Community Church of Durham
I John 4
1.
So when you tend to the bees in your beehives at home all summer long, tenderly hoping that your tending is part of God’s mending: that’s the first love birthing your love and making the whole world new. And when you sit with a friend watching a bright yellow sun turn orange and red as it sets over the hills in the west, your heart afire with gratitude: that’s the first love birthing your love and making the whole world new.
And when you commit to a shift that keeps another friend safe in a season of intimidation and cruelty, when you put your body in a place between him and harm: that’s the first love birthing your love and making the whole world new. Loving is your birthright!
And what this means, of course, is that we don’t have to think our way to God. And we don’t have to rationalize God’s existence, according to other intellectual traditions or theories. And we most certainly don’t have to wait for some headstrong evangelist to explain God to us, or even threaten us into belief and salvation. We simply and only yield to the most human instinct of them all, the most human that is also the most divine: we love, and we love, and we love. In the fields out back and your beehives. On a bench with a beloved and that sunset. In a quiet hall, keeping watch for a friend. (And you know the friend that I’m talking about.) All of that loving—because God has first loved us, because God has first loved everything, because God has first loved the world. And we’re a part of it all. Loving. Our birthright. Our vocation. Our heart’s desire.
And the writer of this letter goes on, as you’ve heard, and puts a fairly fine point on all of this. So that his friends in beloved community are clear around their own vocation, their ministry, in the here and now: “If someone claims, ‘I love God,’ but hates a brother or sister, then they’re a liar,” he says. “Anyone who does not love a brother or sister, whom they have seen, cannot possibly love God, whom they have never seen.” Again, the heart, the soul of Christian vocation. And then just to be sure those first Christians don’t miss his point: “Jesus gave us a clear command, that all who love God must also love their brothers and sisters.”
2.
A couple of weeks ago I mentioned here a lively conversation I’d had on campus with two graduate students, Christian graduate students, who worried about the rainbow flag out front, the message it sent, and the kind of Christianity that distorts what they claim to be the urgent truth of biblical faith. Well, two of the three returned last week, visiting me here in the office, and (in the end) sadly announcing to my face that I was a “false teacher” of a misguided gospel. To be honest, I wonder if they came up with that on their own; or if some preacher somewhere put them up to it. But there they were.
Now while I had to admire the chutzpah of a 23 year old who would presume to sit down with a 63 year old pastor and say such a thing, I have to confess the whole thing also breaks my heart. That there are churches out there, and presumably preachers out there, directing their 23 year olds to scour the streets looking for “false teachers;” that there are Christians out there with such a sad and narrow definition of “loving” that it leaves little room for anything other than their own bland and tired and (frankly) misogynist versions of the same; and that these same believers have reduced the bible to its most outdated and damaging verses, without grasping the radically liberating texts in the same book that argue against such judgment and cruelty. Texts like this First Letter of John. Which doesn’t threaten or constrain or limit our loving—but dignifies it, celebrates it, even consecrates it.
Because—and this right here in this morning’s reading—“God is love.” “God is love. And anyone who lives faithfully in love also lives faithfully in God, and God lives in them.” I mean this is the point of it all, am I right? This is our vocation, am I right? Loving as mutual recognition and joyful trust. Loving as prayerful discernment and courageous service. Loving as relationships that shine with respect and commitment and kindness. “Anyone who lives in love also lives faithfully in God, and God lives in them.” And then these words, among the most important and emancipating words in all of scripture: “Love will never invoke fear.” Again. “Love will never invoke fear.” Because “perfect love expels fear, particularly the fear of punishment. And the one who fears punishment has not been completed through love.”
I mean, I get it. Getting back to my two young friends in the office. I understand that fundamentalists are all vexed about our rainbow flag, and the loving spirit of our expanding ministry with queer kids, and the spirited weddings we do in this place for all kinds of couples. I get it.
(By the way, I officiated at a wedding in this very space several years ago, in which two women celebrated their vows; and I have not—in 36 years of ministry—celebrated a more joyous, more Christ-like, or more loving marriage; nor a wedding with deeper spiritual values and wisdom; nor a community of such grace, enthusiasm and resilient hope in one another. Some of you were here that day. I imagine it still shines in your soul. As it does in mine. God is love. God is love. God is love.)
So let’s be clear. As this wonderful letter is clear. Jesus comes with a message of love and grace: and that good news diagnoses our fearfulness and then liberates us with a love so big, so sweet, so creative and so “perfect,” that it frees us from those devastating, soul-crushing fears once and for all. “We love because God / has first loved us.” Not because we’re afraid of going to hell. Not because God’s wrath is waiting out there, somewhere, for the unconverted. “We love because God / has first loved us.”
3.
I want to speak to the importance of prayer, of some kind of regular practice of prayer, in welcoming that love, embracing that love and manifesting that love in a world of dear friends and bewildering vulnerability. Because like those fundamentalists, I really do think prayer is where the rubber hits the road. (I just think we’re talking about different roads!)
