September 14, 2025 • 24 mins
What does it mean to "love boldly" in a society fractured by political division and violence? At a pivotal moment in American culture, this exploration of Jesus's greatest commandment couldn't be more timely or necessary.
The United Methodist Church has embraced a powerful new guiding vision centered on loving boldly, serving joyfully, and leading courageously. This sermon unpacks the first principle by examining Jesus's famous conversation with the Pharisees about the greatest commandment. His answer—love God with all your heart and love your neighbor as yourself—has been recognized as the cornerstone of faith by Jewish and Christian thinkers for two millennia. Yet we struggle tremendously to put this teaching into practice.
When current events force us to confront painful questions about who counts as our "neighbor" and what our love should look like in practice, we often retreat to safer, more comfortable alternatives. Rather than letting love lead, we defer to power, money, division, fear, or anger. But these approaches have consistently failed to bring justice, peace, or harmony to our communities.
Perhaps Jesus wasn't offering a naive platitude but the only practical solution for human beings to live together despite our differences. The challenge for people of faith today is whether we're ready to truly believe Jesus—to trust that his commandment to love God and neighbor is the viable path forward. This requires holding ourselves accountable first, ensuring our words and actions honor the humanity of all people, even those with whom we deeply disagree.
Join us as we wrestle with what it means to love boldly in today's world. How might our communities transform if we had the courage to place love at the center of our interactions with others? What would change if we truly believed what Jesus taught about love?
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Pastor Darren (00:00):
The United Methodist Church has come
together, our bishops, and theyhave put together what they're
calling a guiding vision for ourdenomination right, our brand
of Christianity.
They're putting together aguiding vision for where we're
(00:21):
headed as a denomination goingforward.
And so today, well, I can tellyou it's three things.
It's love boldly, servejoyfully and lead courageously,
which I thought was pretty good.
They've even got a little video.
Maybe we'll send it out in theemail this week.
(00:42):
I thought I'm going to do asermon series on the three and
we'll have a little time tothink about.
Well, who are we UnitedMethodists these days?
So we start with loving boldly.
And our bishops, they pickedthis passage from the Gospel of
Matthew.
It's chapter 22, verses 34 to46.
(01:07):
And a lot of our gospel passages.
They are conversations betweenpeople like the Pharisees those
who are running the church ofthe day and Jesus, and they're
debating, to a certain extent,what they are supposed to be
doing.
They're debating theology aboutwho God is, and the Pharisees.
(01:30):
They ask Jesus a fairlystraightforward question what is
the greatest commandment?
Right?
And most of us know thecommandments being the 10
commandments from the OldTestament, from the Hebrew Bible
.
Does anybody here have theirfavorite commandment?
What's your favoritecommandment?
(01:53):
Thou shalt not steal, all right.
So not a big fan of TenCommandment group.
Okay, noted, noted, you take orleave of Ten Commandment group.
Okay, noted, noted, you take orleave the Ten Commandments, all
right, very good.
Well, jesus, he not only hasone, he actually offers two.
(02:18):
And in some ways a lot of folkshave summarized all of the Ten
Commandments into these two,that the first one in many ways
summarizes the first fivecommandments and then the second
of his two greatestcommandments kind of summarizes
the back half.
So in the first half we'retalking about our relationship
(02:40):
with God, in the back half ofthe commandments we're talking
about a relationship with eachother.
So it comes down to these twothings for Jesus love God and
love neighbor.
I might've showed you thisbefore.
I had somebody pointed out thatfor us Christians we're all
(03:02):
about loving God and lovingneighbor, that our cross itself
is sort of a metaphor for how weunderstand our lives.
We love God, our upwardrelationship, and we love
neighbor, our relationships witheach other.
That was his answer.
It's a fairly commonly agreedto answer.
(03:26):
It is a belief, a theology thatmost people generally agree with
, and even in biblical times,even post-biblical times there
was general agreement.
In fact, many people of faithwould use this as if you're
really going to barrel down theChristian faith, or even faith
(03:47):
more broadly, into a statement.
