John 14:23-29

Jesus answered Judas (not Iscariot), "Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words; and the word that you hear is not mine, but is from the Father who sent me. "I have said these things to you while I am still with you. But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you.

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.

You heard me say to you, "I am going away, and I am coming to you.' If you loved me, you would rejoice that I am going to the Father, because the Father is greater than I. And now I have told you this before it occurs, so that when it does occur, you may believe.

After a two week hiatus I have been invited to return to the task of preaching. In order to earn back this honor and privilege I had to promise that I would never again talk about ripping the lips off of a fish, which was the primary illustration of my last sermon! So instead, we’re going to talk about stewardship. Although, I think some of you would rather talk about ripping the lips off of fish!

Today is commitment Sunday – a day when you are asked to establish (or reestablish) your commitment to the ministry of Christ’s church with your financial resources, time, abilities, and ideas.

I’ve had to be reminded on several occasions that the term “commitment” is intentional and important at Cross of Grace. Conversely, I grew up in, and served as pastor to, congregations who used the word “pledge.” A parishioner would write down their financial pledge on a pledge card and drop in in the offering plate. A pledge, by its very definition, is a non-binding declaration of an intention to contribute something of value.

Remember that next time you think about the Pledge of Allegiance. By calling it a “pledge” we are voicing our non-binding declaration of an intention to contribute something of value. Kind of cheapens it a bit, doesn’t it? The words we said every day when school started – the words our kids say every day still now – are a non-binding declaration of an intention to contribute something of value. That doesn’t sound right.

The financial commitment card we have asked you to fill out – as well as the time and talent sheets that we hope also ends up in our offering plate – they are more than a non-binding declaration of an intention to contribute something of value. A commitment is an obligation (which I realize has a negative connotation) but it’s true nonetheless. A commitment is a binding declaration of an intention to contribute something of value.

A pledge is what you say when you recite rote words before the American flag. A commitment is what you do when you enlist to serve your country.

A pledge is what you do when you show up in a congregation. A commitment is what you do when you look at the world God has blessed you with and say, “I have something of value to give in response to God’s love that I have felt in this place.”

So let’s make sure we’re all on the same page here. What we are asking for today – what we are celebrating today – is your binding declaration of your commitment to the mission and financial health of our church and the church throughout the world.

I doubt that I ever made a pledge when I was growing up in the church. But I know that I made a commitment. It was a commitment learned from my parents who decided that regular participation in worship and the life of the church would be part of my life from my earliest days. It was a commitment shaped in response to the people from St. Mark’s Lutheran Church in Bowling Green, Ohio and St. Martin’s Lutheran Church in Archbold, Ohio – the people from every generation who took me under their wing, supported me unconditionally, and gave me a glimpse of what a congregation serving Christ was capable of. It was a commitment to dedicate my vocation to serving people and preaching the good news of grace through Jesus Christ.

Once you make a commitment to the church, your life is changed. You are no longer on the path of your own choosing. It’s a bit like falling in love – you cannot possibly know when it will happen, but when it does, everything changes. It’s permanent and it’s transformational. All of the sudden you are invested, you have a stake, you are bound together.

I am a product of a church that loved me unconditionally. That’s why I’ve committed my life to its service. I am a Christian. I am a Christ-follower. I am a sinner. I am a saint. And I am committed to spreading the truth that God is not a distant, detached being somewhere in outer space, but rather a loving God who lives among us and intends to transform the world around us so that all people may know the truth about the power of forgiveness, love, and grace.

If you’re not ready to fill out your commitment card or your time and talent form, then don’t fill it out. If you cannot imagine committing to the life and ministry and well-being of the church, don’t just turn in something to feel better about yourself or because it seems like everyone else is doing it. Take it seriously. Think deeply. What are the gifts that you have received as a part of Christ’s church? What do you have to share with others?

If you have received nothing, than you have nothing to give, and that’s my fault as much as anyone else’s. But I think that you are here today because you have received something. And if you've received something that means you have something to give back – something that someone else in our congregation or community will receive as a gift. This is precisely how the church will continue to thrive for another 2,000 years.

Jesus told his disciples, “Those who love me will keep my word…Whoever does not love me does not keep my words.”

The dollar amount you indicate on your commitment card does not indicate whether you love Jesus or not. Signing up for the most ministries on the time and talent sheet doesn’t earn your salvation. To say otherwise would be outright manipulation. But the truth remains that God desires your love and commitment. Commit to Christ’s church what you can of your finances, time, and talent. And do it with seriousness, faith, and trust that God will work through this motley crew of saints and sinners to bring grace to a world so desperate for good news.

Amen.

John 13:31-35

When he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him. 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. 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.”

I read a devotion by Peter Marty about something called “Kangaroo Care,” this week. I’d actually heard of it before…knew it was a thing…but just never knew it had a name. “Kangaroo Care” is the practice of laying a naked newborn baby onto the bare chest of its mother. And I knew it was a meaningful, successful way of establishing a connection…of promoting a very real physical, emotional bond between a mother and her child. I even knew it was something done by fathers and adoptive parents, to establish a kind of physical bond and connection for parents who aren’t the birth mother. That it is something God has facilitated through the natural way of things for eons, seems obvious.

But I read this week that it’s been noticed by doctors and nurses and the medical community as a viable medical practice and treatment, even, on occasions when medicine and doctors and therapy and other modern conventions don’t cut the mustard. The story I read came from an occupational therapist who worked in a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit who talked about putting Kangaroo Care to use very deliberately when a baby’s heartbeat is irregular, out of whack, slightly off rhythm.

When drugs don’t work, and because electrically shocking a newborn’s heart is too risky, the simple, holy prescription to re-synchronize the little baby’s heartbeat is to lay the naked child, onto the naked chest of the mother. The baby’s head is deliberately turned so that the child’s ear is just above the heart of the mother, and when it works, the fix…the cure…is nothing short of miraculous, if you ask me: the less powerful beating of the child’s heart begins to pump in time with the more powerful rhythm of the mother’s heart. Their hearts begin to beat in time, together. Apparently, even outside of that, NICU nurses and therapists have found that everything from sleep and weight gain to respiration and more can be helped by this kind of skin-to-skin “Kangaroo Care."

Of course, they call it – “Kangaroo Care” – because of the way kangaroo mothers carry their kangaroo babies so close to their bodies for so long after they’re born. But it made me think about Jesus…and this new commandment to love one another…and the practice of Holy Communion, which we’ll celebrate today with a handful of our youngest ones.

But first, we can’t just read or hear these words from today’s Gospel and pretend to find any meaning in them, without first being reminded of their context. And that’s a little strange for us, on the 5th Sunday after Easter, because these are the words Jesus said to his disciples on the evening of the Last Supper – before Easter – just before he was betrayed and denied and crucified and killed. Not only was it the Last Supper, but these were some of Jesus’ last words to his friends and his family, before life and death – as they knew it, anyway – would be changed forever.

So, the short version of this already short little snippet of a Gospel reading, is that Jesus was preparing to leave, to say goodbye, to head for the hill of Calvary, to his own execution, death, and burial. And he wanted to give his disciples some final instructions, some last words, this “new commandment,” before leaving. When you see it after the fact – when you read these words as “parting words” like I do, anyway – it makes you wonder if Jesus might have had some doubts about that whole resurrection thing working out.

But these parting words… these final instructions… this “new commandment” is no less profound or meaningful, even after the resurrection, as we anticipate Jesus’ departure once again.

Jesus said, “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, so you also should love one another. By this, everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

But this is hard work, loving one another, don’t you think? When I hear Jesus say, “just as I have loved you, so you also should love one another” I think, “Yeah…we’re gonna need you around a little more often. We’re gonna need to keep seeing and experiencing that kind of reminder, that kind of presence, those kinds of examples: the foot-washing, the preaching, the teaching, the healing, the forgiving, the feeding hungry people, the comforting of the lonely, the loving the outcast. All of that is gonna need to keep happening if you’re going to expect me…if you’re going to expect us…if you’re going to expect them to keep loving one another the way you’d like.”

Because when we get too far away from the source of our faith… when we step beyond the reach of our inspiration and encouragement for loving one another… when we move beyond our ability to hear the command and encouragement of Jesus to love the other… we drop the ball, don’t we? We lose our way. We fall behind. The heartbeat of our faithfulness slows to a rate that can be imperceptible from its source, or even from our best intentions.

Which is why Jesus gave this command to love one another, just after washing the feet of his disciples and just before heading to the cross where he would lay it all down for the love of them, and for the love of the world. It’s why Jesus gave this command to love one another around the table with bread and wine. It’s why he transformed the earthly bread and wine of that meal into the heavenly body and blood of the sacrament – so that we would be nourished with it, comforted in it, encouraged by it, loved through it.

So that our sinfulness, laid bare-naked in the presence of the body and blood of our creator – like a sick child, laid upon the breast of her mother – could be transformed by forgiveness and changed into new life and deep, grateful love for the sake of the world.

Holy Communion is like God’s “Kangaroo Care” for those of us whose hearts have missed a beat. It is our tangible connection to God’s love for us. It is our tactile reminder of God’s grace in our midst. Communion is our connection to the divine love of God that means to re-calibrate the beat of our hearts as disciples and the beat of our collective heart as the church in the world, so that ours – and so that OURS, together – will beat in time with grace and gratitude, with generosity and service, with hope and love, in the name of Jesus Christ, who loved us first, who loves us still, and who calls us to nothing more and nothing less than, to love one another.

Amen

Commitment – John 14:23-29

"Kangaroo Care" – John 13:31-35