EDITOR'S NOTE: In October 2017 I began a new venture as a synodically authorized minister at Faith Lutheran Church in Wolverton, Minn. The ride over the past 2.5 years has been an amazing journey of learning, growing and a deepening of my theological mind. This sermon took place on May 9, 2018.
Outside in the nave of the church, over in the corner by the coat rack, there is a table on which there sits a number of purses. ... Down alongside the table is a Rubbermaid container with shampoos and other hygiene products in it. … I’m sure many of you have seen that display.
Also, on that table, is a little, unobtrusive collection box. It’s not fancy, and that’s OK. But inside that collection box is a gift more precious than any other I can think of in the church today. …
Well, that is, of course, if the WELCA ladies haven’t already collected from that box. … And, if you have, please just go along with me!
So, yes, a most precious gift is in that box, a gift that could teach many of us a valuable lesson.
But I get ahead of myself … Let’s first start get back to today’s Gospel: John 15:9-17.
You might find that today is a kind of story time brought to you by the Gospel of John ... sort of like when Sesame Street’s episodes were brought to you by the letter “M” and the number “9.” … I see some of you may be too young to understand that reference!
So, today we continue in the Gospel of John, and if you haven’t caught the drift yet after all of these weeks, John’s Jesus is all about the love. I’m talking capital … L … O … V … E. … Love.
You will find in the other three gospels -- Matthew, Mark and Luke -- that the two great commandments are to love God with all of our heart and mind and soul and bodies, and to love our neighbor as ourselves.
And as you may know that that is the purpose of the Gospels, they help to remind us that Jesus’ coming is what replaces the laws of the Old Testament. In the Old Testament, the Hebrew people were given the laws to help govern life here on earth. It was the covenant that God had made with the people of Israel.
And then Jesus was born and Jesus’ love replaced the laws, as God delivered on his promises to send our Messiah.
So, here in the Gospel of John, we see him focus on God’s love for his son and his people, and Jesus’ love for God and us. … Read through John’s entirety, and you can’t miss that John is all about the love. … In fact, John reminds us time and again that God’s love is unconditional, and so if we do nothing else, we need to love. …. We are given example after example of how Jesus demonstrates his love for us, and thus gives us a roadmap as to how we should live our lives.
Go back several weeks ago to Maundy Thursday, and what did we talk about? Jesus’ washing of the disciples’ feet, a demonstration of how to love another. A reversal in the importance of roles, with the “master” washing the “servant’s” feet.
In the next passage, Jesus tells the disciples about his coming betrayal, and yet he says it will be committed by one he loves. … Catch that? It will be committed by one he loves.
Next, Jesus gives the disciples the “Great Commandment” as described by John, which is to love one another. And I quote: “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
Then there’s Jesus’s description to the disciples as to how anyone knows the way to the father, which of course is … . That’s right love.
Next, there’s Jesus’s promise of the Spirit. He tells the disciples that if they keep his commandment, the Father will indeed send the Spirit … and he will … love them!
And then there’s today’s Gospel passage: “And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. I am giving you these commands so that you may … love one another.”
It may come as no surprise to you that I love … L … O … V … E … love the Gospel of John. … A lot! … As the kids say these days, it is my jam!
But, what’s that you say? … Oh yes, the story! … What about the story! …
I apologize, I get a little distracted when I get rollin’ on the Gospel of John.
But, anyway back to the story. … So, in the 1950s, my father was in the army. He was shipped to basic training in Colorado, and after the completion of basic training he stayed there, and my mother joined him. … There, my father met who would become his best friend for life. His name was Dallas Vance. He was from International Falls, Minn., and the two of them bonded like cement. Later after my mother, and Dallas’ wife joined their husbands on base, there started a lifelong friendship that bind the two families forever together.
The couples were inseparable. Even after they moved back to Minnesota, they didn’t let the four-hour drive between Crookston and International Falls separate them. Even in the days when automobiles weren’t plush, and money was scarce, they spent as many weekends and vacations together as they could. And the similarities between the families were uncanny. The men looked strikingly alike, and the women could have passed as sisters. And each family had a litter basket full of kids.
Needless to say, all of us kids grew to accept each other as essentially members of the same family, either ours or theirs. It didn’t matter. … To this day, the Vance kids still call my mom “Auntie” as she is the only remaining parent of the four. … So, when I tell you I have eight siblings, the truth is it is far more like 15. … But this was not uncommon in the '60s and '70s, after all. And many of you may have similar stories in your family history. Families just did that sort of thing then. ... It was a different time.
Nowadays, it’s a complicated family dynamic to explain through the lens of today’s view of family. … It’s just not the type of relationships we build with people today. … That’s an intimacy with others we just don’t have time for today. … But it shouldn’t really be that complicated, should it? … After all, our two families’ relationship boils down to love, and it kind of reminds me of a certain gospel book, for which I have an affinity, that we also try to make too complicated.
We read Jesus’s words and we think, “Well, OK, I can dig that: I can abide in your love Jesus, because I certainly want you to abide in me. … Check!