It might be that ProfessorNicholas Shazer he's at
Malacaster College and he worksin workingpreachercom.
That's a website I really like.
He says Jewish sages who livedin Jesus's era described these
biblical verses in very similarways.
(04:08):
For instance, according to theJerusalem Talmud, it'd be around
the fourth century in thecommon era, or AD as we have
commonly understood it.
Rabbi Akiva, who was bornaround 50 years after Jesus,
says that the Levitical commandto love your neighbor as
(04:29):
yourself is the greatestprinciple of the Torah.
So this is right.
After Jesus' life, they'realready claiming this as an
important part of the teachings.
Another famous story preservedin the Babylonian Talmud this
would be 600 CE, so 600 yearsafter Christ was living states
(04:51):
that the renowned first centurysage Hillel once paraphrased
Leviticus 19.18 for a non-Jew bysaying whatever is hateful to
you, do not do it to yourneighbor.
That is all the Torah.
The rest is commentary.
Go study.
(05:12):
I like that last bit.
Go study.
I've told you what is Now.
Go figure it out, go live it.
Make it real.
In Matthew, jesus couples thesame verse with Deuteronomy 6.5
and asserts on these twocommandments, hang all the Torah
and the prophets.
Hopefully you're understandinga significant verse, a
(05:34):
significant teaching, so much sothat for many this barrels down
what it means to live a life offaith, and not just for
Christians, but in the Judaictradition as well.
(05:57):
Love God, love neighbor, lovethe lawnmower it's those three
things.
It can be a provocative message, right I?
We often ask ourselves well,who's my neighbor then?
Which is a complicated question, isn't it?
Amidst our current focus as anation, trying to separate
(06:20):
certain parts of the community,it forces us Christians to be
asking ourselves okay, maybethere's some economic reason
we're doing this, but then again, my faith says love my neighbor
.
Are they my neighbor?
What makes them not so?
If they aren't, is itcitizenship?
(06:40):
Citizenship?
Or is it possible that whenJesus says this, love God, love
neighbor, he really only meantcitizens?
Or maybe he only meantChristians, in which case we ask
another level of question whatwould it mean even to love them?
(07:01):
What would it mean if they areof the body or even outside of
the body?
Then, what is Jesus asking usto do?
What does that love look like.
Does it mean we need to letpeople stay?
It's a complex question, isn'tit?
(07:23):
It's one we wrestle with.
So after he has thisconversation, then Jesus, he
asks his own question.
He asks of these Phariseeswhose son is, or at the time,
will be, the Messiah?
Provocative question, right,for many, jesus understands
(07:45):
himself and others understandhim as the Messiah.
So when he asks the Phariseeswho's the Messiah it's an
interesting question.
Their answer is the son ofDavid.
But that's sort of problematictoo because, as they all would
know, david refers to theMessiah as being at the right
(08:06):
hand of God.
This would be in a psalmwritten before Jesus came to
take body in this world, on thisearth.
So now you have this questionwell, who's the son then, if
Jesus was already in existence,right hand of God pre-David, but
also is the son of David?
So some of you who arewrestling with that last bit,
(08:28):
that's kind of the overview andit was just a really interesting
question that Jesus poses tothem and overall it's an
interesting conversation.
Sometimes those conversationswith Jesus and the Pharisees
they get a little contentiousand you can tell they're working
at things.
But this one felt like a realhonest conversation about
(08:51):
theology, but it brings us backto the meat of the passage today
.
What is love?
Baby, don't hurt me.
What is love?
That was for all the Gen Xers,I don't know, did anybody?
I apologize for my musicreference, but hey, I'm a Gen
(09:15):
Xer and we don't get a lot ofpub.
What is love, and what does itmean?
To love boldly, I mean, we canassume it means in the
scriptural sense, right, ourbishops chose this.
So what are we to make of thislove?
You know, when we think of love, just hearing it in our common
(09:36):
culture and outside of thechurch, we often think on this
range from romantic to kind ofsilly.
Right, we hear of love out of afaith context and we're
thinking well, ross and Rachel,should they have been together
or not?
Sam and Diane, right, did theyfit?
