Easter 6A 2008 John 14:15-21

What do you mean if? At first reading, the words of Jesus in this passage from John are not very inspiring. "If you love me, you will keep my commandments." The problem is that little word "if." Haven’t we heard our grandparents down to our grandchildren, and people who talk as though their love for us was conditional. "If you loved me, you would do this or that.” "If you loved me, you would NOT do this or that.”

Among the smallest words in English, this two letter “if” is extremely powerful. It appears in English translations of the Bible about 1600 times. The Greek of the New Testament, hean (ean)))), meaning if, unless, except, provided, is used by Jesus about the relationship between himself and his followers as being conditional, only in this “If you loved me, you would do what I tell you to do” sense of if. It is a strong, absolute sounding, “If….”

What strikes about today’s gospel passage is that it seems to conflict the unconditional, no matter what love Jesus has been demonstrating elsewhere in the gospels toward his disciples.

One commentator has observed that on the first Easter morning, Jesus simply spoke her name to the brokenhearted Mary Magdalene.

When the disciples were hiding behind locked doors in fear, Jesus simply stood there among them, sorrowful that they were unable to trust the good news brought to them by the women that morning, but not wasting any time with recriminations or scenes of righteous indignation. And later to Thomas Jesus said nothing conditional like "If you really loved me you would know me without my having to show you my scars."

And on the road to Emmaus, Jesus, in the guise of a stranger, repeated what he had so often done with his friends and disciples while walking along the road: he taught them the meanings of scripture. He deliberately recreated the Last Supper while they were at table together: he took, blessed, broke, and shared bread. Once they recognized him, Jesus did not say, "Well it took you long enough." He simply vanished, leaving them to rejoice now.

These post-Resurrection appearances strongly suggest that the risen Jesus loved his disciples unconditionally. Yet suddenly in today's reading, going back to a time immediately before his arrest in Gethsemane, we have the big "if." There may be absolute, unconditional love for us on God's side of things, but on our side, Jesus poses a condition: if you love me, you will obey my commandments. The conditional paired with the imperative.

These words may have been written down by Saint John late in the First Century to strengthen the weak hearted in the newly taking shape Christian Church in the face of the power of the Roman Empire as the persecutions began to occur.

The clue, of course, also lies not so much in "if" but in "obey." We need to know what commandments John wants us to obey at this point. Are we to understand the whole tradition of commandments, from Sinai on down, or are we to understand it as the new commandment that Jesus handing over to his friends in John 13:34: "A new commandment I give you, that you love one another even as I have loved you"?

This is a distinction without a difference when we consider the Ten Commandments in the Sinai covenant tradition as a gift that describes a life for humans consistent with the life God wants for us. It is better to think right from the start that God's Sinai commandments guide us and guard us in learning how to love him and each other. It is therefore not so much the absolute conditional and imperative "if you love me, you will obey," as it is the present tense "By loving me, you are obeying my commandment to love one another as I have loved you, to love God with all you are and have, to love your neighbor as yourself."

When we follow this guide and guard, we in the embrace of the Spirit of Truth. The Holy Spirit is what helps us to see and respond to God's life in Christ in ourselves and each other. By assuring us of the continuity of God's presence in our lives, Jesus, through the Holy Spirit is also assuring us of God's absolute and unconditional love, now and forevermore..

In the powerful words of St. Paul, we may therefore be sure that nothing, "neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come ... will be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus."

AMEN


-- Adapted from a sermon for Easter 6A 2008 by The Reverend Angela V. Askew (priest-in-charge of St. Ann and the Holy Trinity Church in Brooklyn, New York), http://www.episcopalchurch.org/sermons_that_work_96461