Loving Commandments - Sermon for the Sixth Sunday of Easter (May 10, 2026)

Scripture Readings: Acts 17:22–31 | Psalm 66:8–20 | 1 Peter 3:13–22 | John 14:15–21 

“If you love me, you will keep my commandments.”
(John 14:15).
 
Have you ever wondered why certain rules exist?
I mean, the rationale for some rules seem pretty self-evident. Like don’t use your hands in soccer. Or be sure to drive on the right side of the road… unless you’re in England, of course.
 
But sometimes the reasons behind rules can be a bit less obvious… making them seem kind of arbitrary, and maybe even irrelevant for our day to day lives. When that happens, it can become easy for us to just ignore them… or if we do obey them, to do so merely out of a sense of obligation, or out of fear of getting into trouble.
 
But today in our Gospel reading, Jesus our Saviour offers us a different insight: He draws a clear line for His disciples between loving Him, and keeping His commandments. Now I know lots of things come to my mind when I hear the word love… but obeying commandments isn’t exactly that high on my list. But if we sit with this connection for a moment, I think it starts to make more and more sense.

I mean, for starters, when we really love someone, we develop a sense of devotion… a commitment to them that opens us up to serving their interests, and seeking to do what we can to make them happy. Love also invites us to trust the other person… to believe that deep down, they have our best interests at heart as well. And so, if someone we love tells us to do something, it becomes a whole lot easier to oblige them… even if what we’re being asked to do ends up being far from easy itself.
 
In our Gospel passage today, Jesus wants us to see that there is an essential relationship between loving Him and obeying His commands. To recognize that His words to us are not arbitrary rules, given for no real reason, even if we don’t always understand them. And He’s also not setting up some sort of spiritual fitness test, designed to weed out all those who are unworthy… and promote those who love Him ‘enough’… based on how well they perform.  
 
No, He’s doing something much more important. He’s teaching us… He’s training us how to love. Showing us what it looks like, and what it takes to have our lives reshaped and realigned by God’s holy love.

Jesus said: “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” (John 14:15). Keeping Christ’s commandments is how we love Him. He’s spelling out for us that loving Him and living His way must go hand in hand.
 
And what has Christ commanded us to do? All sorts of things! Far more than we can cover this morning. The four Gospels are full of His teachings, and directions for His disciples to follow, back then and today. A great place to start looking would be the famous Sermon on the Mount, found in Matthew Chapters 5-7… but as Christians, we are called to make ourselves well acquainted with our Lord’s whole story, and all that He teaches us to do.
 
On top of the Gospels, there’s also the writings of the Apostles… the New Testament letters, which are full of the wisdom, and guidance, and yes commands that have arisen from the Good News of Jesus Christ the Risen Lord. And these in turn have also been shaped by the whole story of the Bible, beginning way back in Genesis… and all the way through the Living God’s dealings with Israel, and their calling to be faithful to the covenant the LORD made with them.

In other words, all of Jesus’ commands come to us in the context of the Holy Scriptures… the grand narrative of God’s rescue mission for His creation, unfolding through the centuries, and reaching its climax in Christ Himself. And while the Bible is not primarily a rule book, despite how some of us might have been taught to read it… the Scriptures do paint a pretty consistent picture for us of the character of life God wants for us. And so, we can, and often do, sum up that way of life… that commandment with the word love. 
 
We love Jesus Christ our Lord, by obeying His commandments… which in turn are about training us to love. And who are we being commanded to love?
 
Well, when our Lord was asked what the greatest commandment in the Torah and Prophets… the Old Testament was, He replied: “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment.” (Matthew 22:37-38).
 
Christ’s commandments first of all train us to love God. To offer our trust and devotion to our Creator… to our Father in Heaven.
 
And we really need this training! We humans have always tended to struggle pretty hard when it comes to loving the Living God. And one of the big reasons for this is our general human tendency towards idolatry… to worshipping and giving ourselves over to things that are categorically not God… devoting ourselves to gods of our own invention and imaginations… or even trying to reduce God Himself, the Maker of Heaven and Earth, into something concrete we can manage, contain, and manipulate, instead of giving Him the honour and glory as the Almighty and untamable One.
 
