Easter 5C
May 18, 2025
John 13:31-35
INTRODUCTION
Today, in the midst of the Easter season, we are transported back to the night of Jesus’ betrayal, when he is in that upper room with the disciples. He has just washed their feet, and then, immediately before today’s Gospel reading, Judas leaves the room to go and sell Jesus out. And then, knowing what’s just happened, and that he’s about to die, Jesus will turn to his disciples and give them a “new” commandment: to love one another as he has loved them. Easy to say, difficult to do!
Before we get to the Gospel, though, we will hear a couple other readings, one from Acts and one from Revelation. Both are visions, and it is useful to look at them through the lens of that new commandment Jesus gives, because they can each show us a bit about what it can look like to be a community that is marked by the command to love one another.
In Acts, Peter has a strange vision, three times. To understand this vision, remember that Jews had a stringent set of dietary and other laws that they followed in order to set them apart as God’s chosen people. Gentiles did not follow those rules, and so until now, they had not been a part of the Christian community. But this vision Peter has blows apart the idea that Gentiles are not included in God’s chosen people. Just as no food is excluded, so also are no people excluded from God’s love.
Revelation gives us yet another vision of what life ruled by the commandment to love can look like – a new heaven and a new earth in which “death will be no more, mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.” All three texts offer lots of hope for the original audience, and for us today. As you listen, hear that hope offered also to you: hope of acceptance, and love, and restoration, no matter what you are facing. Let’s listen.
[READ]
Alleluia, Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed! Alleluia!
Grace to you and peace from our risen Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.
Here’s how I started my week. After a very full weekend of plans and celebrations, we had not gotten to the grocery store, and by Monday the poor dog was out of food and had been getting by on literal crumbs from her dogfood bag, and whatever the kids dropped (mostly chips) for almost a full day. So, killing two birds with one stone, I used my morning walk to walk to Wegmans, and get little Joey some food. I checked out using Samsung Pay, like usual… but had forgotten that we’d had a credit card fraud incident over the weekend, and the card had been canceled. Frustrated, I left the store in a hurry to get home and get my wallet. As I raced past a woman on the sidewalk, she said, “You look like a woman on a mission! I’ll get out of your way!” I laughed and told her why I was in such a hurry, and how frustrated I was that this was the second time in three weeks that we’d had a credit card fraud alert. She said, “I’ll buy your dog some food.” I told her she didn’t have to do that, but she insisted, pulling me back toward the store. I gushed about how kind she was, how she really didn’t have to, but she was relentless. “All I ask,” she said, “is that you pay it forward.” After we checked out, we chatted as we walked toward our respective homes. She said, “I just think spreading kindness like this is the way to heal this world.” I agreed. When we parted, she wished me all God’s blessings, and I did the same to her. I introduced myself, and asked for her name (Gail), so that I could pray for her by name, and we parted ways.
“I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, so you should love one another.” I knew going into this week that this would be the Gospel reading for this Sunday, and so I had planned to keep my eyes open all week for stories of love – and God delivered at 7am on Monday morning! Gail had said, “All I ask is that you pay it forward,” which sounds an awful lot like, “As I have loved you, so you should love one another.” That same day, I posted some items on Facebook to give away for free, rather than selling them. I called a couple people back who had reached out to St. Paul’s for some financial assistance and I bought and sent them gift cards for food. I prayed for Gail. Small things, each. Yet each one made a difference for someone, brightening their day. Each was an act of love.
Now, I don’t want to be saccharine about this love commandment. Buying a stranger dogfood or supplying a Wegmans gift card for someone in need – these are certainly feel-good acts for all involved. But we also know that love is not always so easy and not even always feel-good. And truth be told, while I think God is pleased when we do these things, I suspect Jesus’ commandment here is more about the very difficult sort of love. Keep in mind the context of this command: we are back on Maundy Thursday, the day before Jesus’ death. He has just washed his disciples’ feet, including those of Judas, who he knows has just left to betray Jesus to the authorities. Jesus gives this commandment also to Peter, whose three-fold denial Jesus will predict in the very next verses. This is literally Jesus’ dying wish to his closest friends, who will, each one, abandon him in his hour of need.
In other words, this moment is not a feel-good one. Jesus isn’t, like, suggesting over Sunday brunch that they should all volunteer for an upcoming fundraiser (though that would also be loving). He is commanding, into the darkest moment of all of their lives, into the midst of betrayal and fear and anxiety – that they love one another, even those who would do them wrong. In fact, he says, this sort of love – the kind that isn’t easy and often requires enormous sacrifice (as it did for Jesus) – is how others will know they are followers of Christ.
Think of that! It is not their, or our, church buildings that will show that we love Jesus, nor our doctrines, nor our diligence in Bible study. It is not our beautiful, sparkling cross necklaces. No, our devotion to Christ will be known by how we love one another: strangers at the store, yes, but also strangers in our land, and people who have wronged us, who scare us, who believe differently from us, and people who live their lives in a way we don’t approve. Love people whom Jesus loved – those who are suffering or struggling, people who are hungry, sick, or in need. Love one another, as Christ has loved you.
We are all capable of loving people in the way that Gail did at the store – whether it is buying groceries for someone, or holding a door, or simply asking how someone’s day is going and really listening to their answer. We can, and we should! But what sort of more demanding love might Christ be calling you into in this time?
Could it be finding a way to forgive someone who has hurt you? Could it look like listening to and trying to understand the viewpoint of someone who differs from you, or striving to see the opposing side, or someone whose experience differs from yours, with compassion rather than fear or anger? Could loving one another in this time be not only donating food to hungry people, but also addressing the root causes of their hunger by engaging in advocacy – calling your legislators and urging them, as they work on a budget for the next year of our shared life, to remember the needs of the sick and poor in our community? (If you are interested but nervous about doing this sort of advocacy, by the way, maybe the first step toward this sort of love is to come to the advocacy workshop we are offering on June 7, which will address how such advocacy is a way to live out our faith and our baptismal promises! Sign up HERE.)
How else might you live out Jesus’ command to love one another, as he has loved us? Could you commit to finding one new way to love one another this week, and going forward?
However it looks, I agree with my new friend Gail: loving one another with the same compassionate, self-sacrificing, humble love with which Jesus loved us is how we can heal the world. It is how we can participate in bringing about the new heaven and new earth described in Revelation, in which mourning and crying and pain will be no more. I believe in that world, believe it is possible, if we do truly love one another with the love Jesus shows us, and furthermore I believe God is calling us to be a part of bringing new life to a world in need.
One of my seminary classmates recently spoke out in a public setting with diverse clergy from around her state, and with her permission, I’d like to close with her words, which I think so beautifully echo both Jesus’ command to love one another, and that vision from Revelation. She said, “One of the traditions we share is the practice of theological imagination in which we dare to dream of a world we have not yet seen but we believe is possible if we are willing to do our part in creating it – a beautiful reality in which every person has what they need to flourish and thrive. May we continue to practice the discipline of hope that guides our work for a more just and compassionate [state], country, and world. May it be so.”
Let us pray… Loving Christ, when we are suffering or fearful, it can be difficult to reach out to one another in love; we are more inclined to turn inward. Give us the strength to turn outward and love, especially in the midst of suffering, so that we might witness and be a part of the new thing you are doing amongst your people. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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