Friends of Jesus

May 15, 2020

DAILY GRACE

May 15, 2020, Friday of the Fifth Week of Easter

Hi Everyone!  
 
I hope you have had a good week despite everything going on right now in our world. I want to remind you that this Sunday evening our Sunday Night Live program will start up again and be hosted on Zoom. For those of you who would like to join in at 5:30 you should probably download the Zoom app (if you haven’t done so already). I will send out a Zoom invitation by email for this today, or by Saturday at the latest.
 
Our online Sunday worship service will of course be on YouTube and on the church website. The email link that I send out for that will go out on Saturday evening after I have received the upload from our videographer, Matt Irvin.
 
One other note: Our Worship and Property Committees will be meeting this coming Monday evening to go over the state’s requirements and recommendations for church “reopenings.”  There is much to weigh and your prayers and your thoughts on this very important matter will be most appreciated.
 
Peace,
Dave
 
 
Scripture: John 15:12-17

“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. I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.”

The Word of the Lord.  Thanks be to God.

Meditation

        “I do not call you servants any longer, . . . I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything. . .”

   We are not slaves of Jesus, but his friends. So why, in the previous line, does he say, “you are my friends if you do what I command you”? That’s a little confusing. Don’t slaves do what they’re commanded to do? But Jesus explains that a slave isn’t “in on” the master’s plans. Slaves do what they’re told without any understanding of the bigger picture, of what part they play, of what the goal is.

    Friends are different. We can tell things to our friends and share our plans with them. Think back to friends from childhood. Even then, friends were kids we shared things with —- secrets, fears, hopes, and dreams. Adult friendships are different in many ways, but it’s still true that our friends are those we can confide in and, of course, who want to listen to what we tell them: “Tell me everything!” For some friends, that’s as far as it goes — they’re “emotional support.” But for others, it goes deeper.

    Jesus wants friends who not only know about the plan and the goal, but who also pitch in and work toward the goal. Jesus doesn’t tell us what he has “heard from the Father” just so we can cheer him on. He invites us to join him. “You are my friends if you do what I command you.”

    It starts with loving one another, his first command to us. Love is the foundation of the community of his friends. Then he sends us to bear fruit. That is what it means to be friends of Jesus.
 
Prayer
    I love to hear you call me your friend, Lord. I don’t want to be a fair-weather friend who sticks by you only as long as the plan is going well. I don’t to be your friend in name only. I want to be a true friend who is close to you and hears all that you share with me . . . and then joins you in your great vision, mission, and commission.
 

Contemplation                     

   “I am a friend of Jesus.”