We might say we love people in theory, but loving them in practice is much harder. It’s what Peter experienced when the Holy Spirit sent him to Cornelius, and what we experience whenever God challenges us to love someone outside our comfort zone.

Vicar Jessica Christy
The Second Sunday of Easter, year B
Texts: Acts 10:44-48, John 15:9-17

Where are the limits of your love? How far are you willing to go, and how much are you willing to lay down before you draw the line? Who are those people who you pray that God loves, because you don’t think that you can?

Today we see the early Church wrestling with the limits of its love. Our reading from Acts is the culmination of a story in which Peter visits the home of a faithful centurion named Cornelius. But the apostle doesn’t go there of his own volition; both he and Cornelius’ household are guided by the Holy Spirit. Peter is staying in a nearby city when he has a strange vision of a giant sheet descending from heaven, filled with all manner of unclean animals – four legged creatures and reptiles and birds. And he hears a voice saying, “Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.” Now, because Peter is Peter, he fights back – not once, but three times. He objects that he has never eaten anything impure, and he has no desire to start now. To give Peter his due, the problem isn’t just that he thinks that eating a lizard sounds gross. He objects because he loves the law. It’s a fundamental part of who he is. The teachings of Moses were how Peter and his people stayed faithful to their God in a world that constantly threatened them with extinction and assimilation. And now God is instructing him…to let go of that? To turn away from the sacred teachings that have meant not only ritual purity but identity and survival and a sure relationship with God? What God is asking of him is terrifying. God is telling him that he must die to himself in order to be reborn as something new.

Then three men appear and tell Peter that an angel has instructed them to bring him to the home of a Roman officer, and Peter understands what God is asking of him: in order to carry the Gospel where it needs to go, he has to break bread with Gentiles. He will need to lay down his life as he has known it in order to serve others. He goes and announces the good news of Christ to all of Cornelius’ household. And before he’s even finished talking, the Holy Spirit comes down on his audience. That same Holy Spirit that descended on Peter and the believers in Jerusalem on Pentecost now comes to this Roman household. There’s no difference. In this moment, there is no more us and them, just one Spirit-filled people. Peter’s companions are astounded by this sight. They can’t believe that God would come to these foreigners.

Now, this shouldn’t be news to any of them. Peter traveled with Jesus, saw him heal people of all faiths and ethnicities and walks of life. On Pentecost, he quoted the prophet Joel saying that God’s Spirit would be poured out on all flesh – all flesh, not just some. Peter and his followers knew that God’s love could extend to Gentiles, at least in theory. But as we’ve been hearing these past weeks, love isn’t love when it’s just a theory. Peter had proclaimed the expansive love of the Spirit, but embracing the physical reality of what that meant, that was something harder. When he was asked to make that love incarnate, to see it and touch it and eat it, his first instinct was to fight back. He wanted God to love all people, but he hadn’t been ready to do it himself.

And isn’t that what we always do? In this place, we are bold to proclaim God’s limitless, unconditional love for all people. We strive to create a community where everyone can find warmth and welcome, and to live lives that carry God’s mercy into the world. But believing in God’s love is much easier than being God’s love. In reality, there people with whom we’d rather not share fellowship. There are places we’d rather not go. There are differences we’d rather not work to overcome. So who are you afraid to love? Who do you wish you could love not just in theory but in practice, but don’t know how? Is it people with different political beliefs? Is it people of different nationalities or languages? Is it people of different social classes? People whose bodies look or work differently from your own? Who makes you want to leave the room, or look away, or cross on the other side of the street, and say, “sorry, God, but this person isn’t for me.” I wish I could say that my answer was “nobody.” I wish I could love all people without reservation or qualification. But if I said I did that, I would be lying. I believe that God’s love is for everyone, but faced with the flesh and blood reality of what that asks of me, I often shy away. All the time, I choose to love people who are easy and comfortable and safe rather than allowing the Spirit to lead me somewhere new.

