September 20, 2020
“From the Beginning”
Micah 6:6-8
1 John 2:7-10
John 13:31-35
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O God, our strength and our redeemer. Amen.
So, in the passage from 1 John that we just heard, the writer says, “I am writing you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you have had from the beginning.”
The audience for the writer of 1 John is a group of believers who are straying too far from the teachings of Jesus. And so the people are being told to remember who they are, and what they have been commanded to do from the beginning.
And then the writer of 1 John gets very specific, and spells it out, saying, “Whoever says, ‘I am in the light,” while hating a brother or sister, is still in the darkness.”
Indeed, the call to love one another has been a part of not only our Christian religious tradition but of all the major world religions, from the beginning.
Earlier this year, Rev. Bob’s Wednesday night book study looked at a book called “Holy Envy” by Barbara Brown Taylor. And now the Thursday evening and Friday morning WORD groups are looking at the same book.
The author is an Episcopal priest who writes of her experiences teaching world religions in a college setting. She treats the topic of world religions with great respect, honoring the differences while lifting up the many similarities across religions traditions.
In one of the chapters in her book, the author talks about how sometimes on the last day of class she hands out cards to her students with different versions of the “Golden Rule” on them.
As Christians, we learn as children to “do unto others as you would have them do unto you,” and “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
That same idea, however, is expressed in Judaism with these words: “Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful.”
In Islam one finds this saying: “None of you is a believer until you love for your brother what you love for yourself.”
And in Hinduism we find these words: “This is the sum of duty: do not do to others what would cause pain if done to you.”
My point is this – some version of the Golden Rule can be found in all the major religions of the world. It is so very basic to our humanity. And yet at times it can be so very difficult to follow.
In the Gospel lesson for today we heard Jesus giving the disciples the instruction to love one another. That was not a new idea at the time. The commandment to love was deeply engrained in Jewish tradition and present in the ancient Hebrew scriptures. In that respect, Jesus was really just reminding the disciples of that which had been there from the beginning.
Our passage from 1 John was written several decades after Jesus walked the earth, and still the writer continues to remind the people of that which has been there “from the beginning.” In fact, throughout the epistle, the writer of 1 John continually reminds his audience of the commandment to love.
I don’t have to tell you that we are living in tumultuous times. The fight to overcome racism in our world continues. Clearly there are no easy answers or solutions.
In declaring today Anti-Racism Sunday, however, the Ohio Council of churches put forth the call for churches to lift up their voices in unity and boldly declare that racism is an affront to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Racism has no place in a world where we are clearly called to love one another.
And in response to this call we are specifically encouraged to pray for peace and justice, to educate ourselves and our children on the history of racism in this country and the implications of white privilege, to exercise our right to vote, and I would add, to remind ourselves of the commandment that has been there from the beginning. The commandment to love.
I began with the passage from 1 John in which the writer says, “Whoever says, ‘I am in the light,” while hating a brother or sister, is still in the darkness.”
Allow me, then, to end with this familiar quote from the Rev. Martin Luther King who said:
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
Go forth in peace and in love.
AMEN