(09:56):
What was it?
Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell?
I'm trying to hit all thegenerations here, right.
Right, I mean.
But that's when we think love,right, we don't automatically go
to agape.
Godly love, right, we thinklove, oh, yeah, that's when
you're 22 and you're oh,whatever, this and that and the
(10:17):
other thing, and you know it'sthis thing that's really
meaningful and yet we can kindof compartmentalize it.
You know, that's just romanticthings, the stuff of movies and
TV.
We don't generally think ofagape love and maybe that's why
(10:38):
when we hear this phrase fromJesus, love God, love, neighbor
we have trouble kind of puttingit first, neighbor.
We have trouble kind of puttingit first, putting it as the
lead of our lives, because itmakes us feel a little
vulnerable.
Wait a minute, I'm going tolove, I'm going to give my heart
, I'm going to make myselfvulnerable to others.
(11:02):
How am I ever going to succeed,how am I going to flourish in
this world if I do somethinglike that?
I can't do it unless he's goingto do it or she's going to do
it.
So I thought today it might behelpful for us to actually
reflect on what we think agapelove is Right and I'm going
(11:23):
would this be old school?
Yeah, on what we think agapelove is right and I'm going
would this be old school?
Yeah, right, here I'm going oldschool.
I've got an easel, I've gothere some paper, right, we're
gonna get this organized, we'regonna get it decided.
(11:46):
See, and you don't thinkthere's like choreography
involved in this at all.
But no, paul and I, we had towork together on this.
We decided that this was a goodspot for this, so all my
brothers and sisters at home canmake sure they see it.
I would like to know from you,right here today, what do we
(12:08):
think agape love is, and don'tfeel like you've got to embrace
it completely.
Just give me some words.
What is agape love?
When you think of agape love,just throw them out there, I'm
ready to go.
Kindness, kindness, respect,respect, respect, respect.
(12:31):
Maybe I should have done two ofthese.
Commitment oh, I like that.
Grace, amen.
I got a Methodist out theresomewhere.
Giving of oneself, giving ofoneself I heard intentional
(12:55):
Compassion, all right.
Empathy it's a lot of stuff,see, maybe this is why it's hard
.
I heard one over here, but Ididn't make it out.
Unconditional All right, allright, we got it figured out.
(13:25):
Unconditional forgiving,empowering I like that too.
We often don't think about that.
Does my love for you empoweryou?
Pretty good list, service,service, service, service.
(13:48):
I did alright, we got a prettygood list.
Alright, we're doing alrighthere.
I like this.
That is a good list.
Agape love isn't quite thatunfamiliar to us Now.
(14:10):
Some of you have been here.
Well, many of you have beenhere long enough to remember
Brother Walt when he was hereand he had his mantra right.
What was the mantra?
Oh, if I say it, you're goingto go.
Oh yeah, let love lead.
Right, let love lead, amen tothat.
Right, let love lead.
(14:31):
Now, we had poster up.
It was on a website, it was inthe emails.
You know, it's a good phrase,it's a good mantra, it's a good
motto.
Now we took it down becausewe're thinking, all right, new
guy, we probably ought to dosomething different.
But on a day like this it doesmake me think.
(14:52):
You know, should we be bringingit back?
Are we really good at lettinglove lead, which really love God
, love neighbor.
That's kind of what that means.
It's been a difficult week forthis scripture, am I right?
(15:13):
This kind of passage for thisscripture?
Am I right?
This kind of passage?
We had a big event this week tofollow other big events, a
couple big events a couple weeksago, as I mentioned in prayer
time 358 big events since Jan 1in our country, and it hits us
(15:35):
this one this week right in ourpolarized weak spot.
See, you guys think my job iseasy.
I've got to come up here onSunday.
I've got to preach somethingwhen this happens In this
society where we have committedand entrenched, we're not only
(15:57):
on two different sides, butwe're trying to figure out how
to undermine, how to take thelegs out, how to take each other
out, a little difficult topreach in.
I'm just going to say it.
So we have a young man.
He was killed and he's mournedby many.
