If You Love Me, a sermon on John 14: 15-21 preached on May 14, 2023

Yesterday, I had the pleasure of being back on the campus of Presbyterian College to take part in their graduation ceremony. It was first time I’d been back for any significant amount of time since Sara and I graduated there a few years ago. That place is packed full of memories. It was a gift to walk around and remember what my life as a college student was like. Back then, I couldn’t imagine myself as a husband, a father, and a pastor back here. The life I now live was only a dream back then. Yesterday, I walked past Georgia Dorm, where I lived when Sara and I first started dating. She once told me that I smelled like a mix of Old Spice deodorant and Georgia Dorm. The place had seeped into my pores. I also walked past the auditorium where accepted students’ orientation took place. Months before my first classes started, all the accepted students and their families were invited to the campus. Most of my classmates had either their mom or dad with them. A few had both. Me? I remember sitting there with Mom and Dad, my sister, and my brother, as well as my grandparents. Everyone else was there with one of their parents, maybe both, while I was having a family reunion. My grandparents were so proud of me that they wanted to be there. Making them proud was so easy. They kept a big, glass jug on their porch. Every time we sat out there, no matter who was visiting, my grandmother would talk about how amazed she was when I was a toddler because I filled the thing up with sticks from the yard one afternoon. How was that amazing? But that was my grandparents. I once shared a perfectly average term paper with my grandfather, and he suggested I submit it to the Harvard Business Journal. Much later, I had the chance to meet and have my picture taken with the Governor of Tennessee, Bill Haslam. As my grandfather moved from his home to assisted living, then to memory care, one thing about his room remained the same. That picture of me and the Governor was always on his bedside table. My grandparents were proud of me. And it was so easy to make them proud. All I had to do was get accepted to a college. It could have been any college. I wrote a mediocre term paper, and they thought I was brilliant. I had my picture taken with the governor, and they were sure I was on my way to moving into the governor’s mansion. Was it that way with you? Was it easy or is it easy to make your grandparents proud? I hope so. It can be different, though, with mothers. On this Mother’s Day, I think about how many mothers have this higher standard, and they must because being able to fill up a glass jug with sticks will not get you into a good college, and not every term paper is worthy of publication. Mothers have a different standard, and likely, some here never felt like they reached it. Some here may still be trying to make their mothers proud, though their standards are impossible to meet, but that’s not my main point this morning. The main point this morning is this: What does it take to make Jesus proud? In our second Scripture lesson from the Gospel of John, He spells it out. This morning we read, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” That’s clear enough, although perhaps you’ll agree that it is easier said than done, for keeping the commandments of the One who got Himself crucified is an inherently dangerous undertaking. Keeping the commandments of One who always told the truth in love may make us dangerously unpopular. While the church doesn’t always say it, this faith of ours is countercultural, even today, and doing the will of the One who ate all the time with the social outcasts, saying, “Love your neighbor as you love yourself,” comes with a cost. County Commissioner Keli Gambrill, who sits in the balcony of the Sanctuary most every Sunday at the 8:30 service, and is often the sole dissenting vote on the Cobb County Commission, recently shared with me a song that inspires her. The song goes like this: It’s such a strong temptation To live for man’s applause. But I don’t want to buy into the lie because I know that’s not a worthy cause. I’ll be content to serve an audience of one. Only his approval counts when all is said and done. And this is my prayer when my race is won. I want to hear well done from the audience of one. That’s the song she listens to when it seems like she’s in the minority. That’s the encouragement she needs to continue doing what she believes is right, and this is no easy thing, doing what you believe is right, because doing what you believe is right does not always bring with it applause or recognition. The applause and recognition of the world may not come to us by following in the footsteps of Jesus. Worse still, sometimes the applause and recognition of the world comes when we walk in the opposite direction from where Jesus leads. Make no mistake, the way of Jesus is countercultural. Making Him proud comes with a cost, and so while we may aspire to do what