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In our competitive and fragmented world it’s easy to fall into the trap of feeling worthless and unlovable. The truth is no matter how we may feel, we are deeply loved by God. The gift of his son Jesus, who invites us into friendship with God, is eternal confirmation of that. Every moment of every day we have the opportunity to extend that loving friendship to one another.

 

The Place Called Love

My horticultural career started early but was very short-lived. My first job was at a place called Orban’s Plant Nursery in Bradenton, Florida. I was one of the many youth employed there one particular summer. Our primary responsibility was to plant Poinsettia plants for the Christmas season. One of my supervisors there was a very strict woman, kind of a roaming Poinsettia dictator, who liked to bark orders at her underlings. One day, hot, tired, and covered in soil, I had had enough. I hatched a sinister plot to strike back, in a passive-aggressive way, of course. I began to secretly plant some of the little Poinsettia seedlings upside down in the soil. Now before you judge me, know that I was 13, and that was before I knew Jesus, and before any kind of conflict resolution training. I can’t remember if I planted two of them or a whole row of them like that. Regardless, someone was going to get an interesting surprise because barring some miracle, those poor things weren’t going to produce because their roots weren’t anchored in the rich soil, but rather pointing up and away into the air.

Friends, in life as in gardening, it matters where our roots are planted. That’s the context of our passage this morning. Jesus’ death is imminent and he shares with his disciples a metaphor of a vine and branches. He says he is the vine and they are his branches. As long as they stay rooted in him, they will produce a cornucopia of fruit. If their life-roots are elsewhere, they won’t produce fruit. They’ll dry up and be thrown on a stack of firewood.

Our passage takes this metaphor deeper, explaining what it means to be rooted in Jesus.

(read John 15:9-17, 1069)

Jesus says,

“As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love.”

To be anchored in the vine means to remain in Jesus’ love. Another translation of the Greek word for “to remain” is “to live.” We live in his love. We build our homes in his love and walk around in it from room to room, enjoying the reality of God’s deep love for us.

And the world is screaming for that love. I have a friend who has just recently accepted Christ into her life, but she is still struggling to grasp God’s unconditional love for her. How can God love her, she says when her heart is black, when she’s lived so selfishly? Can God truly forgive her when she’s lived for forty years like that? How many of you are where she is? How many of us have deep feelings of shame or rejection or worthlessness, wondering if the world would notice if we just disappeared, or wondering if the world would be a better place if we did. The truth is God loves us no matter what?

In John 13, Jesus, who always followed the promptings of his Father in heaven, is at his last evening meal with his disciples and he gets up, takes off his outer clothing, and wraps a towel around his waist. He pours water into a basin and begins to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel. Where his words didn’t suffice, he showed them the full extent of his love, as John puts it. What an intimate way to show them that he was giving them the gift of his life, humbly putting them ahead of himself.

In this scene, Jesus refers to himself as master and his disciples as servants. And as one Bible commentator writes, there is no shame in carrying the title of servant of God. It was a title of honor. Some of the greatest people of faith in the Bible carried that designation, from Moses to Joshua to David to the apostle Paul, and others.

Yet another commentator observes that as the evening progresses with his disciples, however, as the cross nears, Jesus calls them something else. Friends. That’s what he calls them in our passage. There is some Biblical background to the idea of God’s people being referred to as friends of God. Abraham was called a friend of God. But, it wasn’t common. For a person to be welcomed into friendship with Jesus who was one with the Father, would have been a striking concept to those who first heard and read this.

Jesus had offered his disciples a level of intimacy with God that no human had ever experienced. Friends share with each other what is on their minds and hearts, their hopes and dreams for each other. And that’s what Jesus had done. He had shared with them the whisperings, the plans, and purposes of his Father in heaven.

Our modern day conception of friendship is a little different than Gospel writer John’s. For him, friendship and love were synonymous. The root of the Greek word he uses for “friend” is the root for the word "to love." To be a friend of Jesus meant to be loved by him and to love him. Friendship for Jesus was not a light matter. There was unimaginable cost to him. As he lay down his clothes to wash his disciples’ feet, he would also lay down his life and suffer for them, for us on the cross, so that all of his friends and future friends could be forgiven of rebellion against the living God and be reconciled to him.

Verse 13: “Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” That’s Jesus’ love for us. If we could let the reality of this radical love soak into our minds and hearts, our lives would be so much different, wouldn’t they? It would be very difficult to carry grudges toward one another; we wouldn’t fear the future; we would be lifted with hope in the midst of suffering; we would never again count ourselves worthless and cast aside.

Remaining in Jesus love certainly involves drawing it into our lives, just as a branch draws nourishment from the vine. But that’s not the full understanding of this concept. Remaining in Jesus’ love includes loving Jesus back. And Jesus is pretty clear about how we show our love for him. Look at verse 10: If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, and verse 14: You are my friends if you do what I command. We show our love for Jesus by obeying his commands. That means simply we do what he says to do, and we live the way he says to live. And in those final hours before the cross, the command he emphasizes is for his disciples to love each other. He says it twice in our passage here, in verse 12 even saying that they are to love each other as he had loved them. That’s a lot of love.

If we are to obey Jesus in loving others to the extent that he has loved us, it will be costly for us. It will cost us our very lives as it cost Jesus his. This kind of care is deeper and wider than emotional attachment or romantic affinity. It’s our laying down our lives for one another. It’s not likely that the cost for us will be physical death, but it will be sacrificial, because as we remain in the vine, we’ll increasingly put others before ourselves.

The apostle Paul gives a wonderful description of what this Jesus kind of love will look like in our lives, in chapter 13 of 1st Corinthians, the very familiar love chapter that you probably have heard several times at weddings.

• He says love is patient. That means we won’t be in a hurry with people, so when your four year old daughter wants you to look at her picture when you’re working on your sermon, you’ll turn around and look. We’ll be patient even with people who drain our energy. Their demands on our time won’t ignite anger in us.
• Paul continues love is kind. We’ll look for ways to do good to our family and friends and neighbors.
• Love does not boast, it is not proud, it’s not self-seeking, Paul writes. There is so much pressure to compete and to promote ourselves in our lives so that we can get ahead, whether it’s for a promotion at work, or for that scholarship at school. Jesus’ kind of care leads to us promoting others, celebrating their talents and worth. It doesn’t look down on others. This kind of affection doesn’t cling tightly to our rights and to getting our needs met, but insists on others’ needs being met.
• Paul continues, love keeps no record of wrongs. This is accounting terminology. This kind of love doesn’t keep track of all the wrongs done to us in a ledger but wipes the books clean. It forgives.

And Paul goes on and on about love. I think you get the idea, that the kind of love that flows from Jesus the vine to us the branches is quite different than some of the predominant understandings of love out there in our culture. This kind of love is not the kind we see expressed on the reality shows The Bachelor or The Bachelorette.

Some time ago, I experienced the practice of footwashing. A group of people from my church participated in a local outreach in which we gave away hundreds of new sneakers to people in need. Before we would give the individuals the shoes, we would wash their feet and then put their socks and shoes on for them. There was one unanticipated glitch in the outreach early on. The hot water heater was not working, so rather than feet sliding into nice and warm water, they were met with an icy cold sensation. I remember some gasping at the shock of it. You know Jesus talks about the importance of giving even a cup of cold water to someone in need, so even better would be to give a whole basin of it, right?

Even with the cold water, there was such warmth to the experience, after the initial awkwardness. I remember washing the feet of a young Hispanic mother and then other members of her family. They shared struggles they were having as prayer requests and I prayed for them audibly as I gently massaged their feet in soapy water. It was an incredibly meaningful experience. I served this family, not with any special talents or abilities, because I’m not a particularly talented foot-washer. For those moments, my gift of service was simply putting my needs aside, and being totally present with them and their needs. (Maybe that’s what love is…being totally present and available for another.)  

People around you every day are desperate for that kind of love. They need to see and hear God’s love for them in you. You and I are desperate for that kind of love.

How do we go about this? I’m not suggesting that you start taking a bucket around and begin washing feet here in the Fellowship Hall by the Coffee and Donuts, or at your work place or at your school, unless God calls you to that. What I am saying is that we should serve each other with the spirit and attitude of Jesus’ foot-washers.

We can do that in many ways. If a friend or member of this church is at the hospital, or in a nursing facility, you can go and visit them and pray with them. Be present with them. You can serve the children by helping in Sunday School; you can show love as a greeter. You can pray for someone consistently and let them know you are doing that. You can serve someone in need in your small group. There are so many ways we can lay down our lives for other people.

We can also love others with our words. That’s one we sometimes overlook with the people around us. We may speak our affection to people under our roofs every day, but let’s remember others around us. I was reminded of this by a dear member of ZPC who had written a glowing reference letter for me as I was looking for a new pastoral call. I emailed my thanks to her for the kind words. She emailed back words that meant so much to me. Let me read it to you.

Bill, It doesn't matter what words I use to describe your service to ZPC and to people Jesus loves even though very sincere. That's just the world's way that a church body needs to know who Bill is and if they can trust you. What I rejoice in is what the Lord's words are about you. And with Jesus' forgiveness and grace and indescribable love, I'm sure He would say much more to touch your heart, mind and spirit. And who you are; is His beautiful child; His treasure. To God be all glory and honor and praise for who he has made you!!!

Those words made my spirit soar. We need to speak words of God’s great love to each other, words that lift up, not words that bring down.

It’s Lent and we’re making our way to Easter. What a great time to practice this kind of “foot-washing” love with each other. Who is one person in your life in whom you could focus on loving very well these weeks before Easter? Pray about how you can show God’s care for them.

Spiritual writer Henri Nouwen writes about gestures of love shared with the world. He writes,

            imagine your kindness and generosity are little mustard seeds that will             become strong trees in which many birds can build their nests. Imagine that             your smiles and handshakes, your embraces and your kisses are only the             early signs of a worldwide community of love and peace (98,99).

What a beautiful image of the church. As you and I love each other well, seeds are planted and rooted, trees are multiplied. And the world around us will take notice. Imagine your caring for one another here at First Presbyterian of Concord as providing a large tree with branches reaching out into the world. Imagine people being drawn into the cool shade of that tree, where people can experience Christian community, and where they are drawn in toward the trunk of that tree Jesus Christ, where unlovable people can experience God’s personal love for them. Jesus has commissioned us to this.

Look at verse 16. Jesus says to you and me:

You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit-- fruit that will last.

Jesus has commissioned you and me to go into the world to love as he has loved us. That task may seem so incredibly large that you’re tempted to become paralyzed by it. After all, how can we possibly love this deeply? How do we love those people in our lives that we have such a hard time even being around? Our success in this does not depend on our own power. Our success at bearing fruit depends upon our keeping the roots of our lives connected to the true vine, our remaining in relationship to Jesus, the one who calls us his friends. It’s his love and his power which flow through you. Fruit is the inevitable result. So, take a deep breath. Relax. Simply be present to Jesus every day as you are present to others.

Have you received the gift of God’s friendship offered to you in the life of Jesus? Would you like to turn toward God, and allow him to come near to you? If so, you’ll have the opportunity in the next few minutes as our service closes to do that, while we listen to this next song, or when we close in prayer. In the quietness of your heart you can simply say yes to God’s gift of Jesus to you. If you do, you will have God’s assurance that you are forgiven of all of your sin, and that you have entered into eternal life and relationship with your creator. If you do that, or if you’d like to do that in the presence of another person, please grab me or one of the other pastors or worship leaders, or someone around you after the service and share that with us. Let’s meditate on God’s word to us as we listen to this next song.