Obedient Dependency

Jann Martin April 27, 2008

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John 14:15 - 21

Gospel Lesson

Jesus Promises the Holy Spirit

¹⁵ "If you love me, obey my commandments. ¹⁶ And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor, who will never leave you. ¹⁷ He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth. The world at large cannot receive him, because it isn't looking for him and doesn't recognize him. But you do, because he lives with you now and later will be in you. ¹⁸ No, I will not abandon you as orphans-I will come to you. ¹⁹ In just a little while the world will not see me again, but you will. For I will live again, and you will, too. ²⁰ When I am raised to life again, you will know that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you. ²¹ Those who obey my commandments are the ones who love me. And because they love me, my Father will love them, and I will love them. And I will reveal myself to each one of them."(1)

This is the Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to You, O Christ.

God created us to need one another. We are commanded to love one another by Christ. That means we are to care for each other and reach out in love and compassion.

One of the ways we do that here at Faith Community is through the Stephen Ministry. The Stephen Ministry is a ministry of caring for one another. The Stephen Ministers go through a 50-hour training program, focusing on listening to peoples needs and concerns. The most important key to this ministry is confidentiality. We reach out in love to listen and support those who are going through a difficult time. Through the listening we pray and ask God for guidance as to what to say to support and guide our Care Receiver to healing. We are only there to support; it is God will do the healing.

Through love we are obedient to Christ and are dependent on Him to make the right choices in our lives. This kind of dependency is good. Being dependent on money, things, drinks and drugs will lead to all kinds of problems. But being dependent on Christ and His love will lead to a good and productive life. We can feel a sense of peace when we are dependent on Christ and love.

When I keep Christ first and the care and love of others foremost in my life everything always goes better. It's nice to receive gifts and compliments but I feel much better when I am the one that is reaching out to others. In 1 John 4:7 we learn about God's love and ours it says: "Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God." We usually think of love as a feeling, but it really is a choice and an action. We choose how we will react to and with others we come in contact with. We learn from God how we are to treat others but we are the ones who choose how we will act in each situation. We receive the gift of love through the Holy Spirit. Sometimes it's hard for us to reach out, when this world tends to focus us on ourselves.

When we follow Christ however we are told to reach out in love to others. A good example of this is in a paraphrase of 1 Corinthians 13 that I received.

LOVE: A PARAPHRASE OF 1 CORINTHIANS 13

If I talk a lot about God and the Bible and the Church, but I fail to ask about your needs and then help you, I'm simply making a lot of empty religious noise.

If I graduate from theological seminary and know all the answers to questions you'll never even think of asking, and if I have all the degrees to prove it and if I say I believe in God with all my heart, and soul and strength, and claim to have incredible answers to my prayers to show it, but I fail to take the time to find out where you're at and what makes you laugh and why you cry, I'm nothing.

If I sell an extra car and some of my books to raise money for some poor starving kids somewhere, and if I give my life for God's service and burn out after pouring everything I have into the work, but do it all without ever once thinking about the people, the real hurting people-the moms and dads and sons and daughters and orphans and widows and the lonely and hurting-if I pour my life into the Kingdom but forget to make it relevant to those here on earth, my energy is wasted, and so is my life.

Here is what love is like--genuine love. God's kind of love. It's patient. It can wait. It helps others, even if they never find out who did it. Love doesn't look for greener pastures or dream of how things could be better if I just got rid of all my current commitments. Love doesn't boast. It doesn't try to build itself up to be something it isn't. Love doesn't act in a loose, immoral way. It doesn't seek to take, but it willingly gives. Love doesn't lose its cool. It doesn't turn on and off. Love doesn't think about how bad the other person is, and certainly doesn't think of how it could get back at someone. Love is grieved deeply (as God is) over the evil in this world, but it rejoices over truth.

Love comes and sits with you when you're feeling down and finds out what is wrong. It empathizes with you and believes in you. Love knows you'll come through just as God planned, and love sticks right beside you all the way. Love doesn't give up, or quit, or diminish or go home. Love keeps on keeping on, even when everything goes wrong and the feelings leave and the other person doesn't seem as special anymore. Love succeeds 100 percent of the time. That, my friend, is what real love is!

We are not called to be real creative or heroes when we love. We are to follow the example of Christ in the way we are to reach out to help others. Christ always put others and their needs first. When He was tired and hungry He still talked to the people and fed them, then He went up the mountain to rest and pray. Doing for others first gives us a sense of peace.

We are not left on our own to reach out in love to those around us. Before Christ left the disciples He promised them the gift of the Holy Spirit. He told them that they couldn't see the Holy Spirit but that this gift would be in them. He also said that this gift is for everyone for all times.

Have you felt that sense of peace that passes all understanding? That peace is the guidance of the Holy Spirit. It's when you feel that everything is going right. The Holy Spirit gives us the capability to obediently love others. It also helps us to not feel alone and left to our own attempts to try and work things out without really knowing how do handle the situation.

We are not meant to live our lives alone. We have been given the gift of salvation through Christ and the gift of the Holy Spirit to guide and comfort us each day. We are then called to share this gift with others by loving and caring for them and teaching them about Christ and the Holy Spirit.

In our culture we are taught to take care of things on our own. We can hear a student talk about going away to college. You hope they want to go away to study and gain the knowledge they will need to have a good and productive career. Usually what you hear is that they are looking forward to getting away from home and being able to make their own decisions.

Then on the other end of the age scale you hear senior citizens talk about not wanting to be a burden to their children. Quite often seniors are more concerned with being a burden than with the loss of a spouse.

With young couples you sometimes hear that they are putting off marriage because they don't want to loose their freedom. Or we have heard children that are going away to summer camp say they are going because they can do what they want.

Our society pulls us in the direction of being self-centered instead of God and love centered. It's a hard battle to fight but well worth the effort to reach out in love to others. It's like being in a war when we leave the church. Everything points us away from love and caring. Everything points us to being independent.

C.S. Lewis once commented on a friend's observation of an atheist and that they were some of the best people that he had met. C.S. Lewis's response was "no wonder atheists are good people, they must be good. They have to get everything right. They don't believe in a God who forgives."

Thank goodness we don't have to get everything right. As a Christian our life is based on being forgiven and the wonderful gift of love and support that we receive from our triune God, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

If we are obedient and depend on God and His love to guide our lives we will all live much better and happier lives.

Amen.

©Jann Martin 2008