More Than A Slogan--October 23, 2024

More Than A Slogan--October 23, 2024

"After Jesus had washed the disciples' feet, had put on his robe, and had returned to the table, he said to them, 'Do you know what I have done to you? You call me Teacher and Lord--and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have set you an example, that you should do as I have done to you.... I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." [John 13:12-15, 34-35]

To hear Jesus tell it, it means virtually nothing to call him "Lord" if it does not lead us to serve others in the same love he has shown us first.  If we name Jesus as "teacher" or "master" or "king," he inevitably directs us to follow his lead and look to his example and look for ways to serve others and put their needs before our own.  In other words, Jesus is not looking for people merely to salute, bow, or mouth words of allegiance to him--he is looking for disciples who will take up our basin and towel alongside of him.

All too often, I think we settle for empty gestures or slogans as the signs of our love for Jesus.  But Jesus turns out to be much less interested in putting on a show by saying the right thing and much more interested in loving other people the way he loves.  As Jesus puts it in Matthew's version of the Sermon on the Mount, "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven" (Matthew 7:21).  And as the letter we call First John says, "Those who say, 'I love God,' and hate their brothers or sisters, are liars; for those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen. The commandment we have from him is this: those who love God must love their brothers and sisters also" (1 John 4:20-21).  In other words, if you actually ask the voices of Scripture about how we are to love Jesus, they all point us to showing love to the people around us, including putting ourselves in the roles of serving and seeking the well-being of others ahead of our own interests.  The way to show that Jesus is your Lord, Teacher, and King is to wash feet the way Jesus did--which, if we are honest, includes both friends like Simon Peter or James and enemies and betrayers like Judas.

When I hear Jesus' instructions to his disciples here in John 13 on Jesus' last night with his disciples, I hear the words of that 1990 ballad, "More Than Words," by the band Extreme.  (Can you hear the strum of the acoustic guitar or remember the artsy-serious black-and-white of the music video from that song?)  "More than words is all you have to do to make it real, then you wouldn't have to say that you love me... 'cause I'd already know."  You know, for a hair-band ballad, that's pretty close to Jesus' direction to his disciples here.  He tells his disciples that if they recognize he is Lord and Teacher, the way to show that is to love the way he has loved them--to serve others the way he has served them.  He's looking for more than words--even fancy, pious words.

It is so much easier in this life to slap a "Jesus is My Co-Pilot" bumper sticker on your car while you still cut other people off in traffic than to let it be clear by the way you love and serve people who your Lord really is.  It is so much more tempting to virtue signal to people about your piety by giving the right appearances, saying the right religious words, or wearing the right faith-themed fashion accessories than to set the cross-stamped rings and bracelets aside in order to pour the water on the smelly feet of the person next to you... or to find the 21st century equivalent of being willing to do the quiet, grubby work behind the scenes that nobody else has bothered to do.

So today, let's decide right now not to let our faith be reduced to a slogan.  Let's commit not to settle for mouthing the words "Jesus is Lord!" like it's a magic spell or mantra, and let's certainly not let it be co-opted into a bit of performative theater for partisan politics. If we are going to acclaim Jesus as our Lord, King, and Teacher, he has already told us how we will be known: not by empty talk, but by love that shows up in serving action more than words.

Whom might Jesus be sending us to serve today as a way of embodying our love for him?  And are we willing to let him lead us beyond empty gestures in order to meet them with our pitchers of water at the ready?

Lord Jesus, direct us again to love you by loving others, and to show you are our Lord by the ways we love like you.