Apr 23 2019 John 14:15-31

If you love me, keep my commandments.



This is part of Jesus last bit of advice for the disciples, and occurs in that space after Jesus washes their feet, has his last meal with them, and Judas leaves to betray him, and before he’s arrested. It’s been an emotional week, and his disciples have, up to this point, fully showed their love, if not imperfect human love, to Jesus. His final hook to them, is that if they love him, they should keep his commandments.



For many years, I heard this as paternalistic, or legalistic,  or conditional. First off, Jesus isn’t implying or stating that they need to do anything to get his love. He didn’t say, if you want me to love you, keep my commandments, so it’s not conditional love at all.



It’s also not paternalistic or legalistic. If Jesus was saying that there was a long long list of rules or commandments to follow, maybe. But he’s just simplified the law into two simple commandments. Love God, and the new commandment he gives – love your neighbor. SO what Jesus is saying is that if his disciples love Jesus, they should love God and love their neighbors.



This morning, I’m thinking about God in all of God’s forms. Through Lent and now into the 50 days of Easter, I’ll think and learn a lot Jesus, God the Son. He walked this earth and showed us how we should walk through this earth. God the father is bigger than I can imagine, but I sense in nature and in the largest and smallest things. Mountains, galaxies, hummingbirds. God the Spirit, I sense in my own deep peace, and in the connections between me and other people.



I’m thinking about commutative property from math, if a+b=c, then c=b+a. Breaking down Jesus’ words using math, I hear ‘my commandments = love God and love your neighbor’. So Jesus is saying, ‘if you love me, love God and love your neighbor’.



I’m thinking about the Trinity. God the father, son and holy spirit. If the three are one, than this commandment isn’t as much telling them what they should do, as explaining the truth of what loving Jesus means. If they loved Jesus, by that same commutative property math, they loved God and loved the Holy Spirit. Since God is everywhere, and the Spirit is in all of us, I hear ‘if you love me then you love God the Father and God the Spirit’. And since God and the Spirit are here and everywhere, doesn’t that mean ‘if you love me, you love God and your neighbor’?



For the original disciples who had a human Jesus to follow, Jesus was the most tangible and accessible face or experience of God the disciples had. For me, thousands of years later, sometimes I connect with Jesus, with the human things Jesus did and said. Sometimes I sense God through the Spirit in me or in others. And sometimes I sense an all powerful God in the mountains or ocean. If I love God the Spirit, I love God the Son and God the Father.



Jesus continues in his farewell that they should not let their hearts be troubled, and that he’s leaving them his peace. All of this, the don’t be troubled, and peace-leaving, are comforting. And this morning, what’s most comforting is that old commutative math theory. Love Jesus = Love God and Love Spirit and Love Neighbor who is infilled with the Spirit. Who knew that commutative theory would ever come in handy? My math major son would be proud.