And I know that you want me to keep your commandments, and even though I slip once in a while, I’m pretty faithful. … So, check!
So far, so good.
But then comes that next line: “This is my commandment, that you love another as I have loved you.” … And it gets a little trickier, right? … It sounds so easy on the surface, Jesus, but do you really expect me to lay down my life for my friends? … And, seriously, you want me to do what it is that my friends command of me? … That’s what love is? … I mean, after all I am not you, Jesus, and I cannot walk in your shoes. … If that’s what you expect of me when you say love one another, it seems really, really complicated.
But is it?
Oh yeah, wait a second, sorry about that. … Again, I get so distracted by the Gospel of John that I can get carried away sometimes.
OK, back to that story.
So, anyway, last weekend our son Carter was confirmed at Christ the King church in Moorhead. And I was thrilled that two of the Vance siblings -- Lois, whom was named for my mother, and Linda -- were able to attend Carter’s confirmation service. It’s just what our two families do. Even five decades later our families are intertwined, and we don’t see the end of one or the beginning of the other.
Well, it just so happened that this time around, Lois and Linda were able to bring with their great niece, whose daddy was busy working that weekend. So she got to make a special “girls weekend” trip with her two great aunts. … Now, Charlie, is 7 years old, and is about the cutest thing you’re ever going to see. And while we’ve never met before, Charlie took a liking to Shelley and I. … And frankly, there’s absolutely no way that we could not fall in love with that little angel.
Last Saturday night, after we had dinner, I offered to take Lois and Linda and Charlie -- and my mom -- to come visit the church here. Again, our families celebrate everything together, and I knew that they would love to come visit a place that gives me so much joy. So we came out, and we walked through the church. … I brought them in here to see our sanctuary, and while the adults indeed thought our sanctuary was beautiful, you could tell that little 7-year-old Charlie was mesmerized. … Everything amazed her: The altar, the pews, the balcony, the quilts, the stained glass windows. … Everything.
After the Sanctuary, we made our way to the Fellowship Room, and eventually to my office. And Charlie took it all in. … You could tell that she was dazzled, and I’m going to go out on a limb here and say, that I could see the Spirit moving in this child.
So, while we were in the office, I went to my desk and pulled out one of these comfort crosses. I keep a stash in my desk, and also one in my black bag you’ve all seen me carry.
They are little wooden crosses that come with a reassuring message that God is there with you at all times. And the purpose of that cross is for you is to grab a hold tight whenever you are anxious, or sad, or frightened … or, frankly, even when you are happy. It’s a piece of rock that reminds you that Jesus is there, and that you are loved. … And I could think of no better souvenir to send with Charlie after watching the Spirit work in this child while we toured the church.
You could tell that she was genuinely thrilled!
So, we finished up in my office and we made our way back to the nave, and as 7-year-olds do, Charlie wandered over into the corner where our basket for food donations is and also the table where we are collecting donations for women and children in need. … And, again, as children will do, Charlie asked about the food basket and what it was for. I told her. … And then she asked what the table of purses and box of shampoos and soaps was for. And I told her.
And then Lois, my “sister,” who was standing by the stairs, asked me a question. And my attention turned to her, although out of the corner of my eye, I could begin to see Charlie fidgeting.
When my gazed returned to Charlie, she was standing there, with a huge grin on her face, and her hands clasped behind her back. … She looked up at me … and raised a crumpled, folded dollar bill to me, and said, “I want to pay you for your cross!”
Pleasantly surprised, I said back to her, “No sweetheart, I cannot accept money for that cross. That is a gift to you from Jesus. … Not me.”
And, Charlie’s face grew from a grin to a full-blown smile, and said, “No, I don’t want to pay you. I want to put it in there!” as she pointed to the collection box that is sitting on the table of empty purses. “I want to give it to the people who need it.”
That’s right … you were wondering what happened to that precious gift in that box out there weren’t you?
Well, that dollar, and that moment, reminded me … in the blink of an eye, about what Jesus tries to tell us over and over … and over again in the Gospel of John.
Even though us adults like to complicate Jesus’s greatest commandment. .. We allow our biases and our complacency and our fears and our hurts to taint our understanding of his message, when it isn’t complicated at all.
Little Charlie understood that message. She simply knew that Jesus had given her that cross, and inspired by that love, she acted. She gave her dollar -- an undisputed treasure to a 7-year-old -- because other people needed it. … And that is why I say that collection box holds a gift that is more precious than anything else in this church today.
Charlie didn’t complicate Jesus’s commandment. Without a thought, she wanted to pay forward what Jesus did on that cross for her, and she did it out of love. Charlie didn’t complicate matters when she was overflowing with love. She just gave. She laid down her last dollar without remorse because she inherently knew that someone needed that dollar more than her.
And that my friends, is today’s Good News. … I pray that each of us can live like Charlie. … Not complicating God’s message, but loving one another in whatever way you are called to do in the moment. … After all, it’s not complicated. And Charlie understood that.
And that is the Good News for this Sunday. ... Amen.
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