May 2019 Sermons
May 19, 2019 Rev. Dr. Barbara Elliott
Easter People Living in a Good Friday World
For the past five weeks, while enduring the national and global news, we have been celebrating Jesus’s glorious resurrection as part of our church’s Easter season. As Ann Lamott describes it: we are an Easter People living in a Good Friday world. Every day, our news reminds us that we are living in a Good Friday world—including discussions of trade issues, nuclear arms fears, climate change, and stories of refugees needing safety. How do we find Easter again?
Today’s readings bring us back to the night of Jesus’ betrayal, the day before Good Friday. This is a time when Jesus knew what was going to happen to him in the next hours and days, and the disciples did not. Literally, Jesus was living the Good Friday part of human life. So that Last Supper evening Jesus was intent on giving his disciples the tools they would need to keep going when he was gone.
The central piece of Jesus’ teaching that evening is in today’s reading: The New Commandment, “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another.” The love Commandment—Jesus’ guidance that provides the basis for what we know as our Way of Love ethic. We need to use it today, 2000 years later, to build our Easter experience while we live our Good Friday lives.
Presiding Bishop Curry and Episcopal Church have defined the Way of Love as a path for these days. This message reminds us of Jesus’ words and helps us see how we need this path today, just as the Disciples did in the times just after Jesus was crucified. The Way of Love provides the essence for living our relationships with one another.
I like the clarity of this, our spiritual job description: love everyone, don’t judge them. That is very clear. Nice and simple and to the point. It is also very difficult to do. How do we do this?
Our relationships! Our relationships with others are truly a sacred space when we base them in love. We walk the Way of Love when we listen to (and truly hear) what another person says. Some people we know are really good at this; who listens to you? Who do you offer this gift of love to, really hearing them?
We also walk the Way of Love when we share our joy, celebrating life with smiles and lightness day-to-day with those around us. Another way we share our path of love is by meeting those around us with patience and gentleness, especially when there are hard times and suffering. Can you think of someone who you know that does that in your life? Are you showing your love this way, too?
The systems around us can also be based in love, and when that becomes a reality, we experience justice. A fair and just setting is a place where everyone has the same opportunity to develop to the fullness of their gifts and talents. Love at the systems level is justice. That is big -- really big. Profound.
When we choose to live the Way of Love together, our just society offers everyone access to quality education and health care without disparities. In a just society, there is enough food, shelter and clothing for all. And our just society, based in the Way of Love, also defines our stewardship of the earth, nature and creation. A society built on the Way of Love allows people and creation to become all that God created them to be, sustained and thriving in nature’s settings.
All of this is based on the Way of Love, that powerful, convincing and profound way of being in relationship that Jesus lived and then he commanded us to follow. Jesus offered this teaching using these words: “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.” The Way of Love shows us the right path.
It is through our actions with each other that we become Easter people in our Good Friday world. Our relationships are sacred—and we need to treat each other following the Way of Love, every day, all the time.
Let us pray:
O Holy One, be with us as we live into Jesus’ commandment, that we love one another. We commit to loving one another, as Jesus loved us, and to creating a just society where the Way of Love guides all our relationships.
AMEN
###
Easter People Living in a Good Friday World
For the past five weeks, while enduring the national and global news, we have been celebrating Jesus’s glorious resurrection as part of our church’s Easter season. As Ann Lamott describes it: we are an Easter People living in a Good Friday world. Every day, our news reminds us that we are living in a Good Friday world—including discussions of trade issues, nuclear arms fears, climate change, and stories of refugees needing safety. How do we find Easter again?
Today’s readings bring us back to the night of Jesus’ betrayal, the day before Good Friday. This is a time when Jesus knew what was going to happen to him in the next hours and days, and the disciples did not. Literally, Jesus was living the Good Friday part of human life. So that Last Supper evening Jesus was intent on giving his disciples the tools they would need to keep going when he was gone.
The central piece of Jesus’ teaching that evening is in today’s reading: The New Commandment, “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another.” The love Commandment—Jesus’ guidance that provides the basis for what we know as our Way of Love ethic. We need to use it today, 2000 years later, to build our Easter experience while we live our Good Friday lives.
Presiding Bishop Curry and Episcopal Church have defined the Way of Love as a path for these days. This message reminds us of Jesus’ words and helps us see how we need this path today, just as the Disciples did in the times just after Jesus was crucified. The Way of Love provides the essence for living our relationships with one another.
I like the clarity of this, our spiritual job description: love everyone, don’t judge them. That is very clear. Nice and simple and to the point. It is also very difficult to do. How do we do this?
Our relationships! Our relationships with others are truly a sacred space when we base them in love. We walk the Way of Love when we listen to (and truly hear) what another person says. Some people we know are really good at this; who listens to you? Who do you offer this gift of love to, really hearing them?
We also walk the Way of Love when we share our joy, celebrating life with smiles and lightness day-to-day with those around us. Another way we share our path of love is by meeting those around us with patience and gentleness, especially when there are hard times and suffering. Can you think of someone who you know that does that in your life? Are you showing your love this way, too?
The systems around us can also be based in love, and when that becomes a reality, we experience justice. A fair and just setting is a place where everyone has the same opportunity to develop to the fullness of their gifts and talents. Love at the systems level is justice. That is big -- really big. Profound.
When we choose to live the Way of Love together, our just society offers everyone access to quality education and health care without disparities. In a just society, there is enough food, shelter and clothing for all. And our just society, based in the Way of Love, also defines our stewardship of the earth, nature and creation. A society built on the Way of Love allows people and creation to become all that God created them to be, sustained and thriving in nature’s settings.
All of this is based on the Way of Love, that powerful, convincing and profound way of being in relationship that Jesus lived and then he commanded us to follow. Jesus offered this teaching using these words: “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.” The Way of Love shows us the right path.
It is through our actions with each other that we become Easter people in our Good Friday world. Our relationships are sacred—and we need to treat each other following the Way of Love, every day, all the time.
Let us pray:
O Holy One, be with us as we live into Jesus’ commandment, that we love one another. We commit to loving one another, as Jesus loved us, and to creating a just society where the Way of Love guides all our relationships.
AMEN
###
