John 13: 34-38

 

“Love one another.”

This is the new commandment, the mandate from which this day takes its name.

But we would object, wouldn’t we, that there is nothing new about this commandment.

Just a few weeks ago we heard the story of a scribe who was so impressed by Jesus’ teaching that he asked: “What is the greatest commandment?”

And Jesus replied with the words from Deuteronomy: “You shall love God with all your heart and with all your mind and with all your soul and with all your strength.” For good measure, Jesus added the words from Leviticus, saying that the second is this: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

Nothing new here.

Love God.

Love your neighbor.

On this night, around this table, however, let us look more closely and listen more carefully.

Take note of when it is that Jesus gives this commandment that he calls “new.”

It is during a meal.

There is food to give strength for the challenges ahead.

There is, as the psalmist would say, wine to gladden the heart.

It is during a meal with companions—from Latin words meaning “those with whom we eat bread”—it is during a meal with companions that Jesus give this commandment.

With others—that is the only way that any of this is going to work.

With others we find strength. With others we find gladness.

That’s the only way we’ll get through.

With others, perhaps we do begin to hear something new:

I give you a new commandment, that you love one another.

            Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.

By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."

Unlike the commandments

            to love God with our whole being

                        to love our neighbor as ourselves

                                    or even to love our enemies,

this commandment focuses so specifically on love among those who are seeking to follow in the ways of Jesus Christ.

There is nothing easy about loving one another—treating members of the community with kindness and compassion, dignity and respect; sincerely desiring and working toward the well-being of one another. We know how difficult this can be.

And yet, we also know that we need each other.

We need this congregation to give us strength, because no individual can live the Christian life on his or her own. In isolation neither you nor I can feed the hungry or shelter the homeless or save the planet. Alone we can’t have much effect in the human struggles for justice and the quest for peace among enemies. Together. Together we make a difference.

We need this congregation to help us to be honest, because we are so ready and able to deceive ourselves. My actions never look so good and noble to others as they do to myself—nor do yours. We need each other to keep ourselves honest before God. As we do this discover that by God’s grace we are able to move forward in new relationships based on love, acceptance, and forgiveness rather than on expecting to have all of our dreams and illusions met.

We need the community of Congregational UCC to help us bear our burdens. The load just gets too heavy, too often, for us to carry it alone. When this congregation is at its best, it is a source of comfort through the times of grief and loss, illness and despair that we all face.

Strength, honesty, comfort—these are some of the primary gifts of community, but they are only a few out of many that could be named. These gifts become evident among us if we have love for one another.

Look closely tonight and in the days ahead:

Jesus gives his life as an expression of the fullness of his relationship with God.

Jesus gives his life as an expression of the fullness of God's love for the world.

It is not an act of self-denial, but of fullness, of living out his life and identity fully.

Genuine love, one for another, is not primarily about self-denial or sacrifice. Genuine love, one for another, honors others and honors self, respects others and respects self.

Jesus invites us to live fully so that we might treat others with kindness and compassion, dignity and respect.

We do hear a new commandment!

Jesus calls us to love one another. Nothing else we do will exhibit to the world who we are and whom we follow.

            Not maintaining our building.

            Not offering beautiful music or inspiring preaching.

            Not our work to feed the hungry.

            Not our generosity nor anything else in which we take pride.

We may do all of these things—and more!

We will do all of these things—and more!

But it is by our love for one another that people will know that we are those who follow in the way of Jesus Christ.

And as we love one another we discover that love growing so  that we open up this congregation to the wider community and invite others in.

We will love one another and we will let that love expand from this place because

The story is not over tonight.

The story is not over on Friday.

The story is not even over on Easter.

The road goes on. Our lives go on. The needs of the world go on.

And as we renew ourselves in love, as we renew ourselves with the bread and cup, we realize again and again—don’t we—that the risen Christ goes on ahead of us as we follow.

We come tonight, weary from the demands of the world.

In our emptiness, in our hunger and thirst for righteousness, we hear, not demands, but the gracious new command of Jesus: Love one another.

Eat and drink.

In doing so we will renew tomorrow’s song.