(16:17):
He's seen as this conservativeactivist who was able to ignite
passion in young people,especially young white men.
He really was getting themorganized and it's a time where
young white men are nervous alittle bit.
They're nervous.
You know, america has been aplace where white men had a lot
(16:41):
of say and as it evens out, itmakes young white men get
nervous, get anxious.
At the same time, in doing hisactivism, he said a lot of
(17:01):
things that were very polarizing, super aggressive things said
about pretty much everynon-white culture and about
women.
These are things that, if theyhad been said about us or about
our own families, we would beled to be scared, to feel unsafe
(17:24):
about the society around us,about the people around us,
worried that we might beoppressed, we might be harassed,
worried that we might beoppressed, we might be harassed,
we might even be killed at somepoint.
That is the environment thatwe're living in, so I don't want
(17:45):
to pick a side.
I'm going to let you all liveinto your own beliefs and how
you understand this situation,but what's clear to me is that
the killing is wrong.
I think that's an obvious thingto say.
Not only is it wrong, but wereally can't afford for people
(18:07):
to be getting killed for theiropinions, any more than we can
afford people being oppressed oreven killed for their skin
color, for their gender, fortheir sexual identity.
We can't live as a societywhere that kind of jeopardy,
(18:28):
that kind of violence, is areality.
It's a world that is left blindand toothless for you
scriptural orientators.
This is why this morning, I'mpointing to the tone, to the way
that we relate with each otherand how we work through our
(18:55):
disagreements.
You know there's a lot ofphilosophies, approaches,
guidelines that we can put aheadof love on our list of things.
There's a lot of them.
Instead of letting love lead,we could defer to power.
Let's let the strong lead.
(19:18):
That's why they're there.
We could defer to money.
Let money lead.
We can let government lead.
We can let caustic words lead.
We can let destroy the otherlead, we can let caustic words
lead, we can let destroy theother lead, we can let division
(19:38):
lead, we can let hate lead, wecan let fear lead, we can let
disengagement lead, we can letanger lead, but can we all agree
, at least for this moment, onthis day, that none of these
(20:04):
actually work?
Can we all agree that none ofthese really bring us to any
sense of justice or peace, orequity, or fairness or harmony
or, most of all, love, the thingthat Jesus claimed as the most
(20:27):
important, the thing that mostbelievers, for 2,000 years, have
claimed as the most important?
I wonder if Jesus is telling usto love God and to love neighbor
, not because he thought lifewas just a really silly sitcom
(20:49):
where we could all be tuttifrutti, silly, in love with each
other and let all the flowersand the hearts grow around us.
Maybe Jesus is saying it isbecause it's the only thing that
works in a society in which weare engaging each other daily,
(21:11):
where decisions that we makeaffect everyone, not just mine.
I am not just affected, oursare not just affected.
We are all affected by our owndecisions as a society, and
we're in a society in which weall disagree on things.
Not only that, we're in asociety, as human beings, where
(21:33):
mistakes happen, we hurt peopleand it's not always intentional.
We live in a society wheremortality is real.
Maybe Jesus was telling us this2,000 years ago, because it's
(21:57):
the only thing that really works.
Our question for today and I'llput it to this community because
I know and I'm learning thiscommunity we are a heart
community, we are a headcommunity, we want to be
blessings in this world.
So I put it to this communityAre we ready to believe Jesus?
(22:23):
Are we ready to trust in thatscripture, to love God and love
neighbor?
Because I tell you what?
It isn't easy.
Today we have moved in oursociety so far from any trust in
that scripture.
We've convinced each other wereally need to destroy each
(22:45):
other.
Are we ready to hold each otheraccountable and by holding each
other accountable, I'm nottalking about holding the other
guy accountable, the other galaccountable.
I'm talking about holding yourown folks accountable.
I'm talking about holdingyourself accountable when
(23:07):
something is said to convey thatanyone else or anything that
anyone else in this world isanything less than a child of
God.
Are we ready to hold othersaccount?
Are we ready to hold them toaccount to say hold on, we are
(23:28):
all children of God.