And when we worship things that are not God, these idols distort and reshape us in their image… messing around with our hearts, and our minds, and our relationships with those around us. For instance: when we worship money, making it the most important thing in our lives, we become self-centred, and find it much harder to spend our resources to care for those who cannot repay us. Not to mention the fact that all the money in the world can’t save us. In the end, we can’t take one cent with us.
 
I could go on with lots of examples of idols we people worship: pleasure, power, security… not all bad things in and of themselves, but totally destructive when we give ourselves over to their command.
 
Thankfully, Jesus offers the world an alternative to idolatry, as He is the Living God Himself in the flesh… revealing the character, and heart of the Father to us, once and for all… so we can truly come to know our Creator, to turn our hearts and lives to Him. 
 
In our first reading today, from the book of Acts, we heard the words of St. Paul, speaking to a crowd of Greek Gentiles in Athens… and inviting them to respond to the Good News of Jesus. Paul notes that they appear to be a deeply religious community… worshipping all kinds of gods… and even putting up a shrine to an “unknown god”, to make sure that they didn’t offend any spiritual beings they hadn’t heard of yet. Many people in those days lived in perpetual fear of offending the gods… who often were thought to act in unpredictable, and often vengeful ways… so it was normal to hedge your bets and offer sacrifices to them all… giving gifts at every altar to keep in everyone’s good books. But like paying mobsters for protection… you’re never quite sure if they’re really on your side.
 
In complete contrast to this vision of the divine, St. Paul invites his listeners to worship the God they had not yet known: “The God who made the world and everything in it, he who is Lord of heaven and earth, [who] does not live in shrines made by human hands, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mortals life and breath and all things.” (Acts 17:24-25).

Unlike the fickle gods and idols that they were familiar with, this God was not looking for a bribe… but for them. Graciously providing for and sustaining them… already up close and at work in their lives… even before they knew of Him… and eager for them to find Him… to set aside their empty idols, and instead look for the true Lord of life, and come to experience His love.
  
And Paul goes on to say that “While God has overlooked the times of human ignorance, now he commands all people everywhere to repent, [to turn around] because he has fixed a day on which he will have the world judged in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed, and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.” (Acts 17:30-31).
 
Paul’s basic message was for the Athenians to leave behind their old ways of life that lead only to death, and instead to place their faith in the one who will judge all rightly, the risen Saviour and Lord of all.
 
And hearing his words today, we are reminded that loving God as Christ commanded us isn’t about trying to appease or bribe our Heavenly Father… but about expressing our faith in Him, and putting our devotion to Him into practice… and our gifts are offerings of thankfulness and praise to the Living God, who has already given us everything. In Jesus Christ, God is no longer unknown, and we have come to know what He wants from us… and that is love. But not just directed towards Him, but also to all those around us as well.
 
Back in Matthew Chapter 22, right after Jesus says that the first and greatest commandment is to love God, He says that a second commandment is just like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” (Matthew 22:39-40).
 
The heart of the Christian ethic… our whole way of life is to share God’s holy love with everyone. To treat all our neighbours the way that we would want to be treated… with compassion, patience, and grace. To recognize in every single human being a beloved child, created in God’s own image. And to even extend this love to our enemies… to those that don’t have our best interest at heart… not enabling evil, but refusing to be caught up in it… resisting the urge to demonize, those we disagree with, and doing everything we can to work for the good of all.
 
But alongside this general commandment to love all our neighbours, Christ Jesus gives us a very specific commandment in John Chapter 15 to love our fellow Christians, making this a central part of the Church’s life.

John 15:12-14, Jesus said: “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you.”

It can’t get much clearer than this: if we’re Christians, we’re called to love one another… as Christ has loved us… beyond the normal neighbourly limits of love… but as beloved brothers and sisters… as true friends, willing to lay down our lives for one another… to suffer alongside and for one another. Bearing with one another, especially when it isn’t easy.
 
