Sermon: The Challenge of Loving One Another, March 6, 2011

"The Challenge of Loving One Another" John 8: 1-11
Dr. Christopher Miller, preaching.

Jesus was clear with us that loving one another is the most reliable indication of a real Christian Community. As we hear in 1st Corinthians 13, most of our abilities and gifts are not worth much if we are not loving. But what is the love Jesus recommends? Whatever it is we are suppose to be doing in our life together as church or family is harder to do than we might expect.

Watching Jesus in John's account of the woman caught in the act of adultery, Jesus in His predictably surprising way demonstrates the kind of unexpected or counter-intuitive behaviors consistent with the love He models. In His responses to the hostile intent of the Scribes and Pharisees, as well as His way of interacting with the woman herself, we see Jesus exhibiting several features of the kind of love He hopes we can develop.

First of all, Jesus reads peoples' minds. He knows without human authority or clear and direct communication, what others are intending, how they are thinking and feeling and what matters to them. Whether you are an enemy intending to do harm or a blatant sinner or in the crowds following and observing Him, He knows who you are and what you need. In this way, He loves people the way a mother loves her baby, with empathic awareness and easy attunement, knowing the child's needs, interests, fears and preferences without being told in words. As long as a child experiences this kind of maternal presence, that developing child's mind will stay open to the mother's mind, engaged in reciprocal interaction that creates the experience of trust and grace over time. When the child, or any of us, encounters other people who are not interested in what we feel or think or experience, and may even be judging or trying to correct or control our minds without empathic awareness or attunement, our minds close down. This is the experience of mistrust that can so easily develop in families and churches.

So Jesus models being non-reactive to loved ones, enemies, and sinners alike, responding in ways informed by full awareness of who He's dealing with. This transforms crisises without shame, judgment, blame, revenge or violence. Jesus enables the Scribes and Pharisees to abandon their hostile mission, saves the woman and Himself, thereby creating both justice and peace by this form of love.

So, like Jesus, we are to develop minds that are attuned and empathic with people, whether they threaten us or not and interact with their minds with understanding and full awareness so that trust occurs. Then the peace that passes understanding is enabled in our loving encounter with loved ones, strangers and enemies alike.