Fruitful Living: Growing in Love
Pentecost 4 (Summer Series)
July 6, 2014
Grace, Mankato, MN
1 Corinthians 12.31-13.13; John 21.15-19
Let us pray: Gracious and loving God, make us love as you have loved us, so that all of the world will know your love. Let this continually be our prayer until you come again. Amen.
Most of us have experienced the power of love and know firsthand its influence upon us. The overwhelming emotions that surge within us at the sight of our newborn son or daughter. The deep turbulence in our teenage years the prompt us to do with our bodies what our minds aren’t ready for. The stirring of our souls for our country as the US flag and veterans pass by, the “Stars and Stripes” playing and the fireworks going off. In fact, so necessary is love that the inability to love is considered a psychological disorder. Furthermore, the absence of love is crippling to our development. There was a story published a number of years ago babies in a Russian orphanage. There were too many for the staff to care for so that some were held regularly but others not touched at all. Those who were not touched frequently had arrested development and many difficulties.
It is this last example that gives us a small window into the biblical understanding of love. This summer we are doing a series on the nine fruit of the Spirit listed in Galatians 5. We got a running start on Holy Trinity Sunday with a reminder of the fruitful God who makes fruit possible. The God who abides in us welcomes us to abide in God and produces fruit in us. Then two weeks ago we heard about those things that stand in the way of fruitful living, what the Apostle Paul calls the works of the flesh. Last week, we heard that fruitful living is a communal experience and that we are in this together. Today we begin our study of each fruit, not merely as fruit inspectors or even as fruit tasters, but cultivators of fruit.
We do so with two of the three most famous love passages in scripture, 1 Corinthians 13 and John 2. (The most famous is probably John 3.16.) It’s helpful to know the context of each: the Corinthian church was one Paul founded and cared deeply for. With Paul gone, the Corinthians became conflicted, with various groups struggling for power. The conflict arose because they had a distorted understanding of spirituality, thinking there was pecking order of gifts. They thought that those who possessed the gift of speaking in tongues were spiritually superior to those with other gifts. Paul tells them that loveless gifts are empty. In John, Peter comes before the resurrected Jesus and is asked three times if he loves Jesus. Many people see in this Peter’s rehabilitation for denying Jesus three times and that he is now restored to discipleship and leadership.
Early this last week I asked my Facebook friends to fill in the blank: Love is ________. Only one of the responses came close to describing love as feeling, but even that one was only through an action. Did you notice in the readings the same thing? Biblical love is not a feeling, it is active. I heard a story this last week about a son who asked his father when he first knew he loved his mother. Perhaps he wanted to know if what he was feeling for a young lady was the real thing. The father paused for a long time and then surprised his son saying it wasn’t until 10 years into his marriage that he knew he lived his wife. Seeing the startled look on his son’s face, he explained: until that point he didn’t really know what love was.
In Galatians, Paul tells us that through God’s love in Jesus Christ we live in a new reality. We now live by the Spirit. However, he adds, that is not all; we are to be led by the Spirit. Paul goes even further: faith is not only active in love; love is a way of being. We are to be to others what God is to us. Love is both gift or fruit and task. There may be times when we don’t know what love requires of us, but there are never any times when we can set love aside. In the end, though, God makes possible what God demands.
One of my favorite movies is Disney’s Frozen, loosely based on Hans Christian Andersen’s The Snow Queen. It tells the story of two princesses, Elsa, who has cryokinetic powers, and her younger sister Anna. Unfortunately, Elsa is unable to control her power and after a childhood accident she is hidden from everyone, including Anna. After ascending to the throne, the young women argue over Anna’s new love, Hans, and Elsa’s power is exposed. Panicking and fleeing, she unleashes an eternal winter on the kingdom. Anna, with the help of newfound friend and iceman Kristoff, seek out Elsa, trying to convince her to return.
Though they reunite, Elsa refuses to return, becomes agitated, accidentally striking Anna in the heart. Anna starts to freeze and Kristoff seeks healing from the trolls, who say that only an act of true love can save her. Thinking this means a kiss from Hans, they rush back to the kingdom. Yet it isn’t a kiss from Hans (who is revealed to be a conniver) or even Kristoff that can save her. It is Anna’s self-sacrifice, placing herself between Hans and Elsa as he tries to kill Elsa, just as she turns solid that is revealed as an act of true love. Anna thaws and Elsa realizes that it is through love that she is able to control her power.
Love, though active, is not heartless. But I think we get them backwards, believing that feeling comes first. Yet, I think more often than not we act our way into thinking and feeling, doing so because of God’s grace and power. May you discover the Spirit’s presence blowing through your life, leading you to grow in love. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment