Where is love?

John 13:31-35

13:31 When he had gone out, Jesus said, "Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him.

13:32 If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once.

13:33 Little children, I am with you only a little longer. You will look for me; and as I said to the Jews so now I say to you, 'Where I am going, you cannot come.'

13:34 I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.

13:35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."

Anyone who has studied another language knows that words don't translate uniformly.
We had an experience in Indonesia of wanting to work out how to ask for a milk shake to be "thicker".
My, then, wife asked the taxi driver "What is the word for 'thick'?"
He had some difficulty understanding what she meant,
 but after she had gesticulated the word she was talking about 
he finally gave her a phrase.
I realised that he seemed to have understood 'thick' 
to mean more 'wide'
 than 'viscous'
so, when she next asked for a milk shake she got a really wide one!!!

The point of that diversion?
Well the word that we translate as 'love' 
is often a number of different words in the Gospels.
There are 5 or 6 Greek words agape, eros, philos...etc 
several Latin words caritas, amor...and so on
And we often just call them ...love.

John plays around with these words a bit,
 and we don't always undersstand the subtlety of it.

This passage however gives us a pointer...
Jesus says 
"You should love as I have loved"
We do not need so much to understand the words as know the quality of life

How has Jesus loved?The love of Jesus is shown in two related ways.
First 
he gives up his Godly status to be born as a human being
(see my reflexion on Philippians 2 here which explains this).
This character of his life is humilityHe doe not use his power to manipulate 
or to get his own way
but rather lays it aside.
We often simply want to bludgeon our way to success,
whether it be at work
 or at home
maybe we are sometimes more subtle than this
and try not to look like we are doing this

BUT if we take these passages seriously
then the way we are to love
is by emptying ourself!

The second way we see Christ loving
is by giving up his life.
This is really hard 
for those of us who live in a world that says
look after yourself and take care of your own life


There is almost a reckless abandon
to Christ's gift 
of the life that is lived at the disposal of others.

It is such a radical gift 
that it transforms not only his own life
but also the life of others.

There is a promise 
that living one's life 
with such radical obedience
will bring new, 
resurrected life to bear.

For thought and prayer
Where do I use my life to manipulate 
and how do I need to stop doing this?
Where is God calling me 
to put aside my giftedness,
 my authority 
and to live out of the risk of not using it?
Where can I lay down my life for others?
Pray for the courage to do this!