Lectionary Reflection — 06 May 2018, Sixth Sunday of Easter
9-10 “I’ve loved you the way my Father has loved me. Make yourselves at home in my love. If you keep my commands, you’ll remain intimately at home in my love. That’s what I’ve done — kept my Father’s commands and made myself at home in his love.
11-15 “I’ve told you these things for a purpose: that my joy might be your joy, and your joy wholly mature. This is my command: Love one another the way I loved you. This is the very best way to love. Put your life on the line for your friends. You’re my friends when you do the things I command you. I’m no longer calling you servants because servants don’t understand what their master’s thinking and planning. No, I’ve named you friends because I’ve let you in on everything I’ve heard from the Father.
16 “You didn’t choose me, remember; I chose you, and put you in the world to bear fruit, fruit that won’t spoil. As fruit bearers, whatever you ask the Father in relation to me, he gives you.
17 “But remember the root command: Love one another.
Other readings:
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In the state of Oklahoma, the state in which I live, there have been a lot of debates about a monument of the Ten Commandments on the capitol grounds. It’s a twisting tale.
In 2009, a bill was submitted to install the monument at the state capitol. It passed the legislature and was approved by the governor and in 2012 the monument was installed. Since 2009, the monument has been called a “lightning rod of controversy.” There are those who claim that the monument should be there because of religious freedom and there are those who claim it shouldn’t be there because of Article II, Section 5 of the Oklahoma Constitution:
“No public money or property shall ever be appropriated, applied, donated, or used, directly or indirectly, for the use, benefit, or support of any sect, church, denomination, or system of religion, or for the use, benefit, or support of any priest, preacher, minister, or other religious teacher or dignitary, or sectarian institution as such.”
If you haven’t seen the local news stories, in 2014 a person drove through the capitol grounds and destroyed the monument. And the same person destroyed another monument in a neighboring state. These incidents even made national news.
In 2015, the Oklahoma Supreme Court ruled that the monument was unconstitutional and must be removed from the capitol grounds. In October of the same year, however, Governor Fallin said the people should be able to vote on amending the state constitution to reinstall the monument. So, in November 2016, State Question 790 was placed on the ballot to amend the Oklahoma Constitution and allow the Ten Commandments Monument to return to the capitol grounds. But, SQ790 was defeated by the people with roughly 60% of them voting against it.
Regardless of the Supreme Court’s ruling, or the vote of the people, some people are still trying to amend the Oklahoma Constitution and bring the monument back to the capitol.
So what does all of this have to do with today’s Lesson? Quite a lot, actually.
I’ve seen Christian people argue (quite violently at times) about the Ten Commandments and the Christian’s duty to follow them. For example, when I ride with my wife to work, we pass a church that has a large monument of the Ten Commandment on their property. And it always makes me cringe. Our lesson today touches on why.
Jesus told his followers to keep his commands (verse 10). When one asks what commands Jesus has in mind, people will often go straight to the Ten Commandments.2 But is this what Jesus meant? Let me be as clear as I can —
No. Jesus does not mean the Ten Commandments.
Here’s a clue: Jesus used the world “love” 9 times in our Lesson today.
When he was asked what was the greatest commandment, Jesus responded by quoting Deuteronomy 6.4-5, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself’” (Matthew 22.37-29; NIV3). While these two commands set the groundwork for John’s scene in our Lesson today, it’s the next verse that gets overlooked. In verse 40 Jesus said, “All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” Notice that. Jesus said loving God and loving our neighbors is the foundation for “all the law.” This includes the Ten Commandments.
