May 10, 2009 - 1 John 4:7-21 - Love is From God
It’s Mother’s Day! This one day each year we set aside to honor the women in our lives who have loved us, cared for us and nurtured us. These women usually include, but are not necessarily limited to our biological mothers, but include all those who over the years mothered us – the ones who often loved us when no one else would – the ones who stayed with us through bad times as well as good times – the ones who loved us not for anything we could do or say, but simply because we are -
On the second Sunday of May each year, we say a special ‘thank you’ to those who loved us before we could ever love them back, the ones who taught us how to love by first showing us what love is all about – not with words and pretty cards, but by what they did – and still do. And some of that doing was pretty miserable duty.
---------------------------------------------------
Those who mother us have a special gift of making us feel special – for showing us that we have some intrinsic value – and they’re right! We are all just that: special! Every one of us! What makes us special? Well, we can begin to answer that by looking at what makes us feel special:
We feel special when we feel loved, when we can feel good about ourselves because someone else does, when we can be happy with who we are not just with what we do. But sadly, feeling good about ourselves and being happy with who we are, is a feeling in short supply now-a-days. We live in a world that is intent on tearing down us instead of building us up, a world that looks into the deepest crevices looking for the evil, the failures, the ugly, instead of the good, the successful, the beautiful.
The only antidote for a world like this is love. Yes, I know, the love card has been played so often that we don't want to hear it - much less believe it any more. Who among us has never been disappointed in love, who has never been betrayed by friend or family who said one thing and did another?
Part of that might just be because we are, like the lyrics of a popular song, ‘looking for love in all the wrong places’ and defining it in terms of what we need and what we can get instead of what others need and what we can give away. Maybe if we thought of loving one another in terms of mothering one another, we would be closer to the kind of love we learn from God – the kind of love we have received from God and the kind of love God commands us to give away to one another.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
And when we think of mothering this way – as what we do – as usually selfless and often thankless acts of kindness that may or may not be appreciated or returned, then in this very special way, those who mother us show us just a glimpse of what God is all about and the kind of love that God shows.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This morning's scripture portion from 1 John talks about love - as does most of the book of 1 John, but here in these verses, the word love appears 25 times in just 15 verses. In this morning’s passage of scripture, John speaks about love more purely, more eloquently, more profoundly that anywhere else in the New Testament (New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol. XII, p. 429). It is a description even more poignant that it's more famous cousin 1 Corinthians 13 - and the thing that makes it so important is its focus. While the words of 1 Corinthians can make it seem that love can come from within, these verses from 1 John make is absolutely clear that love can only start with and originate from God. This morning's scripture portion from 1st John gives us a better definition of what love is and a different perspective on where it comes from and where it should be going – and like its cousin of scripture in 1 Corinthians, John’s letter reminds us that the most important thing in the world is God's love. It is God's love for us that makes it possible for us to love one another.
------------------------------------------------------------------
I turned on the news this morning and cried. I was overcome by stories of murder, hatred, hunger and sorrow - stories of natural disasters and stories of people hurting one another. I thought about how far we are from God’s original plan for us and our world – and I wondered how much God cries at the sin and the pain in the world.
Sin is everywhere in the world, but it is not just the things we do that are wrong, it includes the wrongs done to us - not just by the people in the world, but by societies and governments that systematically cheat the poor, defraud the oppressed, and rape the resources of the planet.
Love is of God, not love is God. God originates love, but is not defined by or limited by our understanding of what love is. Love comes from God because God loved us before we were ever able to return it. All real love comes first from God. And it is this divinely inspired love that makes it possible for us to love both God and one another.
We know this because all that we are, all that we have and all that we ever will be is a gift from God - and this is the promise we have from God: God knows everything there is to know about us. God sees our failures, our pessimism, our doubts - and loves us anyway.
God is not the eternal abusive parent – a parent who hurts their children to appease their own insecurities. God is not the omnipotent sadist who sends hurricanes and earthquakes to punish us or teach us a lesson.
The world tells us lies like that. The world and the evil that exists in it have done a pretty good job as beating us up. Before we were very old at all, the world had taught us to be careful, not to think too highly of ourselves, to expect the worst from the world and from one another -- but as the Holy Spirit of God came we were enabled to turn that around, but none of us is done yet. We are so overwhelmed by the sins of the world, that none of us can be what God intended for us and our world to be – at least not yet.
But this seeming failure is not the end of God’s commands and promises to us. We cannot retreat behind the walls of our church buildings. We cannot turn our backs on the world’s need as if we had no need of them. Our focus cannot remain entirely on ourselves and our own walk with God.
--------------------------------------------------
As Christians, it is our responsibility - indeed our privilege and in fact our commandment - to share with others the love we have already received from God. - This is the defining description of Christians in the first century – ‘See how they love one another’. Over the centuries, we have lost that label and exchanged it for – ‘See how righteous they are’, and ‘See how they take care of their own’ and ‘See how they condemn and persecute those who disagree with them’.
The good news for us this day is that it doesn’t have to be like this. The good for us this day is that through the power of the Holy Spirit we can change this. The good news for us this day is that like the early church, we are empowered by the love we have received from God to do something positive to change the world. We can obey God’s command to love. We can each take a step in changing the world’s perception of Christianity by taking a step in obedience and love.
Take out the bulletin inserts you received this morning. O it, write a list of 3 people in your life who need to feel special, three people who need to know how wonderful they are, who need to know that God loves them: three people who need some mothering the same way God mothers us. These are perhaps not be people in your close family, not good friends with whom you already give and receive love. These should be people forgotten by the world, neglected by others or perhaps even disliked by you.
After you have made that list, don’t throw it away. Keep that list by your side. Pray for them. Picture them as God intended them to be and treat them as God wants to treat them. Visit them, listen to them tell you about their troubles, their joys, their fears and their hopes. Pray with them. Smile with them. Cry with them.
As we begin to be more obedient in love, John assures us that we will begin to see God more clearly. We will be instruments of casting out fear in the world and begin to reach for God’s perfection in love.
Certainly this is a wondrous way to honor all those who have mothered us in love – and the Holy One who makes it possible. Amen.
