The way of love

The readings for this week are those for 2n May 2010 the 5^th Sunday in Easter. Acts 11:1-18 • Psalm 148 • Revelation 21:1-6 • John 13:31-35

We don’t live in the same world, either today or tomorrow. So we need to work out how we are going to respond to change, because whether we like it or not we will virtually always find that we have never properly imagined the future, and we almost certainly have distorted the past, for better or for worse.

The story of the Acts of the Apostles reminds us that as the disciples encountered the Holy Spirit, they also found that their ideas and certainties were being challenged to their very core

What we read today (Acts 11:1-18) doesn’t resonate easily with us. It is about the first Jewish Christians coming to the realisation that God’s promise went beyond their understanding of what it meant to be faithful. Was this just about the clearly defined, but small, world of Judaism

Or was something different happening here.?

The first Christians had to leave behind their preconception that God was operating inside their framework and come to understand that they were being called to move outside their comfort zone. This would no longer just be a Jews-only club.

Where, we might ask ourselves, are we being challenged to think more expansively than our prejudices have led us to.

Jesus teaching

Jesus reminds his disciples that they are to be open to the true spirit of love, and not the spirit of legalism, tradition, or the past.

In the end, it will be how Christians love

each other

and those they are called to serve

that we will see the hallmark of the true Christian life

New Learning

Where might Jesus be inviting you to move beyond the comfort zone of the familiar, the traditional, the made up minds of the past?

Is there somewhere where we can love better? Where am I challenged to love Jesus and God better, in my human relationships and the way I live my life. of resurrexion