We need to figure out how tolive in this way, in this place,
with peace, because I thinkthat's what it's going to take.
Are we ready to acceptaccountability for our sense of
humanity, even in the toughdecisions we need to make as a
(23:48):
society the economic decisions,the political decisions?
Are we ready to be heldaccountable to a sense of
humanity in the way we deal witheach other?
And I'll tell you what itdoesn't mean nothing if we're
just going to believe it.
We got to live it.
The United Methodist Church istaking on this mission to love
(24:14):
boldly, and it will takeboldness in this world for what
we have allowed to come tofruition, to come to existence.
I, for one, am going to bepraying for them.
I'm going to be praying for usas we seek to live out our part
(24:36):
of that mission to love boldly,and I pray that you will too.
Amen.
The United Methodist Church has come
together, our bishops, and theyhave put together what they're
calling a guiding vision for ourdenomination right, our brand
of Christianity.
They're putting together aguiding vision for where we're
(00:21):
headed as a denomination goingforward.
And so today, well, I can tellyou it's three things.
It's love boldly, servejoyfully and lead courageously,
which I thought was pretty good.
They've even got a little video.
Maybe we'll send it out in theemail this week.
(00:42):
I thought I'm going to do asermon series on the three and
we'll have a little time tothink about.
Well, who are we UnitedMethodists these days?
So we start with loving boldly.
And our bishops, they pickedthis passage from the Gospel of
Matthew.
It's chapter 22, verses 34 to46.
(01:07):
And a lot of our gospel passages.
They are conversations betweenpeople like the Pharisees those
who are running the church ofthe day and Jesus, and they're
debating, to a certain extent,what they are supposed to be
doing.
They're debating theology aboutwho God is, and the Pharisees.
(01:30):
They ask Jesus a fairlystraightforward question what is
the greatest commandment?
Right?
And most of us know thecommandments being the 10
commandments from the OldTestament, from the Hebrew Bible
.
Does anybody here have theirfavorite commandment?
What's your favoritecommandment?
(01:53):
Thou shalt not steal, all right.
So not a big fan of TenCommandment group.
Okay, noted, noted, you take orleave of Ten Commandment group.
Okay, noted, noted, you take orleave the Ten Commandments, all
right, very good.
Well, jesus, he not only hasone, he actually offers two.
(02:18):
And in some ways a lot of folkshave summarized all of the Ten
Commandments into these two,that the first one in many ways
summarizes the first fivecommandments and then the second
of his two greatestcommandments kind of summarizes
the back half.
So in the first half we'retalking about our relationship
(02:40):
with God, in the back half ofthe commandments we're talking
about a relationship with eachother.
So it comes down to these twothings for Jesus love God and
love neighbor.
I might've showed you thisbefore.
I had somebody pointed out thatfor us Christians we're all
(03:02):
about loving God and lovingneighbor, that our cross itself
is sort of a metaphor for how weunderstand our lives.
We love God, our upwardrelationship, and we love
neighbor, our relationships witheach other.
That was his answer.
It's a fairly commonly agreedto answer.
(03:26):
It is a belief, a theology thatmost people generally agree with
, and even in biblical times,even post-biblical times there
was general agreement.
In fact, many people of faithwould use this as if you're
really going to barrel down theChristian faith, or even faith
(03:47):
more broadly, into a statement.
It might be that ProfessorNicholas Shazer he's at
Malacaster College and he worksin workingpreachercom.
That's a website I really like.
He says Jewish sages who livedin Jesus's era described these
biblical verses in very similarways.
(04:08):
For instance, according to theJerusalem Talmud, it'd be around
the fourth century in thecommon era, or AD as we have
commonly understood it.
Rabbi Akiva, who was bornaround 50 years after Jesus,
says that the Levitical commandto love your neighbor as
(04:29):
yourself is the greatestprinciple of the Torah.
So this is right.
After Jesus' life, they'realready claiming this as an
important part of the teachings.
Another famous story preservedin the Babylonian Talmud this
would be 600 CE, so 600 yearsafter Christ was living states
(04:51):
that the renowned first centurysage Hillel once paraphrased
Leviticus 19.18 for a non-Jew bysaying whatever is hateful to
you, do not do it to yourneighbor.
That is all the Torah.
The rest is commentary.
Go study.
(05:12):
I like that last bit.
Go study.
I've told you what is Now.
Go figure it out, go live it.
Make it real.
In Matthew, jesus couples thesame verse with Deuteronomy 6.5
and asserts on these twocommandments, hang all the Torah
and the prophets.
Hopefully you're understandinga significant verse, a
(05:34):
significant teaching, so much sothat for many this barrels down
what it means to live a life offaith, and not just for
Christians, but in the Judaictradition as well.
(05:57):
Love God, love neighbor, lovethe lawnmower it's those three
things.
It can be a provocative message, right I?
We often ask ourselves well,who's my neighbor then?
Which is a complicated question, isn't it?
Amidst our current focus as anation, trying to separate
(06:20):
certain parts of the community,it forces us Christians to be
asking ourselves okay, maybethere's some economic reason
we're doing this, but then again, my faith says love my neighbor
.
Are they my neighbor?
What makes them not so?
If they aren't, is itcitizenship?
(06:40):
Citizenship?
Or is it possible that whenJesus says this, love God, love
neighbor, he really only meantcitizens?
Or maybe he only meantChristians, in which case we ask
another level of question whatwould it mean even to love them?
(07:01):
What would it mean if they areof the body or even outside of
the body?
Then, what is Jesus asking usto do?
What does that love look like.
Does it mean we need to letpeople stay?
It's a complex question, isn'tit?
(07:23):
It's one we wrestle with.
So after he has thisconversation, then Jesus, he
asks his own question.
He asks of these Phariseeswhose son is, or at the time,
will be, the Messiah?
Provocative question, right,for many, jesus understands
(07:45):
himself and others understandhim as the Messiah.
So when he asks the Phariseeswho's the Messiah it's an
interesting question.
Their answer is the son ofDavid.
But that's sort of problematictoo because, as they all would
know, david refers to theMessiah as being at the right
(08:06):
hand of God.
This would be in a psalmwritten before Jesus came to
take body in this world, on thisearth.
So now you have this questionwell, who's the son then, if
Jesus was already in existence,right hand of God pre-David, but
also is the son of David?
So some of you who arewrestling with that last bit,
(08:28):
that's kind of the overview andit was just a really interesting
question that Jesus poses tothem and overall it's an
interesting conversation.
Sometimes those conversationswith Jesus and the Pharisees
they get a little contentiousand you can tell they're working
at things.
But this one felt like a realhonest conversation about
(08:51):
theology, but it brings us backto the meat of the passage today
.
What is love?
Baby, don't hurt me.
What is love?
That was for all the Gen Xers,I don't know, did anybody?
I apologize for my musicreference, but hey, I'm a Gen
(09:15):
Xer and we don't get a lot ofpub.
What is love, and what does itmean?
To love boldly, I mean, we canassume it means in the
scriptural sense, right, ourbishops chose this.
So what are we to make of thislove?
You know, when we think of love, just hearing it in our common
(09:36):
culture and outside of thechurch, we often think on this
range from romantic to kind ofsilly.
Right, we hear of love out of afaith context and we're
thinking well, ross and Rachel,should they have been together
or not?
Sam and Diane, right, did theyfit?
(09:56):
What was it?
Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell?
I'm trying to hit all thegenerations here, right.
Right, I mean.
But that's when we think love,right, we don't automatically go
to agape.
Godly love, right, we thinklove, oh, yeah, that's when
you're 22 and you're oh,whatever, this and that and the
(10:17):
other thing, and you know it'sthis thing that's really
meaningful and yet we can kindof compartmentalize it.
You know, that's just romanticthings, the stuff of movies and
TV.
We don't generally think ofagape love and maybe that's why
(10:38):
when we hear this phrase fromJesus, love God, love, neighbor
we have trouble kind of puttingit first, neighbor.
We have trouble kind of puttingit first, putting it as the
lead of our lives, because itmakes us feel a little
vulnerable.
