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A New Law for a New People

Easter 5 : 28 April 2013  : Revelation 21: 1-5 , John 13: 31-35

In my first parish I was startled by the parking habits of country folk in the town I lived in. They would often pull up alongside someone they wanted to talk to, and conduct their conversation car to car, while double-parked in the main street. They also often didn’t bother locking their cars while they went off shopping.

A few years later I was living in a three-storey block of flats in inner city Christchurch. Here the rules of living were different. You had to be respectful of your neighbours when it came to noise levels at night, and the communal laundry could only be used on your allocated day. A general rule of thumb I was learning was that the closer the proximity of people in their immediate living environment the more they had to give each other their due in careful and considered ways. But this wasn’t hard for me having spent much of my youth in institutions of Anglican incarceration.

Today the parish comes together for its AGM, a necessary exercise in accountability and review of our life. While the emphasis this year is on sound financial management, the real sub text as ever is the health and vitality of this particular Christian community. Building and maintaining Christian community is a never ending and precarious achievement. St Augustine wrote that in heaven one of our blessings will be freedom from the freedom to sin. But here human frailty, misunderstandings, and moral failings often undermine our attempts to be the kind of Christian community we would want to be. Which is why today’s readings are so helpful.

As Judas leave Jesus on his final fateful mission, the glorifying of the Son of Man that Jesus speaks of is his being raised on the cross, in John’s terms not the display of a humiliating death, but rather the enthronement of the Son of God at the Father’s right hand, from where he can pour out his gifts on the Church. But first he gives his immediate followers a remarkable command, which is also a gift. George Beasley-Murray writes this of it:

The new command is the rule of life for the new age, the kingdom of God, the saving sovereignty that makes people new for God’s new world–It is not alone the law for a new time, but a law for a new life. It is the outcome of the peculiar redemption that initiates the kingdom and brings sinful men and women into it. The command follows the gift, and is possible of fulfilment by reason of the gift.

So a lot is asked of us in this regard, but a lot is given also so that we can do it. But what does it mean to "love one another: just as I have loved you?"

I was once part of a pastoral team that included an ordained woman who was always hugging parishioners, or was clasping their hands, gazing deep into their eyes, and asking them how they were feeling, were they feeling allright. The emphasis here was on sincerity, high affective content in pastoral encounters, and constant vigilance against parishioner distress. She had certainly cottoned on to Paul’s command to "weep with those who weep, and rejoice with those who rejoice," so why was I uneasy about these frequent public displays of affection?

When we seek to help, empathise, or pastor someone we to some extent must merge with them, become a part of their world, while at the same time remaining distinct from them, giving them and ourselves the space to continue thinking clearly about what is going on in the encounter. That way we can grasp the essentials of what is required, rather than blindly rushing in with inappropriate assistance. It is also important to respect people’s dignity and boundaries. If they want to have a good cry, then let them, rather than trying to hug them out of it, and making it all better right away.

It is also important to respect and encourage people’s ability to help themselves. A friend of mine, a social worker, gave me a piece of wise advice that has stood me in good stead, "Never work harder for the client than they are prepared to work for themselves." If we do everything for someone, and start in effect parenting them, then we infantilise them, and rob them of a developing ability to cope. And there are some slothful and cunning coves who are adept at manipulating others to become their servants. When that happens we become frustrated and resentful as they drain us of our vitalistic energy.

What I am saying in all this is that we need to be wise in our loving of our fellow Christians, giving them what they need in a considered, clear headed way that respects their separateness from us, rather than the often blind promptings of our feelings. Clergy have sometimes been the worst offenders in this regard, which is why the Church in recent times has sought to drum wisdom into them through compulsory boundary workshops. It has been made clear to them that they are there to meet the needs of their parishioners, not the other way around. In their role as spiritual leaders they must maintain professional relationships with their parishioners. While they are to be encouraging, pastorally attentive, and emotionally warm to their parishioners, they cannot be their friends. Friendships with parishioners come later when they have left the parish, and roles have changed.

Of course the Christian loving of one another involves more than worldly-wise common sense. Dietrich Bonhoeffer got to the heart of the matter when we he wrote that we love a fellow Christian for who they are in God’s eyes, who they are on the road to becoming, if they are given the right encouragement and assistance. Perhaps we have a small part to play in the long unfolding of their Christian destiny, but we are not there to play God to them.

John Donne, who we will be hearing more about this week, wrote that, "Man is a future animal." The future God has in mind for us is as citizens of the heavenly city described in Revelation this morning. The new Jerusalem comes down from heaven because the distinction between heaven and earth will have been abolished, and in order to live in the Father’s house, the destination promised us by John, there will need to be a big city to fit us all in. And we will need then as now to know the rules of close in urban living, whereby we cant go around having I-Thou relationships with everybody, but are required to give everyone their due in considered, respectful ways. In that sense the three storey block of flats I lived in all those years ago will have been an apprenticeship in heavenly living and Christian loving.