When Jesus said we’re to keep his commands, then, this is what he meant. Love God. Love others.4
But like we’ve seen before, Jesus is speaking about a specific type of love — self-sacrificial love. He said, “Love one another the way I loved you. This is the very best way to love. Put your life on the line for your friends” (John 15.12-13; emphasis added). Self-sacrificial love is “the very best way to love.” And it’s in loving God and others which fulfills the law. Saint Paul wrote —
8-10 Don’t run up debts, except for the huge debt of love you owe each other. When you love others, you complete what the law has been after all along. The law code — don’t sleep with another person’s spouse, don’t take someone’s life, don’t take what isn’t yours, don’t always be wanting what you don’t have, and any other “don’t” you can think of — finally adds up to this: Love other people as well as you do yourself. You can’t go wrong when you love others. When you add up everything in the law code, the sum total is love.
It’s Love that fulfills the Law. Or, as Paul stated above, we “complete what the law has been after all along” (Romans 13.8). It’s through Love that people will know we’re followers of The Way of Jesus:
34-35 “Let me give you a new command: Love one another. In the same way I loved you, you love one another. This is how everyone will recognize that you are my disciples—when they see the love you have for each other.”
Again we see, then, that it’s Love — loving God and loving others — and not the Ten Commandments that’s the commandment of Christ, the “royal law” (James 2.8).
But what might that look like? What does loving God and loving others look like on a daily basis? We get a clue in Luke’s telling of the Matthew 22 story above.
When Luke tells this story (Luke 10.25-285), it’s a “religious scholar” who asks Jesus, “Teacher, what do I need to do to get the Life of the Age?” In typical fashion, Jesus turns the question back to the scholar asking him how he would interpret the Law. The scholar replies with the same two commands we find in Matthew 22. “‘Good answer!’ Jesus said. ‘Do it and you’ll live.’”
And that “do it” is the key component to Love. In Matthew 5-7,6 Jesus lays out what loving God and loving others looks like. Jesus summarizes his teaching by saying, “Therefore, you should treat people in the same way that you want people to treat you; this is the Law and the Prophets” (Matthew 7.12; CEB).7
And that “do it” is the key component to Love. In Matthew 5-7,6 Jesus lays out what loving God and loving others looks like. Jesus summarizes his teaching by saying, “Therefore, you should treat people in the same way that you want people to treat you; this is the Law and the Prophets” (Matthew 7.12; CEB).7
Jesus said “everyone will recognize” we’re his followers — not by our adherence to the Ten Commandments, or blocking the rights of others we deem as “sinful,” or refusing to serve others because we don’t agree with their lifestyle or religious tradition or their political party — by our self-sacrificial love for others that’s manifested in our treatment of others. And I would go so far to say especially if we’re giving up something of our own rights or benefits or comfort in our love and service of others. It’s there — in that paradox of us giving up our rights, benefits, or comfort so that others can attain their rights, benefits, and comfort — that “everyone will recognize” that we’re followers of The Way of Jesus.
So I have a proposal for my fellow Oklahomans: Why don’t we work on Love — self-sacrificial Love? Instead of putting up monuments of the Ten Commandments at the state capital, why don’t we simply “love our neighbor as ourselves” and “treat [them] the way [we] want to be treated”? Why don’t we erect monuments in our churches stating that self-sacrificial Love fulfills the Law? What would our state look like — our country, our world — if, instead of trying to obey the Ten Commandments, we obey Love? What would we look like if we simply decided to self-sacrificially Love God and others? What would we be like?
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In the Love of the Three in One,
Br. Jack+, LC
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1. Scripture quotations marked (MSG) taken from The Message. Copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.
2. At the very least. Sometimes it’s the entire Mosaic Law.
3. Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
4. I say “others” here because Jesus elaborates on this even further in Matthew 5.43ff. Namely, people who follow The Way of Jesus are to love their enemies, too.
5. Or it’s a different story. A lot of scholars believe that it’s quite possible that there were various themes to Jesus’ teaching. He would use these same themes over and over as he travelled getting varied responses from the people.
6. If we were to be technical, I think we could certainly make a case in stating that the commands of Jesus are found in this teaching. It’s what self-sacrificial love for God and others looks like in a very practical way.
7. Scripture quotations marked (CEB) are taken from The Common English Bible. Copyright © 2011 by Common English Bible.
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