These passages from 1 John must be read slowly and closely,
even savored. Hear the emotion of John,
a beloved and aging pastor speaking to his community:
- “Beloved, if God so loved us, we also must love one another.” (1 Jn 4:11)
- “No one has ever seen God. Yet, if we love one another, God remains in us, and his love is brought to perfection.” (1 Jn 4:12)
This is not easy in today’s world when you turn on
the news to discover the shootings, hate crimes, and who’s lobbing missiles at
who.
- “God is love” (1 Jn 4:16)
The author is trying to express the profound reality of
God’s presence as manifested through the action of love of God and love of
neighbor.[1] It is said that John, in his elderly years,
when asked for a profound teaching would repeat over and over, “Love one
another my children love one another.”
St. Augustine once preached on 1 John 4:12 and it seems he
had come to the same conclusion: “Once and for all, I give you this one short
command: love, and do what you will. ... Let the root of love be in you:
nothing can spring from it but good” (Sermon 110:8).
Augustine agrees with John that God’s love of us begets love
in and through us so that we can be Christ in our world today. “As he is, so are we.” (1 Jn 4:17) Living the life of Christ through the gift of
the Spirit, we are not hobbled by fear, but, loving others as we are loved by Christ,
we are a transforming presence in the world.
However, we know our love isn’t perfect, any more than the
disciples’ love was; they gave in to fear in that tiny boat being tossed about
on the waves. We give in to fear when we
turn our eyes and our thoughts away from the homeless and hungry seeking money
or food along busy highways; when we are silent in the face of overt racism;
when we join in the cry to exclude those who are not “us”! We are the Body of Christ, and we all are “us,”
and so we keep on trying to perfect our love.
God’s remaining and abiding love is as good as it gets and
it is available to all who are willing to accept it and put it into practice.
Jesus “meant to pass them by,” (Mk 7:48) but he didn’t—and he doesn’t
pass us by. We cannot be hard-hearted
and not understand about the loaves, about the Bread of Life. It journeys with us and banishes our fears so
that we can be radical lovers. “Receive what you are
and become what you receive,” Augustine told his neophytes when preaching about
the Eucharist: Be as Christ in the world![2]
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