is right, too often we do what is easy. While we are called to stand for justice, too often we sit quietly, even while brothers and sisters suffer. While Jesus said, “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,” don’t you dare reveal that you think differently than I do about those apartments being proposed by the Marietta market or I won’t talk to you anymore. Do you hear what I’m saying? The way to make Jesus proud is to obey His commandments, which can be summed up by this one simple word: love. Love. I’m not talking, though, about simple love. I’m talking about the kind of love that He embodied. The kind of love that cost Him His life. The kind of love that the Church has not offered to all people. The story goes that a parade went through downtown Atlanta after church one Sunday. One church saw the people coming and was handing out water to the parade goers. The other locked their doors and turned their backs. Did Jesus ever turn His back on anyone? Think back to Sunday School. On whom did Jesus turn His back? He was not a big fan of the self-righteous religious people. Are we more like them? Or are we more like the One we claim to follow? Meri Kate Marcum, who was our seminary intern last summer, is now on the church staff helping with food and fellowship. She preached a sermon for her preaching class last month and told this story: A young girl was just starting school and was required to go through something called “kindergarten screening.” The teachers asked her to count to 20, recite her A, B, C’s, identify shapes and colors, and even asked her to skip down the hallway. Then came the “life situation questions,” like “What do you do when you go outside, but it’s raining?” She answered, “You get a raincoat or an umbrella.” Then the teacher asked, “What do you do when you want to go into a room, but it’s dark.” Without missing a beat, this little girl said, “You hold someone’s hand.” Make Jesus proud this morning and ask yourself, “Whose hand could I be holding?” Which of God’s children is alone in a dark place? Might we go there to hold his hand? Who held your hand when you were afraid? Who held your hand when you were young? Did anyone love you so much that she let go? When I think about my mother, I want you to know that she was often hard on me. She wouldn’t accept Cs on my report card. If she thought I hadn’t washed the dishes well enough, she’d have me wash them again, and she always tried to do what was best for me, even if it was hard for her. The day she dropped me off at Presbyterian College, she went with me to some of the orientation meetings. This time it was just her. I wasn’t going to stand for the family reunion treatment again. After we moved boxes into my dorm room, we went to some of the meetings. All the other kids had their parents with them. It was meant to be a day-long affair, but right at lunch, while all the other kids’ parents were still milling around, she looked at me and said, “I’m about to start crying, and once I start, I don’t know if I’m going to be able to stop, so I’m leaving now. I love you so much.” Then she just left. I stood there and watched her go. On this mother’s day, I hope that, even if you didn’t have a mother who was as easy to please as my grandparents were, that you had a mother who loved you so much that she did the hard things of pushing you to do better, making you redo that which you hadn’t done right, and letting you go so that you could fly on your own, even when what she wanted to do was hold you close forever. If that was your mother, then maybe you know that making her proud is just living a happy and full life, which, according to the commandments of Jesus, comes from being pushed to love people well, especially when it isn’t easy. His commandments are not always easy nor convenient. Loving people well, especially loving well the people who have been pushed to the margins of our society, comes with a cost, but if we don’t live the life that He calls us to we will never have the abundant life that He promised. His call to us to love our neighbors and to pray for those who persecute us is the most countercultural thing we could ever do in this world where everyone is demonizing everyone else all the time. Just read about it in the local paper, as one side turns its back on the other, yet Jesus calls us to love our enemies and to pray for those who persecute us. We make Him proud when we work for understanding and sympathy in a world of division. We make Him proud when we choose to love and accept those who are rejected by the world. We make Him proud we listen to His voice over the applause of the crowd. And we may hear His voice even now because “I will not leave you orphaned,” is what He said. My friends, we may not always see Him, but I know He will keep this promise, and we will hear His voice. When it feels as though you are all alone, know that watching from the heavens is the audience of One, the One who truly matters. If you love Him, keep His commandments. Amen.