One of the many gifts I received over the summer was time, spacious and expansive time; and this allowed me to renew and even deepen my own practice of daily prayer and meditation. Every day, at least once, but often twice, I’ll find a quiet place to sit for thirty minutes. I’ll recite a prayer I’ve memorized—sometimes the Jesus prayer, sometimes a Mary Oliver poem—and then I’ll center my body, my spirit, my whole self in silence for about 25 minutes. Breathing slowly. Aware of all the sensations within. Just me, and my body, and my breath, and God.
With the counsel of some Buddhist teachers Kate and I met in August, I’m increasingly aware that prayer is as much about the body as it is the mind. Somehow—and I hope this makes sense—God is asking, even yearning to pray in me, in my breathing, in my aching, in my discomfort even, and in my restfulness. In all the particularity of my being. And when I yield to all of this, when I welcome God’s yearning in me, and sit down to pray—I discover God not as a thought, or even a matter of conviction, but as a Presence (capital P), as a friend, as the One Big Love that moves within me and within us all. The breath of all breathing. The pumping energy of all hearts. The stillness at the mysterious center of all stillness. And this is why this daily practice of prayer is so essential to me now, and so urgent in my busy life and ministry. “We love because God / has first loved us.” To be aware of God’s loving, to be filled with God’s loving, is to be freed (not miraculously, but steadily) from fears of failure or angst for the future or creeping despair. To be aware of God’s loving—in my body—is to be moved, compelled, even liberated in a world aching to be loved. And worthy of being loved.
So the last five minutes of my practice—again, at least once, but sometimes twice a day—I’ll turn to the people and places I love, or am trying to love. A bell on an app will signal that the first 25 minutes have come round, and in my lap I’ll turn my palms up—and I’ll quietly lift up the names of those I’m holding close that particular day. And what I want to say here is that the embodied prayer of those first 25 minutes most often allows me to experience not just an intellectual connection—but a felt connection, muscle and heartbeat, bloodflow and breath, a bond between my life and the lives of those I love and pray for. Antony and his family. "Christ, have mercy." My Palestinian friends in Bethlehem. "Christ, have mercy." Anita Pilar in rehab this morning. "Christ, have mercy." Dick Aplin’s family in their grief. "Christ, have mercy." Margo and Tabitha and their kids with the stomach flu. "Christ, have mercy." The heartbroken neighborhood in Madbury. "Christ, have mercy." And my family too. "Christ, have mercy."
.
It’s very simple, this litany; but slow, and as easy as my breathing. And what happens in all this is something like communion for me: without the bread and juice, but very much a matter of shared love, mutual care and compassion. It’s not just a “hail mary” of hope that someone “up there” will hear my prayer; but a lived, embodied and deeply mystical sense of friendship, connection and mercy. “We love because God / has first loved us.” In my loving, God’s loving. In my loving, God’s loving. Something like that. Exactly like that.
4.
So let’s be bold this morning, let’s be biblically bold this morning, and let’s say that the whole purpose of Jesus’ ministry among us is to break the cycle of fear, punishment and shame to so often warps human relationships, incites hatred and drives human communities to violence and war. Again. The whole purpose of Jesus’ ministry is to break that cycle and liberate us from fear, punishment and shame—so that we can freely and bravely and creatively love one another and love God as we do. So if you’re living with any kind of fear, especially fears born of a sense of inadequacy in your heart or scarcity in your life, know that God’s intention, Jesus’ love aims to free you once and for all from all that. From the fear that burdens your heart and makes it hard to delight in much of anything. From the angst that there’s never enough to fully relax, or never enough to fully feel safe, or never enough to fully feel settled and honored and at home in the world.
Jesus comes, says the gospel, that every one of us might have life, and have it abundantly. And that’s a given. It’s already accomplished. You are loved! Grace is the gift. So we can love, and love fully and bravely, because God’s loved us already. Fully, bravely, completely.
This morning’s reading begins with this bit about testing spirits, examining them carefully to determine if they come from God. And that’s part of the deal we make in joining a biblical tradition, and a covenantal tradition like ours. There will be many interpretations along the way, all kinds of teachings and spirits. It’s on us to test them all, to examine them carefully. Are the teachings we encounter consistent with the Love of Jesus who calls us into communion and reconciles us all and makes us one? Are the teachings we encounter designed to create fear, judgment, dis-ease? Or do they invite in us a spirit of human kindness, courageous compassion and gratitude? It’s on us to test them all.
So I want to finish by offering this as gently as I can: Preachers who pedal hatred as the Gospel of Jesus Christ are way off course, way, way off course. Jesus comes to be a sign of sacrificial love, a living embodiment of sacrificial love and a human invitation to loving relationships, communities and ministries. “Jesus gave us a clear command,” and this is in the text, “that all who love God must also love their brothers and sisters.” And it’s not a threat. It’s a gift. Everything about this life, everything about this planet, everything about our faith. It’s a gift.
