John 15.1-14

 15 “I am the true grapevine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch of mine that doesn’t produce fruit, and he prunes the branches that do bear fruit so they will produce even more. 3 You have already been pruned and purified by the message I have given you. 4 Remain in me, and I will remain in you. For a branch cannot produce fruit if it is severed from the vine, and you cannot be fruitful unless you remain in me.

5 Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing. 6 Anyone who does not remain in me is thrown away like a useless branch and withers. Such branches are gathered into a pile to be burned. 7 But if you remain in me and my words remain in you, you may ask for anything you want, and it will be granted! 8 When you produce much fruit, you are my true disciples. This brings great glory to my Father.

9 I have loved you even as the Father has loved me. Remain in my love. 10 When you obey my commandments, you remain in my love, just as I obey my Father’s commandments and remain in his love. 11 I have told you these things so that you will be filled with my joy. Yes, your joy will overflow! 12 This is my commandment: Love each other in the same way I have loved you. 13 There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command.”

Comments

If you have been a Christian for a while, you are probably familiar with the three words for love in the Greek NT: eros, philia, and agape. The first is where we get the word ‘erotic’ and refers to physical, pleasure-based love. The second refers to friendship, the reciprocal love between friends. These two forms of love (eros and philia) have some things in common. They are both based on preference, on the lover choosing who to love based on desire, inclination, attraction, etc. In sexual love, the lover seeks his or her own pleasure, in friendship love, we are interested in what benefit we derive from the friendship. In other words, both eros and philia have to some degree a self-focus on the part of the lover, some measure of selfishness, where the object of the love is not so much the other person as what the lover sees of/for himself or herself in the other (a desire to change the object of these loves to conform closer to the lover is common as these loves embrace sameness, not difference). In its basest forms, where the focus is fully on the self, the lover may be nearly or entirely oblivious to the other person, but even in nobler expressions, there remains an essential self-focus, a self-interest that marks all eros and philia love. These loves are temporary, they do not bear lasting fruit.

Agape is very different. It is pure love, divine love, eternal love, love that includes no focus on the self at all, but sole focus on the beloved. Agape is a renunciation of the self. Agape loves the other as they are, as particular persons, celebrating differences. It is not motivated by desire or self-interest, its sole motivation comes as obedience to the command of Jesus: love one another as I have loved you. Jesus did not love out of self-interest, Jesus loved selflessly. Because agape is not dependent on desires or inclinations (which change regularly), it is not temporary. Agape is eternal – it is a love we can remain in. It is a love that bears lasting fruit because the fruit is not immediately consumed by the one loving. Agape creates fruit for others.

So what does agape look like? Jesus tells us is looks like obedience (the opposite of preference). It looks like loving your neighbor – the one near to you, i.e., not the one you have chosen. But this kind of love is quite beyond us. Agape sounds nice, but we are fundamentally self-interested creatures. Jesus addresses this by making clear that the power to grow into agape love only comes from Jesus. Like a vine giving life to branches that give their lives producing fruit, so Jesus empowers us – gives us everything we need – to love neighbors selflessly, to produce lasting fruit. Producing fruit is a requirement for remaining grafted into the vine; disciples are people who produce fruit by remaining in Jesus’ agape love.

New Living Translation (NLT) Holy Bible. New Living Translation copyright© 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale HousePublishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

John 14.18-31

18 “No, I will not abandon you as orphans — I will come to you. 19 Soon the world will no longer see me, but you will see me. Since I live, you also will live. 20 When I am raised to life again, you will know that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you. 21 Those who accept my commandments and obey them are the ones who love me. And because they love me, my Father will love them. And I will love them and reveal myself to each of them.”

22 Judas (not Judas Iscariot, but the other disciple with that name) said to him, “Lord, why are you going to reveal yourself only to us and not to the world at large?”

23 Jesus replied, “All who love me will do what I say. My Father will love them, and we will come and make our home with each of them. 24 Anyone who doesn’t love me will not obey me. And remember, my words are not my own. What I am telling you is from the Father who sent me. 25 I am telling you these things now while I am still with you. 26 But when the Father sends the Advocate as my representative — that is, the Holy Spirit — he will teach you everything and will remind you of everything I have told you.

27 I am leaving you with a gift — peace of mind and heart. And the peace I give is a gift the world cannot give. So don’t be troubled or afraid. 28 Remember what I told you: I am going away, but I will come back to you again. If you really loved me, you would be happy that I am going to the Father, who is greater than I am. 29 I have told you these things before they happen so that when they do happen, you will trust.

30 I don’t have much more time to talk to you, because the ruler of this world approaches. He has no power over me, 31 but I will do what the Father requires of me, so that the world will know that I love the Father. Come, let’s be going.”

Comments

I’m not sure what I can say that expounds at all on the beauty of this passage. One theme here is the promised presence of Jesus. Seven times in this short passage Jesus promises that he will be with his followers, that he will return to be with them/us, that he and the Father will make their home with us, that the Spirit will come as the continuing presence of God who leads us into the presence of God.

Then Judas asked why we would have direct access to God but the world would not. And the answer is so simple and yet so hard – the presence of God remains with us (directly) and we (the church) are to be the presence of God to the world (indirectly). How does the church serve as the presence of God to the world? By obeying Jesus, by learning from the Holy Spirit, by receiving and reciprocating the love of the Father, by living in the peace of Christ, unafraid and untroubled. The world sees and comes to know Jesus, not when the church proclaims Jesus, but when we demonstrate Jesus.

Of course, this only works to the extent that we are committed to following as the Holy Spirit directs us in acting on what Jesus taught and doing the same works Jesus did (and greater!). The church is not usually all that committed to this. It happens in fits and spurts until the ruler of this world reasserts the controls and limitations indicative of its rule, which are not compatible with the freedom the Spirit brings. That’s right, obedience to the Spirit and growing into freedom are the same thing. Controls, power consolidation, manipulation – all these are characteristics of the ruler of this world and altogether incompatible with the church’s mission to be the presence of God in and to the world.

Jesus promises us his presence and he calls us to practice being his presence to the world. This should en-courage us, give us courage, and inspire us to embrace this incredibly responsibility. As Brother Lawrence wrote: “I cannot imagine how religious persons can live satisfied without the practice of the presence of GOD. For my part I keep myself retired with Him in the depth of centre of my soul as much as I can; and while I am so with Him I fear nothing; but the least turning from Him is insupportable.”
― Brother Lawrence, The Practice of the Presence of God

New Living Translation (NLT) Holy Bible. New Living Translation copyright© 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale HousePublishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.