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“Resurrection Life: Jesus Invites Us to Love” Psalm 66:8-12, 16-20; John 14:15-21

A Sermon by Rev. Bob Kells, May 17, 2020 Resurrection Life has been the focus of my sermons since Easter. Each week, we’ve explored one of the many ways Jesus brings new life to us, to his church. When we talk about the Resurrection of Jesus, there’s something we may overlook: The Resurrection of Jesus Christ was not an end point, it is the start of something new.1 The Resurrection is God’s decisive act in human history. It rewrote the books or, rather, prompted the writing of new books, that proclaim God’s victory over sin and death.

- Death is no longer the end. - The natural order of things has been overturned. - Through the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, life has the final word; and it continues to have the final word

because Jesus is still at work in the world. This week, we see just how Jesus continues to relate to his disciples through an invitation, an invitation to love.

Many of us have moved from one town or state to another place at some point in our lives. Maybe it was a short move, like to the next town or county. Or maybe it was a longer one, from the east coast to the west. When we move, we leave behind friends, maybe family members too. How do we stay in touch with those who are still important to us, the people we love and care about? We have a lot of ways to do that nowadays. In addition to cards and letters and telephones, we have cell phones and social media and videoconferencing. We can reach out and touch the ones we love from almost anywhere. Now, when someone moves away, you needn’t ask, “Will I ever see you again?” Of course you will. Just pull out your cell phone and you can see and hear. We can still stay in touch. Love may be strained by these kinds of separations but seeing and hearing one another, like we are doing today, makes the separation a bit more tolerable.

In today’s lesson, Jesus continues to prepare his disciples for his departure from this world. He’s going to Jerusalem and the Cross. He knows it, but his disciples don’t. What they know is Jesus is talking about going away. But they don’t understand where he’s going, only that it sounds like it’s a permanent separation. Where he was going, they could not follow.

- How will Jesus stay in touch with his disciples? - How can they remain in a loving relationship with their Lord?

The answer comes through the Holy Spirit. Ah, the Holy Spirit. It’s hard to know what to make of the Holy Spirit, this third person of the Trinity (God the Father and God the Son are the other two). We encounter the Spirit throughout the Bible:

- In the beginning, the Spirit appears at the Creation and moves across the chaotic waters, bringing order and life.

- The Spirit falls upon Jesus as he is baptized in the Jordan River. - It’s the Spirit that drives Jesus out into the wilderness where he is tempted by the devil, and the Spirit

helps him to overcome temptation. - When Jesus begins his ministry, he speaks these words from Isaiah: “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon

me, because the Lord has anointed me…”

1 Karoline Lewis, “John 14:15-21,” Working Preacher.org, Luther Seminary, article online, http://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?commentary_id=1995, accessed 13 May 2020.

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- The Holy Spirit came to the disciples at the day of Pentecost, which we celebrate in two weeks, and inaugurated the Church—the body of believers—diverse people from the world over, animated by the One Spirit, the Spirit of God and of Christ.

- And it’s the Holy Spirit who is the central actor in the Book of Acts, who leads Peter and Paul and others to proclaim the goodness of God, to perform signs and wonders, all as a witness to the new life that flows into believers from the Resurrected Jesus.

All of these things we can say about the Holy Spirit, but don’t try to predict what the Spirit will do next. “The wind blows wherever it pleases,” Jesus told old Nicodemus one night in Jerusalem. “You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit” (John 3:8). In today’s Scripture reading from John, we are introduced to the Holy Spirit and the vital role the Spirit will play in the lives of Jesus’ followers:

- The Holy Spirit leads us in the Truth. - The Holy Spirit is how Jesus keeps on loving us. - The Holy Spirit is how Jesus ensures we will never be left alone.

The Spirit leads us in Truth. A little earlier in the evening, while Jesus was speaking to his disciples, he made it clear: If you want to know the Truth of God, look at Jesus—he is the way, the truth and the life. Truth is what Pontius Pilate was looking for. “Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice,” Jesus told Pontius Pilate as he stood before the Roman Governor of Judea. “What is truth?” Pilate asked Jesus. Truth is what the Spirit brings to the followers of Jesus. That Truth centers on Jesus Christ, who came to save through his death, and to give life through his Resurrection. This is the Truth of God’s love that the world has trouble accepting. The Spirit is how Jesus keeps on loving us. Jesus loved his disciples, and they loved him. Now that he was going away, their relationship would be broken forever. Or would it? All of the language about the Spirit is relationship-based. We are told the Spirit will dwell with us or abide with us. Dwelling and abiding mean living with. That means the Holy Spirit is how Jesus stays in relationship with us. There are several words we use to describe the Spirit: Comforter, Helper, Guide. But there’s another meaning of the Greek word (Paraklete), the term translated as Holy Spirit, that speaks even more about the Sprit’s role: Advocate. What does an advocate do?

