John 13:31 -35
In today’s gospel Jesus gives his disciples a new commandment But what is new about it? The old testament is full of admonitions to love your neighbor. The writings of Moses insisted that the strangers and foreigners in the midst of the Israelites should be treated not only with respect but with love. So what is this commandment of Jesus’ all about? Why is it new?
Jesus is at the last supper. Judas has gone of to betray him. He’s alone with the other eleven disciples. Notice that he says, “Love one another as I have loved you”. He hasn’t been crucified yet, he hasn’t given up his life for his people, he hasn’t even started his church. But he gives them a new commandment, to love one another as He has loved them. So before Jesus went to his death, he must have loved his disciples in new ways. And what do we know about that?
So how did he love his disciples in a way that they could imitate? I think you have to look at the whole time that Jesus was with his disciples. The first thing that happened was that he called them to share in his ministry. You remember when he called Peter, who fell to his knees and asked Jesus to leave him because he was a sinful man. And Jesus invited Peter to become a fisher of men. And as Jesus gathered his twelve apostles, the story was always the same; he called and they answered, and he promised that they would make a difference, that they would be there to judge the world, that they would be able to work miracles like he worked. But first they would have be be disciples, first they would have to learn from him how to see the world in a new way. And the disciples did. When you look at the gospel stories and the Acts of the Apostles, you can’t help but notice how Jesus took a band of illiterate fisherman and tradespeople and turned them into evangelists, into missionaries. The first way Jesus Loved his disciples was to allow them to share in his mission.
The second way Jesus loved his disciples was by serving them. He demonstrated this by the washing of their feet, which took place just before this gospel story. It must have been pretty obvious to the disciples that Jesus expected them to serve each other; the greatest among them would be the servant of all. Peter took this to heart, as shown in the Acts of the Apostles. He served the early Christian community by being someone who settled disputes, who sought out the Holy spirit in prayer and in consultation, who served the community in humility -- when he was called out by Paul for treating the gentile Christians differently than the Jewish ones, he accepted the correction.. Peter lived for the Church, he put the needs of the Church first. And we see that among the other early leaders of the Church. When you read the scriptures you see this, and it's so familiar to us that we don’t see the uniqueness any more. Before and after Jesus, most leaders chose to be leaders out of self serving motives, and often gained those positions by violence.. But Jesus turns the attention of his disciples to humble service. This is loving leadership.
The third way Jesus loved his disciples was by forgiving them. We think about the betrayal of Peter and how Jesus forgave him there on the shores of the sea of Galilee after the resurrection. But there were plenty of other times Jesus forgave his followers. Maybe their offenses weren’t as serious as Peter’s, like when James and John wanted to call down fire upon the Samaritan village that had rejected them, or when they couldn’t see the point he was making with a parable and he had to patiently explain what he meant. And perhaps that’s the kind of forgiveness we need to imitate. It’s one thing to forgive an enemy, but when someone does us serious harm we tend to avoid that person in the future, forgiven or not. It’s another thing to deal with what we see as shortcomings in people -- our children, our spouse, our friends -- and rather than “put up” with them, learn to love those shortcomings, knowing we have them as well. When Peter proclaimed that Jesus was the Messiah, the Christ, Jesus gave him a nickname -- Peter which means “Rock”. And that nickname would be prophetic, because Peter would eventually become the rock upon which the Church would be built, but he would also be very un-rock like in the courtyard of the high priest the night before Jesus was crucified. And Jesus called James and John “Sons of Thunder” when they wanted to destroy the Samaritan village. And I think when the disciples returned from the mission on which he had sent them and told of all the things that had happened, Jesus observed that he had seen Satan falling from heaven. In other words, as I read the gospels, Jesus loves the things about us that make us unique, and doesn’t just put up with them.
So the new commandment of Jesus is to love as he did -- to invite others into a common ministry; to serve each other without expecting thanks or recognition; and to forgive each other, especially of the little things we don’t even recognize as worthy of forgiveness.
And we are all called to this kind of love. And how do we know when we are living that way? When people see it and know we are Jesus’ disciples.
No comments:
Post a Comment