After all, love isn’t easy. It’s good, and it’s a great blessing… and it’s something that all of us need, and long for… but it also comes with all sorts of risks and challenges, and moments when it hurts deeply. In other words, love often involves suffering. But it is also the best reason we can suffer.
 
After all, as we heard in our second reading today, from 1 Peter Chapter 3, Jesus our Saviour Himself suffered at the cross to save the world that He loves… and as His disciples if we suffer like Him, it’s no shame at all.
 
1 Peter 3:17-18, “For it is better to suffer for doing good, if suffering should be God’s will, than to suffer for doing evil. For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, in order to bring you to God…” (1 Peter 3:17-18).

Christ Jesus our Lord suffered and died at the cross to save us… but that suffering was not a tragic loss. It is the way that God’s love wins, breaking the power of sin with unexpected mercy. Breaking the power of fear with forgiveness. Breaking the power of selfishness with generous grace. Breaking the power of hatred and pride with compassion and incredible humility.
 
And Christ’s commandments to love others, even when it’s hard draws us into this great victory of God… involving us in the risks of sharing God’s saving love with God’s beloved world… knowing that, even if it isn’t easy, it’s what’s best for us all… bringing us all that much closer to our loving Creator. 
 
Which leads us to our final point: the conviction that keeping Christ’s commandments is not just what’s best for our neighbours, or even fellow Christians… it’s actually what’s best for us too! It’s in our best interests to obey the voice of our Saviour. Christ gives us commandments precisely because He loves us… and He knows they are exactly what we need too! He knows we need to be guided away from our old ways… to have the power of our sins and fears and selfishness and hatreds and pride, and all the rest put to death, through practicing His holy love… and sharing in His way of life.  
 
We keep His commandments because we love Him… and because we’re learning to believe… to trust that He really loves us! That everything we receive from His hand, even when it’s hard, is a gift intended to bring us deeper into His own blessed life.
 
And even though we will struggle and fail at times to keep His commands… the Good News is that our Saviour’s still on our side! He knows we can’t do this all on our own. He knows we need His help, and thank God He is there for us in our great need!
 
Immediately after Christ makes the connection between loving Him, and keeping His commandments, Jesus promises to send an Advocate, the Holy Spirit of God, to abide with and in us, forever. He then promises to return… coming back to bring us into complete communion with our Father in Heaven forever.

John 14:18-21, “I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you. In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live. On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me; and those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them.”
 
The reason behind Christ’s commandments is for you and I and all who will keep them, to be graciously invited into the eternal love of the Living God… united to the blessed Trinity in and through our Saviour Jesus Christ. Without Jesus, and all He’s done for us, there’s no way. But He Himself is the Way, the Truth, and the Life… reconciling us to our Heavenly Father, and to one another. Trusting and following Jesus Christ is how we begin to share in God’s love even now. And through the Holy Spirit’s help, we really can turn around, and turn away from our old ways… and have our lives reshaped and realigned by God’s holy love… even when it’s hard… trusting that this really is how God is at work in the world: bringing the Good News of His Son to all the earth through people like us, so that everyone might find the freedom, the forgiveness, and the new life that Jesus our Saviour alone can give.
 
I’ll bring this time to a close with a prayer written by the Lutheran pastor and theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, while he was in prison during World War II… suffering for striving against the Nazi regime, and eventually losing his life… devoted to the end to Jesus Christ, our world’s only Saviour and the Lord of all Lords... and to the world Jesus gave His own life to save. Let us pray.

“O God, early in the morning I cry to you.
Help me to pray
And to concentrate my thoughts on you;
I cannot do this alone.
 
In me there is darkness, but with you there is light.
I am lonely, but you do not leave me;
I am feeble in heart, but with you there is peace.
In me there is bitterness, but with you there is patience;
I do not understand your ways, but you know the way for me.
 
O heavenly Father,
I praise and thank you for the peace of the night;
I praise and thank you for this new day;
I praise and thank you for all your goodness
And faithfulness throughout my life.
 
You have granted me many blessings;
Now let me also accept what is hard from your hand.
You will lay on me no more than I can bear.
You make all things work together for good for your children.”[1]
Amen.


[1] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Letters & Papers from Prison, pg. 139.