St Clement Church Community Fifth Sunday of Easter Service

 

Good morning,

As we gather at St Clement Church or at home to worship, may we think of Jesus’ final commandment to His disciples ‘to love one another just as I have loved you.’

Jesus lived a life of service to all, regardless of who they were or the type of life they lived. He treated His betrayer exactly the same way He treated the other disciples.

It’s a ‘hard ask’ isn’t it? But that’s what we are told to do.

God Bless

With my love

Liz

  

Let us pray:

 

Dear God, we thank you for your amazing power and work in our lives.

Thank you for your goodness and for your blessings over us.

Thank you that you are able to bring hope through even the toughest of times, strengthening us for your purposes.

Thank you for your great love and care. Thank you for your mercy and grace.

Thank you that you are always with us and will never leave us.

Thank you for your incredible sacrifice so that we may have freedom and life.

Forgive us when we don’t thank you enough, for who you are, for all that you do, for all that you’ve given.

Help us to set our eyes and our hearts on you afresh.

Renew our spirits, fill us with your peace and joy.

We give you our love and we need you, this day and every day.

We give you praise and thanks for you alone are worthy.

In Jesus’ name,

Amen.

 

Hymn: 285 For the beauty of the earth

 

Our prayers of Penitence

 

Lord God, we have sinned against you.

We have done evil in your sight.

We are sorry and repent.

Have mercy on us according to your love.

Was away our wrongdoing, and cleanse us from our sin.

Renew a right spirit within us and restore us to the joy of your salvation.

Through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen.

 

Let us pray our Collect for today.

 

Almighty God, who through your only-begotten Son Jesus Christ have overcome death and opened and opened to us the gate of everlasting life: grant that, as by your grace going before us you put into our minds good desires, so by your continual help we may bring them to good effect; through Jesus Christ our risen Lord, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Amen

 

New Testament reading:     Acts 11. 1 - 18

New Testament reading:     Revelations 21. 1 - 6

 

Hymn: 205 Christ is made the sure foundation

 

(Hear the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to John (13. 31 – 35)

Response: ‘Glory to you O Lord

 

During the supper, when Judas had gone out, Jesus said,

 ‘Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified

If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once.

Little children, I am with you only a little longer.

You will look for me; and as I said to the Jews, so now I say to you,

 “Where I am going, you cannot come.”

I give you a new commandment, that you love one another.

By this everyone will know that you are my disciples,

if you have love for one another.’

 

  (This is the Gospel of the Lord.)

Response: Praise to you, O Christ.

 

Reflection

 

We seem to be hitting the rewind button during this season of Eastertide – we keep going back over events that led up to the crucifixion. Today’s passage takes us back to that final meal Jesus shares with the disciples. Interestingly, John doesn’t describe this as a Passover meal like the other Gospel writers – rather, this takes place the night before Passover begins. But, John gives us something the other Gospel authors don’t: he tells us in detail what Jesus says to His disciples during this final night that they have together.

 

In these few verses we find three major themes: Christ’s glorification, preparation for His upcoming departure and the new commandment to love each other.

 

Christ’s glory is only revealed because of betrayal.  There is no crucifixion unless Judas betrays Jesus. Judas is the instrument God uses to glorify Christ ‘at once.’ This glory is revealed immediately, as Jesus dies on the cross. For God to be glorified in Christ, Jesus has to be lifted up in death, and this can only happen if Judas turns Him over to the authorities.

 

Before Jesus leaves them, the disciples need a new way to identify themselves and to be identified by the world. This new way is love.

But, surely this is just like the ‘greatest commandment’ – ‘to love one’s neighbour as oneself.’ No, what is new is that this command tells us to love our neighbour as Christ loves us.

The command to love isn’t a command to feel something rather it’s a command to do something. It’s a command to serve each other, to take care of one another. How we do that shows the rest of the world what it means to follow Jesus and what it means to be loved by God.

Just as Jesus washes Judas’ feet and feeds him the bread and the cup in the same way as he shares his last meal with all the disciples, He expects us to offer grace and hospitality to all, even the ones who insult us, who don’t like us very much, who are rude or unkind to us. Jesus ‘loves them to the end’ so that we may love one another in just the same way.

                                                       

‘You are my disciples if you have love for one another’ – I don’t know about you, but I don’t always find that very easy to do – have love for everyone else. Do you?

 

One only has to switch on the television – ‘Nightmare Neighbours,’

The News, reports of court cases, - can I really love all of these people?

How is one expected to love Putin, the Russian generals and the Russian

soldiers committing such atrocities in Ukraine?

Sadly, Jesus’ commandment is rather easier said than done.

To love without judgement. To love without fear. To love without bias or qualification or exception. To love as Christ loves us.

 

We are to love the people we want to love and the people we can’t stand.

We are to love the people who are just like us and the people who are so different from us that we can’t see how we have anything at all in common.

We are to love as Jesus loved - including all people in our lives walking beside them, eating with them, caring for them, listening to them, including ‘them’ as an integral part of ‘us.’

 

Because, that’s what Jesus says. Love – each – other.

 

Each other – each and every other…until there is no longer any division.

Love each other until the kingdom of God is completely filled with people God has chosen in his infinite mercy.

 

 This story makes me think – does it you?

 

A Jew named Yankel lived in the East End of London. He owned a bakery there and, he had survived the Nazi concentration camps.

He tells his story.

‘You know why it is that I am alive today? I was a kid, just a teenager at the time. We were on a train, in a boxcar, being taken to Auschwitz.

Night came and it was freezing, deathly cold in the boxcar.

The Germans would leave the cars on the side of the tracks overnight,

sometimes for days on end without any food, and of course, no blankets to keep us warm.

Sitting next to me was an older Jew – a beloved elderly man whom

 

recognized from my home town. Although I recognized him, I had never seen him like this. He was shivering from head to toe, and looked terrible. So, I wrapped my arms around him and began rubbing him to warm him up. I rubbed his arms, his legs, his face and his neck. I begged him to hang on.

All night long, I kept the man warm this way. I was tired, I was freezing cold myself and my fingers were numb, but I didn’t stop rubbing the heat onto this man’s body. Hours and hours went by this way. Finally, night passed, morning came and the sun began to shine. There was warmth in the cabin and then I looked round the car to see some of the other Jews in there. To my horror, all I could see were frozen bodies and all I could hear was a deathly silence.

Nobody else in that cabin made it through the night – they died from the frost. Only two people survived: the old man and me. The old man survived because somebody kept him warm; I survived because I was warming him.

 

‘As I have loved you, so you must love one another.’

 

The first law of Christ’s Kingdom is selfless love and the greatest manifestation of this is through service. Just like the boxcar, this world can be a dark and cold place. We live by serving others There is no other way. By serving others we share life with others  and enjoy the truest life ourselves.

Amen