But the Holy Spirit is not about what is easy. She pushes us out of our safe, comfortable places and challenges us to be more, to believe more, to love more. No matter how big we think God’s love is, it will always be bigger than that. When we see its incarnate reality, it will leave us astounded. The immensity of God’s love breaks us open and shakes us out of what we know. Sometimes that comes at a real price. Like Peter, we might be asked to rethink who we are and what we believe. We might need to let go of things we cherish – good things that have served us well, but cannot take us where we need to go next. We might need to lay down parts of our lives so that we can recognize new people as friends. This can be scary and painful, so thanks be to God that we don’t do it alone. The Spirit goes out before us and does the real work. She brought Philip to the Ethiopian official, and Peter to Cornelius, and she shows us where we need to go now. She is the one who inspires, and who baptizes, and who brings new life. Our job is simply to follow along, to recognize what the Spirit is doing, and to not withhold the water.

The best way – and indeed, the only way for us to know God’s love is to love each other. Christ says that we abide in the love of the Trinity when we keep God’s commandments, and the ultimate commandment is that we love one another. There are times when that love can only emerge through sacrifice, even loss. But Christ tells us that the love that lays itself down is the greatest and most godly love of all, and he promises that the feast that awaits us at God’s great banquet is far better than whatever meals we eat at our own tables. It is only natural that we feel some fear when we let go of the familiar and venture into the unknown. There’s nothing wrong with trepidation, so long as we hold to God’s truth that perfect love will cast out all fear. If we follow where the Spirit leads, yes, we will astounded, but on the other side of that astonishment is the fullness of the body of Christ. On the other side of that astonishment is God.

Amen.

Staying connected to Christ, as a vine and branches, keeps us connected to the flow of the Spirit’s love, changes us, and helps us embody God’s love in the world.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Fifth Sunday of Easter, year B
Texts: Acts 8:26-40; 1 John 4:7-21; John 15:1-8 (added 9-11 from start of next week’s Gospel; will read again on 6 Easter.)

Sisters and brothers in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

It all started with a problem of widows and food distribution.

After Pentecost, the newly born Church shared everything in common. Money, food, possessions, all belonged to all. But there were two groups of Jewish Christians, those who spoke Aramaic, and those who spoke Greek. In Acts 6, Luke calls them the Hellenists and the Hebrews. And the Hellenists said the Greek widows were being neglected when the food was shared.

The Church lifted up seven leaders to help, including Philip, whom we met today, and Stephen. Philip’s first job as a Christian leader was to make sure everyone was fed, regardless of their ethnicity.

You see, as we heard a couple weeks ago, these believers learned that love isn’t love if it’s just a theory. They saw God’s love embodied in Jesus, fully revealed on the cross, now living in the Risen Christ himself, and in the Spirit-filled new Church. But you can’t preach love and have people not getting enough food. Love is only love when it’s embodied.

This early Church was shaped by this mutual love, by its willingness even to love others beyond the circle of believers. They embodied Jesus’ command.

The writer of 1 John is crystal clear today: We love because God first loved us. We cannot claim to love God, whom we do not see, the elder says, if we don’t love our sisters and brothers whom we do see. Love isn’t love if it’s just a theory.

Philip, and Stephen, and the other deacons, were just another way the Church made Christ’s love concrete and real. Stephen did more than serve food. He became an evangelist and preacher, and when he was martyred, Philip went out doing the same.

But he wasn’t alone. Filled with the Spirit at Pentecost, Philip was joined into the life of God. He was part of the Christ vine Jesus talked about. He was commanded to love, yes. But he was empowered in that love by staying connected to his Christ. The sap of the vine of God’s eternal love flowed through the Spirit into Philip. And he listened. He followed. And he loved.

The story of Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch begins and ends with the Holy Spirit.

Philip was out telling the Good News and God’s angel told him to go to a certain place on a common highway. When he got there, the Spirit sent him to a man in a chariot, reading the prophet Isaiah out loud.

