5-10-21 Grace-Benson & Vail Sermon

6th Sunday of Easter May 9, 2021

Pastor Tim Patoka Connected by Love Love One Another John 15:9-17 1) As Jesus Loves Us 2) As Jesus’ Friend

There are some familiar ways that people show their love for one another. On this Mother’s Day, children will be taking their mothers out for a nice meal or catching up with them on the phone. In a budding romance, the two people will often exchange flowers, gifts, and heartfelt messages. In long-standing relationships like childhood friends or a golden anniversary, it can be as simple as spending quality time together and reminiscing about their shared past.

However, when it comes to the love that connects Christ and ourselves, it looks quite a bit different. We don’t go out to eat, exchange messages, or talk about the past on the back porch. Instead, as Jesus mentions to us in our verses this morning from John chapter 15, the way that we show our connection to Jesus and his connection to us is by loving one another. We love one another as Jesus loves us as we try to match the why and how of his love to us with our love to others. We also love one another as Jesus’ friend who wants to do what he has appointed of us because that’s what friends do. And as we love one another, we’ll receive and complete the very joy that Jesus himself has.

1) As Jesus Loves Us We look to God when we speak about Christian love because he both defines and models what it should be. We hear Jesus start our verses off by saying, “As the Father has loved me, so also I have loved you.” (John 15:9a EHV) The specific word that is used for love every time in these verses is the Greek word agape. As you may remember, an agape love is the highest kind of love there is. It’s an unconditional love that is given to another regardless of their deserving of it, seeks their good, and doesn’t count the cost to give this love.

This is the love that God the Father shows to God the Son and, in turn, what God the Son shows to us. The best place to see Jesus’ agape love for us is in the greatest way anyone can show anyone love. “No one has greater love than this: that someone lays down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13 EHV) There’s no better way to show your love for someone than to give up your life for them. It’s also a perfect example of agape love as we’ll talk about later.

When it comes to Jesus’ command for us to love one another, he sets himself as the standard to which we strive when he says, “This is my command: Love one another as I have loved you.” (John 15:12 EHV) One aspect of Jesus’ agape love we are to imitate is our 1

Pastor Tim Patoka Connected by Love

6th Sunday of Easter May 9, 2021

motivation. Why do we love one another? We hear our answer from our 2nd Lesson, 1 John chapter 4, “Dear friends, let us love one another, because love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God…11if God loved us so much, we also should love one another.” (1 John 4:7,11 EHV) We love one another because God loves us. As a spring in nature cannot help but gush forth water, so the love that Jesus has shown us places a spring within our hearts that cannot help but gush forth with love for one another.

Another aspect of this Jesus-connected love is how it looks. We earlier heard how Jesus said that the greatest way a person can love one another is by giving their life up for them.

That’s what Jesus did when he gave his life up on the cross and, in so doing, exemplifies what agape love is. An agape love is unconditional, given to another regardless of how deserving they are of it. In the same way, no one has done something to deserve Jesus’ sacrificial death.

An agape love seeks the good of others. In the same way, Jesus’ death sought our good by paying the price for sins so we can could be free from them and the curse of hell. An agape love doesn’t count the cost that must be paid. In the same way, Jesus did not forsake his mission to be our Savior because it would cost him his own life. As Jesus loves us in an agape fashion, so we are to love one another.

I’m guessing that, for the most part, we are nice to one another. However, do we love one another as Jesus loves us? So often our motivation in loving one another is not in keeping with agape love. We love one another to return the favor for what they previously did for us. We love one another because we want to get something out of it and make it worth our while. We love one another to soothe a guilty conscience, like what often happens when walk out of the store and give money to that respected organization asking for support.

Or perhaps our struggle is in the how of our love for one another. We’re willing to love others as Jesus loved us, provided it’s convenient or comfortable. We donate items we’ve accumulated over the years and since forgotten until spring-cleaning. We volunteer our time as long as it doesn’t disrupt our routines and habits too much. But once there’s a personal cost, our instinct is to shrink back from such love. A different pitfall we can run into is when our love is not for the other person’s good. Rather it serves our good or passes the buck by enabling unhealthy habits and spelling future doom.

While it sounds simple to love one another as Jesus loves us, it certainly isn’t. That’s why it’s a good thing that Jesus continues to love us as he alone can. Jesus’ death on the cross not only exemplifies the why and how of an agape love, it also continues to lift us up when we fail to love one another as we should. The forgiveness he won 2,000 some years ago is still a real thing. It covers over every time we love one another with a selfish or guilty heart. It washes away every instance we love one another in an incomplete and lacking way. In short, Jesus’ forgiveness rids us of our sins and makes us clean in God’s sight. Jesus’ agape love for us, as 2

6th Sunday of Easter May 9, 2021

Pastor Tim Patoka Connected by Love

seen best on the cross, also fuels our love for one another in the why and how so that we may love one another as Jesus loves us in the coming days, weeks, and years.

2) As Jesus’ Friend Not only are we connected to Jesus through the agape love he has shown us, we are also connected to him as his friend. As such, we also love one another as his friends because that’s what friends do. Listen to how Jesus calls us his friend. “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know what his master is doing. But I have called you friends, because everything that I heard from my Father, I have made known to you. 16You did not choose me, but I chose you.” (John 15:15-16a EHV) We are Jesus’ friends because he has chosen us to be so. That’s the only way that we could have this blessed status. Because of our sinful nature, we cannot choose to be God’s in any way, shape, or form. Instead, he has to take the first, middle, and last steps to overcome our sin-based rejection of him and his gospel promises that so we can be connected to him through faith. In addition to choosing us to part of his family of forgiven sinners, Jesus also chosen us to be his friend.

And as Jesus’ friend, we have a close connection with him. We are more than mere servants who do what their master commands them without knowing the fuller picture. Rather, we know everything that the Father has made known to us as we learned before our confirmation and have since matured in through life’s experiences. In addition to knowing the fuller picture of our God, we also have a history and shared interests with him as we do with our human friends.

In addition to choosing us to be his friends, Jesus spells out what he expects his friends to do because of their connection to him. Jesus tells us, “You are my friends if you continue to do the things I instruct you…16I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will endure.” (John 15:14,16b EHV) The bearing fruit idea comes from what Jesus had just told his disciples where he is the vine and Christians are the branches that bear fruit. It’s in line with this that Jesus tells us what he has appointed his friends to do – to bear much fruit, fruit that will last.

Although this is our appointed task, the reason why we bear this fruit is not because we have to. But because we want to, because that is what friends do. We saw some examples of this lasting fruit in our 1st Lesson with Tabitha whose acts of love were cherished by those who mourned her passing. But there is only one kind of fruit that will truly last forever – the sharing and strengthening of faith in Jesus Christ. This fruit will last throughout all eternity because it helps bring a person to their heavenly home.

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6th Sunday of Easter May 9, 2021

Pastor Tim Patoka Connected by Love

But how good of a friend of Jesus would we call ourselves? Jesus specifically points out that his friends know everything that the Father has made known. Thinking back to your day as a youth or adult confirmand, how well have you retained your knowledge of the Lord? So often we unintentionally feed the lie that confirmation is like graduation and we’re done with time in God’s Word because we’ve allowed ourselves to forget the truths we once knew so well. When it comes to our appointed task of bearing fruit, do we do it because that’s what Jesus’ friends do? Or is it with a reluctant or complaining heart so that we better resemble grumbling servants than loving friends? When it comes to the fruit that we bear, do we prioritize the gospel fruit that will last throughout eternity? Or do we fixate on the earthly here, now, and much easier?

While we may not be Jesus’ role model friends, that doesn’t mean Jesus made a mistake in choosing us to be his own. Despite our imperfect track record, he still calls us his friend and will not go back on his choice. As his friend, he continues to renew us in his love so that we go back to our appointed task of bearing lasting fruit as we love one another. He does this by refreshing our memory of what all the Lord has made known to us through worship and Bible study. By reminding us what it is that his friends willingly do. And by working through his gospel promises so that our fruit may last throughout eternity.

Conclusion Jesus’ command for us to love one another is not a burden. In fact, it’s a way that we receive and complete the very joy that Jesus himself has. Our Savior tells us so himself, “If you hold on to my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have held on to my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11I have told you these things so that my joy would continue to be in you and that your joy would be complete.” (John 15:10-11 EHV) We remain in Jesus’ love by holding on to his commands. This means to guard and keep them so as to preserve them. As we hold on to Jesus’ commands by living them to the fullest, we also grow in the joy that Jesus himself. For those of you who have done this by bearing eternally lasting fruit, I’m certain you would agree with me that there is a unique joy you get from it. A joy that tends to encourage you to continue bearing this fruit, holding on to Jesus’ commands, and therefore remaining in his love for the time to come.

Jesus’ encouragement for us today is that we love one another. As Jesus loves us, we imitate his agape love with the why and how of our love to one another. As a friend of Jesus, we do what his friends do – bear the appointed fruit that lasts for eternity. And as we love one another, we do so with the confidence that we will share in Jesus’ own unique joy as it grows within us to completion. Amen.

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