Wait a minute, I'm going tolove, I'm going to give my heart
, I'm going to make myselfvulnerable to others.
(11:02):
How am I ever going to succeed,how am I going to flourish in
this world if I do somethinglike that?
I can't do it unless he's goingto do it or she's going to do
it.
So I thought today it might behelpful for us to actually
reflect on what we think agapelove is Right and I'm going
(11:23):
would this be old school?
Yeah, on what we think agapelove is right and I'm going
would this be old school?
Yeah, right, here I'm going oldschool.
I've got an easel, I've gothere some paper, right, we're
gonna get this organized, we'regonna get it decided.
(11:46):
See, and you don't thinkthere's like choreography
involved in this at all.
But no, paul and I, we had towork together on this.
We decided that this was a goodspot for this, so all my
brothers and sisters at home canmake sure they see it.
I would like to know from you,right here today, what do we
(12:08):
think agape love is, and don'tfeel like you've got to embrace
it completely.
Just give me some words.
What is agape love?
When you think of agape love,just throw them out there, I'm
ready to go.
Kindness, kindness, respect,respect, respect, respect.
(12:31):
Maybe I should have done two ofthese.
Commitment oh, I like that.
Grace, amen.
I got a Methodist out theresomewhere.
Giving of oneself, giving ofoneself I heard intentional
(12:55):
Compassion, all right.
Empathy it's a lot of stuff,see, maybe this is why it's hard
.
I heard one over here, but Ididn't make it out.
Unconditional All right, allright, we got it figured out.
(13:25):
Unconditional forgiving,empowering I like that too.
We often don't think about that.
Does my love for you empoweryou?
Pretty good list, service,service, service, service.
(13:48):
I did alright, we got a prettygood list.
Alright, we're doing alrighthere.
I like this.
That is a good list.
Agape love isn't quite thatunfamiliar to us Now.
(14:10):
Some of you have been here.
Well, many of you have beenhere long enough to remember
Brother Walt when he was hereand he had his mantra right.
What was the mantra?
Oh, if I say it, you're goingto go.
Oh yeah, let love lead.
Right, let love lead, amen tothat.
Right, let love lead.
(14:31):
Now, we had poster up.
It was on a website, it was inthe emails.
You know, it's a good phrase,it's a good mantra, it's a good
motto.
Now we took it down becausewe're thinking, all right, new
guy, we probably ought to dosomething different.
But on a day like this it doesmake me think.
(14:52):
You know, should we be bringingit back?
Are we really good at lettinglove lead, which really love God
, love neighbor.
That's kind of what that means.
It's been a difficult week forthis scripture, am I right?
(15:13):
This kind of passage for thisscripture?
Am I right?
This kind of passage?
We had a big event this week tofollow other big events, a
couple big events a couple weeksago, as I mentioned in prayer
time 358 big events since Jan 1in our country, and it hits us
(15:35):
this one this week right in ourpolarized weak spot.
See, you guys think my job iseasy.
I've got to come up here onSunday.
I've got to preach somethingwhen this happens In this
society where we have committedand entrenched, we're not only
(15:57):
on two different sides, butwe're trying to figure out how
to undermine, how to take thelegs out, how to take each other
out, a little difficult topreach in.
I'm just going to say it.
So we have a young man.
He was killed and he's mournedby many.
(16:17):
He's seen as this conservativeactivist who was able to ignite
passion in young people,especially young white men.
He really was getting themorganized and it's a time where
young white men are nervous alittle bit.
They're nervous.
You know, america has been aplace where white men had a lot
(16:41):
of say and as it evens out, itmakes young white men get
nervous, get anxious.
At the same time, in doing hisactivism, he said a lot of
(17:01):
things that were very polarizing, super aggressive things said
about pretty much everynon-white culture and about
women.
These are things that, if theyhad been said about us or about
our own families, we would beled to be scared, to feel unsafe
(17:24):
about the society around us,about the people around us,
worried that we might beoppressed, we might be harassed,
worried that we might beoppressed, we might be harassed,
we might even be killed at somepoint.