And Philip went. That’s the wonder. The Spirit said, “Go talk to him,” and Philip went. He sat in the chariot for hours talking about Jesus and the Scriptures and helping this man hear the Good News. He started with Isaiah, what the man was reading, and next thing we know this official knows about and wants baptism. Philip covered a lot of ground that day, literally and figuratively.

And then the Spirit gave Philip a great gift of love and welcome: the answer to the Ethiopian’s hard question. He asked, “What is to prevent me from being baptized?” And Philip answered him with love, offered baptism, and changed this man’s life forever.

But apart from Christ’s love, Philip would have given a very different answer.

Because the answer had always been “everything prevents you.”

As a eunuch, Jewish law prevented this man from full fellowship in Jewish community, from being a Jew at all. Deuteronomy is clear. This mattered because this official was a God-fearer, a person drawn to Jewish teaching and to the God the Jews proclaimed. There was a large Jewish community in Ethiopia, he likely learned to love God there.

Philip meets him on a Palestinian road because this official travelled all the way to Jerusalem to worship. He came to worship, even though his sexual status prevented him from full participation. He was even reading a scroll of Isaiah aloud as he returned home.

This man was intelligent and worthy of great trust – he ran the treasury for a major African nation and its queen. But he could never become a full member of the faith community he was drawn to so deeply. Imagine his courage to ask Philip if he would also be excluded from the community of Christ.

Why does this matter? Because this is the love the Spirit wants to grow in us. Love that is real, not a theory.

Philip was Jewish. He knew the law, that people who were castrated weren’t welcome. But he didn’t hesitate. He listened when the Spirit said, “Go to that one.” He got into the chariot and spent time with this Ethiopian. Gave him the grace of listening and teaching.

Philip witnessed to the embodied Suffering Servant love of God that Isaiah spoke of. He told the Ethiopian enough about God’s love in Christ that the Ethiopian threw all caution to the wind and asked if he might also be baptized.

How can you claim to love a God you haven’t seen if you don’t love a sister or brother you have seen? That should be carved over every church office, over the entrance (or exit) to every Christian worship space. This is the love Philip embodies, a love that ignores inconvenience in order to be present, a love that overcomes innate prejudice and fear, a love that teaches and shapes a heart to see all people as God sees them.

And today Jesus gives us tremendous news, how we’ll be able to love like this.

This repeated commandment to love could overwhelm us. Love your enemies, pray for them. Give to whoever asks. Turn the other cheek. Be a peacemaker. Welcome back all who stray. Be willing to lose everything to love another. These are daunting. We’re well aware of the command; we care deeply about obeying it. But how can we ever love as God loves?

Stay connected to me, Jesus says. I’m the vine, you’re the branches; you’re part of me. My love runs in you like sap, and you will, you will bear fruit. Abide in my word, Jesus says. Live with the Scriptures, engage them, and I will guide you. Take and eat, take and drink, and I will fill you with my life and my love. Be in servant community with each other, and I will surround you with people who literally embrace you with my love. And watch for this: I will send you the Holy Spirit.

Apart from me, Christ says, you can do nothing. But connected to me, there is no limit to the love you will bear.

As we deepen in faith and in connection with Christ the True Vine, we will be transformed into God’s embodied love. You need to be ready for that. Ready to be open to Christ changing your mind, or saying you’re on the wrong path. Ready for your prejudice and certainty of ideas to be broken apart. Ready to hear the Spirit nudge you to love. Ready when the Spirit says, “There’s the one I need you to meet, go.” Or “here’s the situation you can make a difference in, go.”

But the joy of living in the Vine is you are connected permanently to the life and love of God that heals and loves the universe. The Spirit will make you able to do anything needed. And that’s a path of joy and delight.

Come, Spirit, join us to the vine, fill us with the sap of God’s love, nourish our lives to embody this love always.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen