus loved, and short of their own crosses they were developing ways to mirror the bold love Jesus taught and lived.

You can hear the echoes of this in the reading from 1 John: “We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us—and we ought to lay down our lives for one another. How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.”

And that’s the challenge for us today isn’t it. Since we’re such a detached people generally, when we think about Christianity our tendency is to think of a religion; a system of beliefs, practices and laws that should govern our daily life. And to some degree that is correct. But when put that way does it strike you as what Jesus was about? When you hear Jesus and we read of his life and teaching, do you really think that he was establishing a religion? Do you really think that he was developing systematic thought and complicated dogmas? Or was he essentially about something else? When I think of Jesus in this way, it leaves me cold. It doesn’t capture him. Theology without an ethic of love is lifeless.

Jesus was determined to love; that is what his life was all about. Isn’t that what John is saying when he writes, “we ought to lay down our lives for one another…love, not in word or in speech, but in truth and action.” In other words, don’t give a lot of lip service to love; don’t waste your time talking about religion and trying to cross every T and dot every I; live it! Live love. Determine to love. Choose love.

When as a third-year seminarian I visited Peru as part of a study exchange. At one point in our visit we made our way to a very remote village 16,000 feet atop the Andes mountains. Believe it or not, in that most beautiful of places, where llamas run wild and free, there is a little Methodist church. And from the church elders I learned something I have never forgotten. In a conversation about how Christianity reached their mountain, stories were told about native religions, Catholic missionaries, Protestant zeal, and ultimately the building of their humble chapel. Asked why they had chosen to accept a religion that had been a source of much pain and misunderstanding for them, the elder of the village told us through an interpreter, “Life is a series of choices, love among them. And we have chosen love, for Love,” he said while pointing to the simple cross on the wall, “chose us”. There will always be reasons to cling to past injustices and to relive past wrongs, but Jesus commands us to love. Love is something that forces us to live in the present, to see what is right before us, and we’ve chosen to do that. We love.” Then picking up a fistful of dirt, he said, “We love the earth that God has given us. We love the people we live with, and that isn’t always an easy choice. And we welcome you, our guests, in love. In Jesus love chose us, and so we choose to love.”

A long period of silence ensued. I think we North Americans came expecting to hear of struggle, conquest and liberation. We probably came expecting that our Peruvian hosts would make us feel guilty about our religion, our wealth, our privilege. Instead, they chose to love us. They didn’t give us the exotic, underside of history experience we hoped for; instead they chose to love. They chose the way of Christ.

But before we get too sentimental let’s be clear on what is being said here. Love is not an emotion, or even a sentiment; it’s a choice, a way of life. It’s important that we understand the difference. Jesus didn’t go to the cross and offer his life because he had a sentimental experience. He didn’t endure his final days because of a feeling. He made a choice. He was determined that if people were going to understand him and take him seriously he would need to take his own teachings seriously. He knew what we too often forget, that Love is almost exclusively a verb, and only rarely a noun. And in our readings today we have the first examples of people who started to understand the difference.

This is what Jesus meant when he said that all religion, all truth was summarized in one commandment: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind and with all your strength, and love your neighbor as yourself.” The rest of this life we call faith is a series of choices—the choice to love God and the choice to love neighbor. And if you think about your own life you know that your every day is a series of choices about those two indistinguishable ways of loving. From the moment you wake up in the morning you’re making choices about the quality of your love.

Today the lesson is very clear: love is a commandment and a choice. If we are to be Jesus’ followers, if we are to hear the voice of our Good Shepherd we have a very simple, yet all encompassing choice. Choose love!