Scripture: John 10: 11-18 11 “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12 The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away—and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. 13 The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. 14 I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, 15 just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. 16 I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So, there will be one flock, one shepherd. 17 For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. 18 No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father.” 1 John 3:16 16 We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us—and we ought to lay down our lives for one another.

April 25, 2021 Sermon: 1 John 3:16 John 10:11-18; 1 John 3:16 Kerra Becker English

Because of the signs held up at sporting events as some sort of biblical insider’s code for getting to know Jesus – many of us know one particular scripture verse from the gospel of John - John

3:16. That verse comes from an “under cover of night” conversation that Jesus has with a curious

Pharisee named Nicodemus. And as Nicodemus is asking some pretty pressing questions about who Jesus is and how he has been able to do such signs and wonders, Jesus tells him: For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

I have always had a problem with choosing that particular verse to elevate in that particular way because it tends to center the conversation on belief when Jesus more frequently centers his conversations on love. That’s true in the other 3 gospels where Jesus is more of a doer than a talker, and it’s true for John’s gospel as seen through many of these long soliloquies John records for us. John’s Jesus is the one who gives us the commandment to love one another as he has loved us. That’s pretty deep, and would make a brilliant Christian slogan. However, in John’s gospel, figuring out what to believe about Jesus is not so simple. Jesus not only speaks of himself indirectly – talking with Nicodemus about God’s Son as if it were somebody else – he often uses metaphorical language to describe who he intends to be in the world. He is the gate for the sheep

AND the good shepherd. He is the resurrection AND the life. He is the vine and we are the branches. He is the Messiah. He is God’s Son. So sports-fans who want to get into heaven, do you believe in Jesus? Well, my question is: believe what exactly? That’s the real kicker because I think again that the elevation of this text as the go-to summary of the gospel is not a great choice to pluck out of context. It presumes that belief is the requirement, and eternal life is the reward. It presumes that

God sentenced Jesus to death (gave his only son), when in other places in John in particular,

Jesus has an incredible amount of choice and agency in dealing with the increasing likelihood that he would be killed for what he taught and who he claimed to be. Truth be told, I’m not a fan of taking verses out of context to begin with, but I dare say that there might be some better choices to be made – beginning with FIRST John 3:16.

Let’s start a rebellion, shall we? All we need to do is go up to those signs with a sharpie and put a big 1 in front. How easy is that? If you look to the biblical book of FIRST John instead of the gospel of John, chapter 3, verse 16 says this: We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us – and we ought to lay down our lives for one another. I’d like to see that become the Christian trend in “know your Bible verse” trivia if we are going to go with themes that come from books named after John in the Bible.

First John is reflecting language about love that comes from John’s gospel. That letter consistently and, I would say, more forcefully connects the dots between belief and love than even John’s gospel does. In the gospel, we have this image of divine love in the good shepherd who lays down his life for the sheep. The sheep know the good shepherd, and the good shepherd knows them. They know his voice. They follow it. They trust it. And the command Jesus receives from his Father is to give his life for the sake of those sheep, a command that Jesus dutifully obeys.

In First John, the letter says: we know love IN THIS WAY, that Jesus laid down his life for us.

The whole letter is an argument to that point. For God so loved the world, YES, that he gave his only son, YES, that whoever believes in him (and I would join 1 John in saying that whoever lives their life in his love) is promised eternal life. YES. Then we have the fuller story. Our love for others is expected to be as deep as the love Christ had for all of us. The commandment from

Jesus, repeatedly and in many forms, is to love each other. This letter reminds us that if we are to love as Jesus loved, our lives will be lived to the same end, that even the threat of death will not prevent our love for other people. Belief AND love are wrapped up tightly for John the chronicler of Jesus’ life, and for John the letter writer who was trying to remind the early

Christians that they would be known by their love, or as he argued, that they would be known by their sacrificial love.

This concept is one of the most challenging ones in all of Christian scripture – of believing deeply enough in love to give OUR WHOLE LIVES as Jesus did – and yet I often feel like it is the one most poorly handled by those who want to convince others of that message. Like I said, we see signs at sports arenas that point to the importance of belief in God’s sacrifice of his only son as the gateway between heaven and hell, and yet, during the time of gladiator contests in

Rome, Christians were being thrown into a different kind of sports arena as lion food. From being mauled and devoured for sport, to threatening non-believers with hell during competitive sports seems a long and twisted journey to me.

So, if we are to believe in AND then practice such sacrificial love – I do think that Christianity will foster the same attraction as it did during the spread of its influence throughout the Roman

Empire. People are longing to know and trust that the relationships we have with one another and with God are essential. Belonging is essential. Love that honors the other is essential. Sadly, we live in a socio-economic environment, much like the Roman world, where those on the margins are considered expendable and unworthy of our attention, let alone our love. Jesus’s love touched those margins. Productivity and creating wealth for the wealthy are the empire’s values, and are values without lasting merit, constantly on the take from us - telling us we will never have enough and will never BE enough. Love is a proper value, where we give it away and it only grows even stronger. And in the context of American Christianity that one can fit on a posterboard, those who love in such radical ways are not always admired, but often shunned or criticized – even by those who would call themselves “believers.” Belief – when not deepened by love – becomes a gatekeeper that hasn’t listened fully to Christ the gate to good and abundant pastures, Christ the good shepherd who lays down his life for the sheep.

Though I am critical, I do understand the desire to own a few bite-sized portions of scripture. We want those hooks to help us define our faith. The movement toward churches creating mission statements like businesses does make sense to me. We like to have a goal, a plan, a job to do, and to some degree we can do that. And yet, living into our faith is much messier than that. As I said in the beginning, Jesus says many things, but he always centers the conversation in love. And as

I’ve heard many times and said many times, his two commandments, yes ONLY TWO are to love God, and to love your neighbor as you love yourself. Easy to remember. My friends, that fits on a posterboard. But applying those principles, that is a lifetime of work, a lifetime of challenging yourself to dig deeper and love even more. It means giving your whole life for love.

We ought to lay down our lives for one another – because Jesus did that for us. FIRST John 3:16.

May we be willing to wave that scripture verse. May we be therefore charged and challenged.

May we have the courage and the strength to love as Christ loved us. Amen.