Readings: Psalm 98, Acts 10:44-48, John 15:9-17, 1 John 5:1-6
Preached at First Presbyterian Church, Baldwin, NY, on May 13th 2012
A printable PDF file can be found here
Mother's Day is a time that we honor those who bought us into this world, nurtured us, cared for us and guided us. In many homes, the hub of the action, the centering force of all that the home is, revolves around mother. That can be the same for single parent families, working mums, soccer mums, stay at home mums, every kind of mum that you can think of. In the absence of a mum there still has to be someone in the home who plays a mother-like role in the nurturing of a child. It all goes around mum!
Our reading this morning, from 1 John 5, brings us to the end of a series that has dealt with his themes of 'sin, forgiveness and love'. Last time we saw how it was John who penned the awesome words. 'God is Love'. In this mornings reading he again brings us back to the theme of love, but reminds us that unless we act upon the love that God offers to us, then we haven't really got it.
Today in our church calendar we are trying to act by receiving an offering for Church World Service's 'Blanket+' program. This offering helps provide blankets, food and other emergency supplies all over the world when disaster strikes. Love in action.
I like to think that John would approve of such efforts. Our reading this morning takes us a little further than just suggesting that because we are loved we should love others. He also suggests that our loving actions need to revolve around a center. In the home the center is often the mum of the household. In the household of faith, John tells us that our center is faith in Jesus Christ. He writes in verse 5 “Who is it that overcomes the world? Only the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.”
Isn't John's focus on faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God is a little restrictive? What's the big deal about believing in Jesus? Isn't it enough that we are generous and charitable and get along with each other? Why does John insist on muddying the waters by telling us we need to get our focus right about what we believe about Jesus Christ?
As far as John was concerned there could be no separation between belief and action. 'In fact', he says (Verse 3) 'This is love for God: to keep His commands”. Earlier in his letter he spoke about people who had become so sophisticated in their believing that they had fallen into all sorts of wrong ways of thinking that led them into wrong ways of acting. For John what you believe determines what you do, and what you do shows what you really believe.
John believed that faith is something that God has to birth within us through the action of the Holy Spirit. Faith is something that in John's gospel is described as being 'born from above' that effects the individual as though they had been 'born again'. Truly believing in God, for John is about having a God birthed faith. He gives us some reasons.
Only a God-birthed faith could give us a true love perspective.
Only a God birthed faith could create true community.
Only a God-birthed faith could conquer the world.
1. Only a God-birthed faith gives us a true love perspective.
In previous chapters John has been very careful to define what he means when he uses the word love. He always uses the Greek word 'agapé'. There were other words in Greek that he could have used. They had a word for family love 'storgé', they had a word for physical love, 'eros', they had a word for brotherly love 'philia'. John uses none of these, but uses the word 'agapé' which was particularly descriptive of the kind of love that was seen in the life of Jesus.
'Agapé' love described a life lived for the benefit of others. A love that healed and recreated and went beyond what was expected. A love that lifted up the fallen and was more concerned for the needs of the other than needs of the self. John outlines this love in chapter 4:9-10 “This is how God showed His love among us: He sent His one and only Son into the world that we might live through Him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as a propitiation for our sins.”
John sees Christian action as a response to what God has done for us in Jesus Christ. The act of God in Christ is the motivation and the centering point for loving the world. When we get it right about who Jesus is and why He came, it changes the way we live.
It changes the way we see others. We cannot look down on any body else or see any person as beyond the reach of God. Because Christ died for us, He died for them. Through the eyes of Jesus there is no 'us' and 'them'. All people are people who need the love and grace of God.
'That's love' says John. It's not a feeling. It's not an emotion. It's not something we fall in or out of. It's not being benevolent or feeling charitable. It's not giving out of a sense of guilt or acting out of duty. It is centering our life in Jesus Christ, being empowered by the Holy Spirit, opening our hearts and lives to the grace of God and acting in gratitude for the blessings of salvation Jesus obtained for us through His death and resurrection. Only a God-birthed faith gives us a true love perspective.
2.Only a God-birthed faith creates true community
John also insists that if we say that we love God, but do not apply ourselves to loving each other, then we are deluding ourselves, and the truth is not in us. He goes as far as saying that people who act like that, think they are children of God, but in actuality are walking in darkness, not in the light.
In previous chapters we see that John takes sin seriously. One of the most pernicious of sins is that of failing to work at creating community. We had these words in our reading this morning:- (verse 2) “This is how we know that we love the children of God: by loving God and carrying out His commands.” The stress is on centering our lives in Jesus Christ, and allowing Jesus to be the hub around which our community life revolves.
To truly be a community of faith we have to look to Jesus and see each other through the lens of the love of God. If we look to each other, if we look to having common interests or being like-minded as a center for our life together, then we become nothing more than a civic organization organized around a particular sense of values.
There's nothing wrong in having community organizations. They can do some great things. But they are not the Church of Jesus Christ. The Church of Christ has a higher calling. To be a place where all people can discover the love of God in Jesus Christ. A place where the outcast can find a home and those who feel unloved can be embraced by God's love. An oasis in the midst of a barren uncaring world where the hurting can find healing and the hopeless be inspired by the action of the Holy Spirit renewing their lives.
Unless we make Jesus Christ our focus none of that can happen. Unless we make Jesus Christ our center we quickly become exclusive rather than inclusive. Believe me, I am well aware that bills need to be paid, the building needs looking after and that we have to plan our programs and have our committees and maintain our records. But, please, never let us stop asking “Why?”
“Why are we a church?” Because God has called us to be a community that demonstrates to the world what living a life together focused on Jesus Christ looks like. Because God has a task for us, a task that can only be accomplished through our faith in Jesus Christ, a faith that we demonstrate by having love for each other and inviting others to be in on it. Only God-birthed faith gives us a true love perspective. Only a God-birthed faith creates true community.
3. Only a God-birthed faith conquers the world.
1 John 5: 4-5 “For everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world? Only the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.”
Conquer the world? Lord, who are You kidding? Lord, it's all I can do to hold my life together! You expect a 'pulled in one thousand directions, conflicted, stressed out, not always sure what I'm doing or what I really believe, things to do, places I need to be, person' like me, to conquer the world?
Friends that exactly why what we believe about Jesus Christ is so important. Verse 5... one more time... “Who is it that overcomes the world? Only the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.”
When John says 'Believe' he is not asking us to intellectually give a reasoned response to a number of theological formulations or do a check-list on the Apostles Creed. He is challenging us to consider where we are coming from, what our lives are revolving around, what we are centered upon.
If we can get it in our minds, that we, you and I, here today, at this time, in this place, are God's ultimate concern, than it can change the way we see ourselves, those around us and everything about our lives. If we can see that God's love really is so committed to us that in and through Jesus Christ, God can transform everything we are and everything we do, then it's going to make more than a little difference to the way we live.
It as we allow God to make a difference in us, through the working of the Holy Spirit, that our lives start to make a difference to the world. It happens in simple ways. Like supporting a Church World blanket + program. Like inviting a friend to church. Like visiting one of our shut-ins. Like being a little more attentive to prayer and Scripture reading.
To do any of that it is important we get our center in the right place. We celebrate on Mother's Day that at the center of a loving home is the love of a celebrated mum. John reminds us in his first letter that the center for both our personal faith and corporate life as a church is our faith in who Jesus is and what God is seeking to do in our lives and the life of God's world through the Holy Spirit. Why does he do that? Because...
- Only a God-birthed faith can give us a true love perspective.
- Only a God birthed faith can create true community.
- Only a God-birthed faith can conquer the world.
And to God's name be all glory. Amen.
Rev. Adrian J. Pratt B.D.
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