May 9, 2021: A Lesson in Spelling
John 15:9-17
Rev. Rhonda Blevins
As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.
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You can’t spell “Mother” without H-E-R.
You know who I’m talking about: The woman most instrumental for nurturing your growth. Maybe it was the woman who gave you birth, or perhaps the woman who adopted you. Maybe she was your grandmother or your nanny. Maybe she was a foster family or a children’s home. She took care of you. You can’t spell “mother” without her. You know her name. Would you say it aloud?
Saying her name conjures up all kinds of emotions doesn’t it? Maybe endearment. Maybe joy. Maybe sadness if she’s gone or if the relationship is strained. Saying her name, for some, maybe stirs up anger or resentment. For sure, not all mothers are perfect. In fact, no mother has ever been perfect.
In fact, motherhood, to this mother, sometimes seems like a string of failures, one right after the other. Some of my favorite “mother of the year” stories happened when my youngest was in PreK. Karlene Koch is one of the teachers in the PreK where he went; she can attest to the veracity of these stories. There was that time I pulled up in the car line with my son . . . he was dressed to the nines, his hair perfectly coiffed. Karlene opened the car door for him and I said, “Doesn’t he look so handsome for picture day?” Karlene said, “Er, picture day was yesterday.” Mom fail! So his PreK photograph has him sporting a ratty t-shirt, his hair a mess, something that looks like week-old chocolate cake all over his face. Then there was that time I was dropping him off, all the PreK teachers lined up outside, and a Pinellas County Sherriff’s Deputy followed me into the car line, blue lights flashing. I was driving a reckless 23 miles per hour . . . turns out Pinellas County takes their school zone speed limits seriously! My son asked, “Mommy, are you going to jail?” I hope not son. I hope not. I didn’t go to jail, but I did become the butt of the PreK teachers’ jokes that year. Mother of the year right here.
But has anyone here had the perfect mother, really? Not to be too hard on ole’ Mom, maybe I should ask the question, “How many of you were perfect kids?” That’s what I thought.
One day in a previous church I served, I met a gentleman who was new at the church. As we were talking, we discovered that both of us had grown up in the same area. He asked me where I had gone to high school. I told him, “Heritage High School.” He said, “My brother used to be the principal out there. Did you know Benny Dalton?”
As soon as he said the name, my face began to flush—the flush of shame and embarrassment. You see, I was one of those kids that spent a little too much time in Principal Dalton’s office. It’s not that I was a bad kid—it’s that there were just too many rules! How could one kid be expected to keep track of all those rules?
Folks in Jesus’ day felt the same way. The Jewish law had become so burdensome that no one could be a “good Jew.” There were 613 laws to be exact.
One of the greatest gifts Jesus gave to that community of faith was simplifying the code. I remember a brilliant sermon given by a friend of mine, “When the 10 Become 2.” He taught that Jesus reduced the 10 Commandments down to 2, simplifying the code. All the law, he suggested, could be boiled down to Jesus’ two commandments: love God, and love your neighbor.
While I don’t disagree with my friend, today’s lection seems to reduce the law even further. In this passage, Jesus offers only one commandment. By fulfilling this one commandment, we inherently fulfill the “loving God” piece. The two are so inextricably linked in this passage—they are almost synonymous. The one commandment he leaves us is highly practical and undeniably revolutionary. So if my friend’s sermon was “When the 10 Become 2,” mine could be called, “When the 613 Become 1.”
Why this one commandment? Let’s set it in context. Jesus is offering this teaching on the last night of his life. He has been with the disciples for his final Passover meal. He washed their feet. He broke bread with them and called it his body. He drank wine with them and called it his blood. Now the meal is finished, and it appears they are walking together toward the Garden of Gethsemane where Jesus will be arrested. This is his final conversation with his beloved friends. The things Jesus is telling them are the most important matters—spoken with intensity from one who is about to die.
Why this one commandment? Why now? I imagine that Jesus must be thinking about what would happen to this rag-tag group of followers without their leader. These guys . . . some of them were not the sharpest tools in the shed. So he wanted to make his most important idea crystal clear, so he didn’t give them 10 commandments. He didn’t even give them 2 commandments. He gave them one commandment. It was a commandment they could understand. It was rule of life that would unify a movement. It was a charge that would sustain his friends when things got crazy, and they were going to get real crazy. If they would but follow this one commandment, they would be grafted to Jesus and to the Father. Jesus said, after all, “If you keep my commandments (and I only have one) you will abide with me.”
This new commandment is a verb—an action—something we do. This one thing Jesus called his disciples to do is the one thing he calls us still to do. As a church . . .
We could have the best preaching in Pinellas County—but if we don’t do this one thing, we’re just a noisy gong.
We could have the best music in the Tampa Bay area—but if we don’t do this one thing, we’re like a clanging cymbal.
We could have the grandest building in all of Florida—but if we don’t do this one thing, we’re nothing.
The thing I’m talking about is patient; it is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. This thing does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. The thing I’m talking about never fails.
With this new commandment, Jesus creates a new family. Each of us was born into a physical family. But as Christians, we are born anew with water and the Spirit (John 3:5). With that, we have a new family. And guess what, you’re looking at it. Look around. That’s your sister. That’s your brother. That’s your mother. That’s your son. The children you saw earlier? Guess what? Those are your kids and your grandkids. (I’m dropping two of them off at your house later!) This is your family. With one family, you share physical DNA. With this family, you share spiritual DNA. Barbara Brown Taylor: “For [Jesus], family was not a matter of whose chromosomes you carry around inside of you but whose image you are created in. It was not a matter of who has the same last name or lives at the same address but who serves the same God.”
DOESN’T MEAN AGREE
This doesn’t mean that we all agree on everything. How boring would that be? When was the last time you sat down for Thanksgiving dinner and everyone shared all the same beliefs and ideas? Probably never. But you sit down and eat turkey anyway because it’s what families do. You are family, in all its wonderful, weird, complicated, messiness. You are family. You share the same DNA. So you sit down at table together and dine.
Christ calls us to be family. And in this new family there’s but one rule. It’s a commandment we can understand. It’s a rule of life that can unify a movement. It’s a charge that will sustain us when things get crazy, and let’s face it, things have been crazy.
It’s been a difficult year. We’ve each had our challenges over this past year with COVID, the shutdown, the fear of the virus, the isolation, loss of plans and social connections. Some have lost jobs. Some have lost friends. Then there’s the frustration with other people who handled the whole thing differently, even within our own church family. Maybe you’ve been frustrated with me and other church leaders for how we’ve handled the pandemic here at the church.
What could sustain a church through something as difficult and challenging as a global pandemic? We’re not perfect, but we are family, in all of our wonderful, weird, complicated, messiness. We are family. We’re unified by one thing. One great commandment. Just like Jesus taught.
And speaking of Jesus—just like that neophyte Jesus movement needed that ragtag group of disciples in order to survive, it needs you and me today. We are called to the same high calling as those first disciples.
You know how you can’t spell “mother” without H-E-R? You can’t spell “Jesus” without U-S. So church, we better do “us” well.
Oh! I almost forgot! I don’t think I ever told you what that one commandment was—that one thing Jesus tells us to do. Maybe it’s best remembered in song. If you know it, sing along:
And they’ll know we are Christians by our love, by our love.
Yes, they’ll know we are Christians by our love.