What Is Love?

"You did not choose me.  Instead I chose you.  I appointed you to goa dn bear fruit.  It is fruit that will last.  Then the Father will give you anything you ask for in my name."  ---John 5:16-17

But just what is this Love?  What does it really mean?

For John, Love is an other-centered, belonging-to-something-greater-than-yourself kind of love.  This held a very critical significance to the community John was addressing.  Just as the disciples were about to experience their world imploding as Jesus faced death and those disciples ran for cover, so the Johannine community a generation or two later was facing all sorts of persecution.  They might have been tempted to turn inward, loving God (of course) and one another, and concentrating on their own survival.  Instead, Jesus lays on them a different ethic, one that will transform the world rather than judge or run away from it.

Jesus knew this was not going to be easy.  It was not going to be easy for his little band of disciples, or for the church that followed them.  And it certainly would not be easy for each one of us.  In this farewell address, Jesus reassures us that we face these things not as servants, but as His friends.  We are the ones in His circle who have been let in on the big picture, the reign of God, and given our role in bringing it in

 Charles Cousar suggests that being "friends of Jesus" means "being captured by the story, following the sometimes comforting sometimes disturbing plot that leads to the cross and the empty tomb, and finding in it the light to guide their way in the world."

I know that this does not provide any easy answers about what it means "to love one another," but that is not the point.  We have been entrusted and included and invited to participate in the amazing work of God through Jesus Christ.  The "love" that we need has already been given to us and will continue to be given to us.

"I do not call you servants anymore.  Servants do not know their master's business.  Instead, I have called you friends.  I have told you everything I learned from my Father."  ---John 15:15

---Pastor Suzanne