Love Is from God

Love Is From God

John 13:34-35

            It’s no secret among my friends and acquaintances that I love cartoons.  I collect what I think are some of the best.  One section of one wall in my office is covered with the best of the best.  I have a bunch more sitting on my desk with nowhere to display them.

            For several years Bill Watterson drew and wrote a cartoon strip called Calvin and Hobbes.  Calvin was a Dennis the Menace-type boy, very creative and always in trouble, the kind of kid who grows up to lead a life of crime or become a world leader—or both.  Hobbes was a stuffed tiger who came to life when no one else was around.  Hobbes was Calvin’s voice of reason—sort of.  He also enjoyed the adventures Calvin led him into.

            Watterson once said, “It’s hard to be religious when certain people are never incinerated by bolts of lightning.”  How true! 

            Each of us has a list (secret, most likely) of those we would like to see zapped.  Democrats have a list that’s mostly Republicans—and vice versa.  Liberals have a list that’s mostly conservatives—and vice versa.  We could add many other categories to this list, but these two prove the point.

            A couple of months ago our church secretary picked up voice mail when she got to the office.  The woman who had left the message said that unless we believed what her church taught, we were all going to hell.  She concluded by saying that now her message had been delivered, she could sleep easier.

            Unfortunately, this is the essence of the gospel for many people—far too many.  They know they’re right, so we must be wrong, and unless we change our ways and come on board their belief system, we’re doomed.  They’re perfectly willing to commit us to everlasting damnation because our interpretation of the Bible differs from theirs.

            That’s not what Jesus said to his disciples—and, by extension, to his followers today.  John recorded words he remembered from Jesus’ final instruction at the Last Supper:  “A new commandment I give you, that you love one another:  just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.”

            Jesus didn’t say, “Love the ones who agree with you.”  He didn’t say, “You have my permission to damn anyone whose beliefs are even slightly different from yours.”  There was no equivocating in his commandment, no exceptions.  “Love one another,” he said, “as I have loved you.”  He went on to say that the distinguishing mark of his disciples was the capacity to love, and to love with an unlimited love.

            Perhaps the woman who called our church was conveying her message out of love.  It’s possible that she felt this was the most loving thing she could do, to let us know of our impending doom if we didn’t convert to her way of believing.  If so, the love didn’t come through.  There was nothing loving in her words.

            It’s obvious that John understood Jesus.  He got the message.  When he was writing his first epistle to the churches, he delivered the same message in slightly different words.

            “Beloved,” he wrote, “let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves is born of God and knows God.” (1 John 4:7)

            Love is from God.  God’s followers are to love the way Jesus loved—the way God loved us by sending us Jesus—with unequivocal, unlimited, and unending love.  That eliminates the need for lightning bolts, doesn’t it?