Easter 6 John 15:9-17 5/21/06
"Being The Beloved"

Philip Yancy (_What's So Amazing about Grace?_) writes: >Not long ago I received in the mail a postcard from a friend that had on it only six words, "I am the one Jesus loves." I smiled when I saw the return address, for my strange friend excels at these pious slogans. When I called him, though, he told me the slogan came from the author and speaker Brennan Manning. At a seminar, Manning referred to Jesus' closest friend on earth, the disciple named John, identified in the Gospels as "the one Jesus loved." Manning said, "If John were to be asked, 'What is your primary identity in life?' he would not reply, 'I am a disciple, an apostle, an evangelist, an author of one of the four Gospels,' but rather, 'I am the one Jesus loves.'" >What would it mean, I ask myself, if I too came to the place where I saw my primary identity in life as "the one Jesus loves"? How
differently would I view myself at the end of a day? >Sociologists have a theory of the looking-glass self: you become what the most important person in your life (wife, father, boss, etc.) thinks you are. How would my life change if I truly believed the Bible's astounding words about God's love for me, if I looked in the mirror and saw what God sees? ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ I find that most sermons are pretty easy to write; however, there are some that are staggeringly difficult. This is often because of the lesson that serves as the text. Occasionally, a text just doesn't seem to inspire or doesn't fit the situation or people who will hear it. Some texts have hard sayings and a preacher struggles to preach the hard words in a way that is not hurtful or unnecessarily offensive. Today's lesson, on the other hand, is so beautiful that it was hard to find words adequate to express their beauty. I was caught and helped
though by the quote from Phillip Yancy, especially the question he asks at the end: "How would my life change if I truly believed the Bible's astounding words about God's love for me, if I looked in the mirror and saw what God sees?" I think that deep down inside, most people don't believe they are loveable. Oh, they may act like they just adore themselves or they may have learned to not really look at themselves and thus not have to think about whether they are loveable. But, the dark side of life works very hard to convince us almost from birth that we are not acceptable as we are. This doesn't have to do with the wrong things we do - bad feelings about that are called "guilt" and can be relieved by hearing we are forgiven. Rather, messages that we are unacceptable, defective, intrinsically unlovable, that our very being is ugly are called "shame." Shame is the most destructive psychological state a person can have. At its worst, it eats at the soul and
drives all kinds of unhealthy behaviors. Even when parents try very hard to give their child a healthy sense of self-worth, messages of unworthiness that come from other adults, peers, even (or maybe especially) the media are constantly burrowing into the minds and hearts of a child. As time goes on these shame messages may make us believe that not even God can love us. This is why the doctrine of grace is so very important. That God loved us first makes us loveable. He declares that our being, that which really makes us who we are, is acceptable, beautiful, grace-filled. We may do things for which we feel guilt. When we do wrong things (sin) we need to ask forgiveness and deal with the consequences of our bad behavior. But these sins don't define who we are or whether we are loveable. The distinction between guilt and shame understood, and shame having been left in the tomb when Christ rose from the dead, we are enabled to answer the original
question posed by Yancy: What would it mean, if I too came to the place where I saw my primary identity in life as "the one Jesus loves"? How differently would I view myself at the end of a day? Each of us must answer for him or herself, but we might consider the following. If I see myself as the one Jesus loves, I am freed from anxiety over whether I can be good enough to earn love. Being loved is an essential part of life, but when we know in our inmost being that God loves us and loves us just as we are, we can put other loves in their proper place. Being the beloved of Jesus means we are cherished, that we are the most important being in all creation, that we have One who would die for us. We need not fear how others feel about us because we know that the One who has declared His love for us will never turn on us, never be offended because we don't live up to His expectations, never leave us, never stop loving us. With the freedom of being the
beloved, not dependent on others for love or validation as loveable, we can be truly, joyfully who we are. We can put our energy into living the abundant life and using our gifts for others. We know we will make mistakes and will sin, but we also know that nothing we do is beyond forgiveness. Without the fear of losing love we can respond to love with love for others. We cannot on our own obey Jesus command to love as He loved, but in the freedom of being the beloved we can increasingly see others as Jesus sees them. We can see that they are not their behaviors, but are acting out of their sense of shame. We can then act out Jesus' love in us by showing them that they too are the beloved. As this love spreads, community is created. It is this community that receives the promise that whatever it asks God will give. The people gathered together as the "Community of the Beloved" seeks God's will and is guided in its asking. It is then used by God to
fulfill His promise. And its primary task is to reach out and help others experience being the beloved. Heaven will be a time when a story of Brennan Manning, told in Yancy's book is the story of everyone... an Irish priest who, on a walking tour of a rural parish, sees an old peasant kneeling by the side of the road, praying. Impressed, the priest says to the man, "You must be very close to God." The peasant looks up from his prayers, thinks a moment, and then smiles, "Yes, he's very fond of me." [pp. 68-69]
May each of us come to know what that peasant knew, that God is indeed very fond of us. Amen