The Rev. Kristin Krantz, St. James’, Mt. Airy
May 9, 2021
Acts 10:44-48, Psalm 98, 1 John 5:1-6, John 15:9-17
Alleluia! Christ is risen!
Christ is risen indeed! Alleluia!
[Begin by asking people what the word joy means to them – put a pin in that to come back to in a bit]
This is the sixth of seven weeks of Eastertide, and the third of four weeks exploring Jesus’ teachings about living in intimacy with God. Today we continue reading from what’s known as Jesus’ farewell discourse to the disciples. Encompassing four chapters in John’s gospel, it shows Jesus on his last night with his friends and how he offered them both final teachings and words of comfort as in preparation for everything that was to come.
Following directly on last week’s passage in which Jesus cast himself as “the vine” and the disciples as the vine’s fruitful branches, in today’s gospel reading Jesus elaborates on just what sort of “fruit” he has in mind: works of love for the sake of joy.[1]
Joy, then, is the interpretive key to the great commandment: I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete comes immediately before This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.
Joy is both the foundation and the context for the love we are commanded to live.
It would be nice, then, if joy was more definitive. But just as love is a complex word to wrangle into meaning, joy can also take on many meanings. So to what shall this “complete joy” Jesus envisions be compared to?
A little later in the farewell discourse, Jesus compares it to childbirth: When a woman is in labor, she has pain, because her hour has come. But when her child is born, she no longer remembers the anguish because of the joy of having brought a human being into the world. So you have pain now; but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.[2]
The joy we are called into, then, is like the joy of birthing – strong and creative, exhausted and exultant, a joy that is no stranger to anguish, and above all the joy of having brought new life into the world. It is not a stretch to say, then, that every Christian disciple is a mother or a midwife.[3]
Joy is the “for what” of God’s love. Love not as sentiment, but love as a theological virtue, an excellence of character that God has by nature and in which we participate by grace.[4] Love as action, not merely feeling.
Taken all together – our calling of works of love for the sake of joy point us toward a ministry of birthing and midwifing God’s love into a world desperately in need of compassion, healing, and reconciliation.
We do this through cultivating one-on-one relationships with those around us, through acts of service to those in need, and by working to change the systems that benefit some and harm others.
Some works of love bring quick transformation, their labor is nearly painless. Others take longer, and carrying us through deep pain before shoots of new life appear. We don’t get to choose the work we’re called into, we only get to choose whether to follow the commandment to love. But when we do, the end result is always the same – the birth of joy, with God’s kingdom come a bit closer at hand.
All of this makes me think of one of my favorite quotes from theologian Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “Joy is the most infallible sign of the presence of God.”
Joy is the most infallible sign of the presence of God. Whenever we experience joy, God is near. And when we do the work of birthing joy into the world, we can be assured that God is present and laboring along with us.
This was the promise Jesus made to his friends as he prepared to them to continue on without him, and it is a promise to us as well. May we all answer the call to bear fruit and do works of love for the sake of joy – trusting that even when it feels overwhelming, we are never alone, for God chose us and has called us friends. And for this let us say amen, alleluia.
[1] SaltProject, “Love for the Sake of Joy” Lectionary Commentary for Easter 6.
[2] John 16:21-22
[3] SaltProject, “Love for the Sake of Joy” Lectionary Commentary for Easter 6.
[4] David S. Cunningham, Theological Perspective, Feasting on the Word Year B, Volume 2.