THE GOSPEL IN MINIATURE

John 3: 1-17

It seems that there is never enough love to go around in our world; few people get enough love. Very few ever come to a point in their lives when they cry out “Stop! That’s enough! I can’t take any more love!” Some get married for love; others stay single for love. Some love children tirelessly; others are drained of love by needy children around them. Books have been written about people selling their soul to the devil for love; but mostly what’s for sale is lust, and sex, and companionship. But love is different.

What is love? Is it an emotion; a feeling; a way of living? Are there degrees of love- yes. Are there different kinds of love- yes. C.S. Lewis says that there are four kinds of love; he calls them 1)affection; 2) Friendship; 3) Eros, 4) Charity. There are lots of ways to love; but it is author Greg Baer who reminds us what “Real Love” is: it is unconditional; it is given as a gift, knowing that at the source of love (God) there is a never-ending supply. Author John Powell once asked a psychiatrist friend if people could be taught to love. The psychiatrist’s answer was somewhat surprising when he answered: “Did you ever have a toothache? Of whom were you thinking during the distress of your toothache?” His point was clear: when we are in pain, we mostly focus on ourselves. Now think of all the discomforts that distract you now: some are aware of back pain, or a headache, or pain in a hip, or stomach, or shoulder. Some may have heartache. Some may have anguish over a tense job situation or no job. Some are thinking about things that need to be done on their mental checklist. How can we be expected to think of others, and be a conduit of heavenly love to another person? Yet getting back to love’s source reboots the way we receive and show love. I’m so glad I have Mary Ann, and my kids, and our webmasters near me when my computer freezes; in a panic I cry out to them; at the moment, when I am obsessed with nothing else, they can often get me out of a computer jam. On my new laptop computer that I got for my birthday, a tool I will need for my doctoral program, I’m not fearless, but I’ve grown confident with it because I know at least five people I can call to help me if my computer freezes. But when all else fails, they have shown me how to just restart the computer. I have learned to think “Jesus saves,” throughout all my sermon writing, as a reminder to keep saving what I’ve typed so it is not lost in some computer glich! Going back to basics, and to the sources of help, gives me confidence.

What is the basic source of help when it comes to eternal salvation and love? In the first letter of John, chapter four, we read “God IS love.” When all the human loves get distorted with possessiveness, or desires to control, or manipulation, or dishonesty, or stipulations, it is good to re-boot, to restart our concept of love: to go back to the Bible and read GOD IS LOVE. That’s one source of rebooting. The other is the verse that gets held up to cameras at sporting events; one that is shared in every evangelism pamphlet I have read; it is called “The Gospel in Miniature.” That means if we could put on the head of a pin what Jesus came for us to know, it would be this one sentence: “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” For the longest time I wondered what kind of Heavenly Father showed love by sending his Son into battle to die. “I love you so much, I’ll just send my Son to die for you.” It didn’t seem like real love to read it that way. But today is called Trinity Sunday, and in the mystery and the power of the great Christian doctrine of one God in three persons, based heavily on the Gospel of John, we see that when it comes to the persons of God, it is all for one, and one for all. Let me illustrate that.

Last fall George Painter was ahead of the popular curve when he taught one of our Westminster Institute classes on William P. Young’s book THE SHACK. Now that many others have read it, they’ve asked, “Can we have a class to discuss THE SHACK?” Yes, George has agreed to teach a Sunday class on it again starting in September. For those who haven’t read the book, the characters bend your mind so as to make you suspicious of reading it; and for those who have read it, the God characters helped us re-think the concept of God. Suffice it to say there is a very Trinitarian picture of God in this book. At one place in the story, Mack, who has had a great sadness in his life, has a vision of God in three persons. The Papa character tells Mack that everything is about the truth, that the truth sets all people free, and that the Truth has a name: he is a carpenter with nail scarred wrists, and everything is about him. Mack wonders how Papa can know how he feels; then he looks down and notices Papa’s wrists are also nail scarred, with outlines of deep piercing; Papa turns to Mack with tear-filled eyes and said: “Don’t ever think that what my son chose to do didn’t cost us dearly. Love always leaves a significant mark; we were there together.” Mack was surprised. “At the cross? No, wait … I thought you left him—you know, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ It was a Scripture that had often haunted Mack in The Great Sadness. This was Papa’s reply: “You misunderstood the mystery there at the cross. Regardless of how he felt at the moment, I never left him.”

With human love so tied to all the things I mentioned--emotions, feelings, experiences—grounding ourselves not in what we can see, or smell, or hear, or taste, or touch, but instead grounding ourselves in promise, the promise of the one who is love, we are told: “I will never forsake you; I love you so much that I will take the nails for you; and even though you can’t see me—and that is intentional because I am also Spirit—I still love you and always will.

God loves you so much; when everything and everyone else is your world confuses you, or lets you down, or disappoints you because they are human, connect with the source of all love; it is out of this world.

Jeffrey A. Sumner June 7, 2009