- An advocate does more than just hang around the house with you, watching TV and eating popcorn. - An advocate is someone who will stand up right next to you and plead your case; kind of like you were

in a courtroom, facing a top prosecuting attorney who thinks he’s got the goods on you. - An advocate—and I’m going to use a baseball analogy here because it’s May and I’m missing the

game—is the person who will go to bat for you, even when it’s two outs in the bottom of the ninth, you’re down by two runs, and you’ve nothing left to give.

The Holy Spirit is our Advocate, our connection to Jesus. The Spirit lives in us and in the Church; the Spirit guides us into the Truth; the Spirit stands up for us when everyone else is sitting down; the Spirit... … ensures we will never be left alone. That’s the third way the Spirit helps us. The Holy Spirit is God’s living presence with us. When Jesus told the disciples they would not be left alone, he said they will not be orphaned. That’s a key to the relationship between Jesus and his followers right there. You can’t be orphaned unless you’re already part of a family. The disciples of Jesus, and we, are already assumed to be family, Jesus’ family. Orphans were children who were abandoned, left alone. Their fathers and mothers had died or been thrown into slavery or given them up for some reason. They were without a parent. Jesus does not allow that for his followers. The followers of Jesus are children of God.

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“The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children,” wrote Paul in the Letter to the Romans,” and if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ…” (Romans 8:16-17).

Once again, the emphasis is on relationship with God through Jesus, through the Holy Spirit, God’s living presence with us. Not just with us as individuals, but with us as the Church. Here is a mystery, as is much of the work of God in and through human beings: Somehow, the Spirit comes to live in the gathered community.

- The Spirit picks up the individual threads of our lives and weaves them together into a beautiful tapestry. That tapestry is the Church. It’s not a perfect weaving—people still hurt one another in the church, or they are hurt by others. But the more we allow the Spirit of Christ to change us, to make us more loving toward one another, to think less about our needs and more about the needs of others, then the tapestry will have fewer pulls and ragged edges and threads out of place. The Spirit does this. The Spirit weaves us together, that we may be one as God and Jesus are one.

- The Spirit leads us into the very life and love of God. The love Jesus shares with us is the love of God, the same love that flows within the life of the Trinity. From Father to Son to Spirit to Father, all is love. Love unquenchable, love unstoppable, love undiminished by anything in all Creation. Love divine, all loves excelling! As Charles Wesley would say.

- This is the love we are invited to share with God. Let me give you an illustration which comes by way of Richard Rohr, a Roman Catholic priest and writer on Christian Spirituality. He uses a centuries old painting to describe how we are invited into the love of God: This artwork is an icon painted by a Russian artist named Andrei Rublev in the 15th century. It portrays the Trinity, with the Father, Son and Spirit, seated at a table, sharing a meal. God the Father is on the left, the Son in the center, and the Holy Spirit is on the right. This icon shows the close relationship among the three-in-one and one-in-three. But the real genius of the icon is the way the artist has left some room at the table, right there in the foreground, where we are looking at it. Who is the extra space for? It’s for us. It’s a seat at the table with God. It makes clear that we are invited into the same intimate life of love shared by the Trinity.2

2 Richard Rohr, “Take Your Place at the Table,” Center for Action and Contemplation, article on internet, https://cac.org/take-place-table-2016-09-13/, accessed 16 May 2020.

The Trinity, Andrei Rublev (Abt. 1360-1430)

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We are invited. We only have to come, believe, and have faith in God through Jesus Christ. If that’s not Good News for today, or any day for that matter, then I don’t know what is. My friends, I know we are all under stress right now.

- We are apart from the people we love. - We are unable to travel and go about in public as we would like. - We may be feeling a bit unloved right about now.

But the Good News I want to share with you this morning is that you are loved by God…We are loved by God. You have an advocate…We have an advocate. God is for you, and for us, together, always and forever. God designed love this way—to be shared in a community. Jesus makes it possible. The Holy Spirit fulfills the promise. Through that same Holy Spirit, we are invited to love one another—whether in person or virtually—just as we love God. Amen.