Thanks be to the God of liberating love.
Amen and Ashe.
I want to speak to the importance of prayer, of some kind of regular practice of prayer, in welcoming that love, embracing that love and manifesting that love in a world of dear friends and bewildering vulnerability. Because like those fundamentalists, I really do think prayer is where the rubber hits the road. (I just think we’re talking about different roads!)
With the counsel of some Buddhist teachers Kate and I met in August, I’m increasingly aware that prayer is as much about the body as it is the mind. Somehow—and I hope this makes sense—God is asking, even yearning to pray in me, in my breathing, in my aching, in my discomfort even, and in my restfulness. In all the particularity of my being. And when I yield to all of this, when I welcome God’s yearning in me, and sit down to pray—I discover God not as a thought, or even a matter of conviction, but as a Presence (capital P), as a friend, as the One Big Love that moves within me and within us all. The breath of all breathing. The pumping energy of all hearts. The stillness at the mysterious center of all stillness. And this is why this daily practice of prayer is so essential to me now, and so urgent in my busy life and ministry. “We love because God / has first loved us.” To be aware of God’s loving, to be filled with God’s loving, is to be freed (not miraculously, but steadily) from fears of failure or angst for the future or creeping despair. To be aware of God’s loving—in my body—is to be moved, compelled, even liberated in a world aching to be loved. And worthy of being loved.
So the last five minutes of my practice—again, at least once, but sometimes twice a day—I’ll turn to the people and places I love, or am trying to love. A bell on an app will signal that the first 25 minutes have come round, and in my lap I’ll turn my palms up—and I’ll quietly lift up the names of those I’m holding close that particular day. And what I want to say here is that the embodied prayer of those first 25 minutes most often allows me to experience not just an intellectual connection—but a felt connection, muscle and heartbeat, bloodflow and breath, a bond between my life and the lives of those I love and pray for. Antony and his family. "Christ, have mercy." My Palestinian friends in Bethlehem. "Christ, have mercy." Anita Pilar in rehab this morning. "Christ, have mercy." Dick Aplin’s family in their grief. "Christ, have mercy." Margo and Tabitha and their kids with the stomach flu. "Christ, have mercy." The heartbroken neighborhood in Madbury. "Christ, have mercy." And my family too. "Christ, have mercy."
.
It’s very simple, this litany; but slow, and as easy as my breathing. And what happens in all this is something like communion for me: without the bread and juice, but very much a matter of shared love, mutual care and compassion. It’s not just a “hail mary” of hope that someone “up there” will hear my prayer; but a lived, embodied and deeply mystical sense of friendship, connection and mercy. “We love because God / has first loved us.” In my loving, God’s loving. In my loving, God’s loving. Something like that. Exactly like that.
4.
So let’s be bold this morning, let’s be biblically bold this morning, and let’s say that the whole purpose of Jesus’ ministry among us is to break the cycle of fear, punishment and shame to so often warps human relationships, incites hatred and drives human communities to violence and war. Again. The whole purpose of Jesus’ ministry is to break that cycle and liberate us from fear, punishment and shame—so that we can freely and bravely and creatively love one another and love God as we do. So if you’re living with any kind of fear, especially fears born of a sense of inadequacy in your heart or scarcity in your life, know that God’s intention, Jesus’ love aims to free you once and for all from all that. From the fear that burdens your heart and makes it hard to delight in much of anything. From the angst that there’s never enough to fully relax, or never enough to fully feel safe, or never enough to fully feel settled and honored and at home in the world.
Jesus comes, says the gospel, that every one of us might have life, and have it abundantly. And that’s a given. It’s already accomplished. You are loved! Grace is the gift. So we can love, and love fully and bravely, because God’s loved us already. Fully, bravely, completely.
This morning’s reading begins with this bit about testing spirits, examining them carefully to determine if they come from God. And that’s part of the deal we make in joining a biblical tradition, and a covenantal tradition like ours. There will be many interpretations along the way, all kinds of teachings and spirits. It’s on us to test them all, to examine them carefully. Are the teachings we encounter consistent with the Love of Jesus who calls us into communion and reconciles us all and makes us one? Are the teachings we encounter designed to create fear, judgment, dis-ease? Or do they invite in us a spirit of human kindness, courageous compassion and gratitude? It’s on us to test them all.
So I want to finish by offering this as gently as I can: Preachers who pedal hatred as the Gospel of Jesus Christ are way off course, way, way off course. Jesus comes to be a sign of sacrificial love, a living embodiment of sacrificial love and a human invitation to loving relationships, communities and ministries. “Jesus gave us a clear command,” and this is in the text, “that all who love God must also love their brothers and sisters.” And it’s not a threat. It’s a gift. Everything about this life, everything about this planet, everything about our faith. It’s a gift.
Thanks be to the God of liberating love.
Amen and Ashe.
