Y’all……Do you ever get tired of saying the same thing over and over and over again, ad infinitum?  Do you ever struggle to try to find a different way to say the same thing over and over and over again?  It occurs to me that this is exactly what I do.  Ya see, the Gospel reading appointed for today is this: 

Jesus said,
I give you a new commandment: love one another.
As I have loved you, so you also should love one another.
This is how all will know that you are my disciples,
if you have love for one another.”

After over 2,000 years, countless sermons, essays, and writings, and an infinite number of words, what is there left to say?  The whole of Jesus’s ministry, the foundation of the Christian faith, the very basis of our being, our salvation, comes from that little central premise, love. 

Love God.  Love people.  Love. 
Love God.  Show God’s Love by Loving People.
Love God.  Show God’s Ways by Changing Your Ways By Loving People.
Love God.  Show God’s Ways by Changing Your Ways By Loving People Who are Different Than You.  Whose values, beliefs, bodies, and ways of Being are Different from Yours.

Jesus said to his disciples:

“To you who hear I say, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.

To the person who strikes you on one cheek, offer the other one as well, and from the person who takes your cloak, do not withhold even your tunic.

Give to everyone who asks of you, and from the one who takes what is yours do not demand it back.

Do to others as you would have them do to you.  For if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you?  Even sinners love those who love them.

And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you?  Even sinners do the same.

If you lend money to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you?  Even sinners lend to sinners, and get back the same amount.

But rather, love your enemies and do good to them, and lend expecting nothing back; then your reward will be great and you will be children of the Most High, for he himself is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.  Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

“Stop judging and you will not be judged.  Stop condemning and you will not be condemned.  Forgive and you will be forgiven. Give, and gifts will be given to you; a good measure, packed together, shaken down, and overflowing, will be poured into your lap.  For the  measure with which you measure will in return be measured out to you.”  Luke 6:27-38

Paul teaches us in Galatians that,  “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave or free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus”.  (Galatians 3:28)  And again in Colossians, “Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.”  (Colossians 3:11) 

And again from Paul:  If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.  If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.  If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.    Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.  Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.

Love God.  Love people.  Love. 

Flat out:  If your politics, your posts, your premises, your words, your actions, your beliefs don’t show a love of God and his people, you cannot rightly claim to be of Christ.  Period.  So the question remains, are you a Christian, or a clanging cymbal?