That is the environment thatwe're living in, so I don't want
(17:45):
to pick a side.
I'm going to let you all liveinto your own beliefs and how
you understand this situation,but what's clear to me is that
the killing is wrong.
I think that's an obvious thingto say.
Not only is it wrong, but wereally can't afford for people
(18:07):
to be getting killed for theiropinions, any more than we can
afford people being oppressed oreven killed for their skin
color, for their gender, fortheir sexual identity.
We can't live as a societywhere that kind of jeopardy,
(18:28):
that kind of violence, is areality.
It's a world that is left blindand toothless for you
scriptural orientators.
This is why this morning, I'mpointing to the tone, to the way
that we relate with each otherand how we work through our
(18:55):
disagreements.
You know there's a lot ofphilosophies, approaches,
guidelines that we can put aheadof love on our list of things.
There's a lot of them.
Instead of letting love lead,we could defer to power.
Let's let the strong lead.
(19:18):
That's why they're there.
We could defer to money.
Let money lead.
We can let government lead.
We can let caustic words lead.
We can let destroy the otherlead, we can let caustic words
lead, we can let destroy theother lead, we can let division
(19:38):
lead, we can let hate lead, wecan let fear lead, we can let
disengagement lead, we can letanger lead, but can we all agree
, at least for this moment, onthis day, that none of these
(20:04):
actually work?
Can we all agree that none ofthese really bring us to any
sense of justice or peace, orequity, or fairness or harmony
or, most of all, love, the thingthat Jesus claimed as the most
(20:27):
important, the thing that mostbelievers, for 2,000 years, have
claimed as the most important?
I wonder if Jesus is telling usto love God and to love neighbor
, not because he thought lifewas just a really silly sitcom
(20:49):
where we could all be tuttifrutti, silly, in love with each
other and let all the flowersand the hearts grow around us.
Maybe Jesus is saying it isbecause it's the only thing that
works in a society in which weare engaging each other daily,
(21:11):
where decisions that we makeaffect everyone, not just mine.
I am not just affected, oursare not just affected.
We are all affected by our owndecisions as a society, and
we're in a society in which weall disagree on things.
Not only that, we're in asociety, as human beings, where
(21:33):
mistakes happen, we hurt peopleand it's not always intentional.
We live in a society wheremortality is real.
Maybe Jesus was telling us this2,000 years ago, because it's
(21:57):
the only thing that really works.
Our question for today and I'llput it to this community because
I know and I'm learning thiscommunity we are a heart
community, we are a headcommunity, we want to be
blessings in this world.
So I put it to this communityAre we ready to believe Jesus?
(22:23):
Are we ready to trust in thatscripture, to love God and love
neighbor?
Because I tell you what?
It isn't easy.
Today we have moved in oursociety so far from any trust in
that scripture.
We've convinced each other wereally need to destroy each
(22:45):
other.
Are we ready to hold each otheraccountable and by holding each
other accountable, I'm nottalking about holding the other
guy accountable, the other galaccountable.
I'm talking about holding yourown folks accountable.
I'm talking about holdingyourself accountable when
(23:07):
something is said to convey thatanyone else or anything that
anyone else in this world isanything less than a child of
God.
Are we ready to hold othersaccount?
Are we ready to hold them toaccount to say hold on, we are
(23:28):
all children of God.
We need to figure out how tolive in this way, in this place,
with peace, because I thinkthat's what it's going to take.
Are we ready to acceptaccountability for our sense of
humanity, even in the toughdecisions we need to make as a
(23:48):
society the economic decisions,the political decisions?
Are we ready to be heldaccountable to a sense of
humanity in the way we deal witheach other?
And I'll tell you what itdoesn't mean nothing if we're
just going to believe it.
We got to live it.
The United Methodist Church istaking on this mission to love
(24:14):
boldly, and it will takeboldness in this world for what
we have allowed to come tofruition, to come to existence.
I, for one, am going to bepraying for them.
I'm going to be praying for usas we seek to live out our part
(24:36):
of that mission to love boldly,and I pray that you will too.
Amen.
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