Abide in My Love
Marriage of
Peter
Coyl and Matthew Waeckle
11 November 2023 3:00 p.m.
Parish Church of St. Mark the Evangelist
Medford, Oregon
The
Rev. Anthony Hutchinson, SCP, Ph.D.
As the Father loved me, I also have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down your life for your friends. (John 15:9 – 13)
God, take away our hearts of stone, and give us hearts of flesh. Amen.
“This is my commandment, that you love one another.”
It has always struck me as strange
to have anyone commanding us to love someone. How is it possible to
command love? Love on command is a contradiction in terms.
Love seems to come into our hearts
on its own, unbidden and sometimes unwelcome.
Christians, recognizing this, have always taught that love comes into our
hearts by an act of God. In the letters of John we read, “In this, then,
does love consist: not that we have loved God, but that He first loved us.”
Gratitude for love first given us is the wellspring of our own love. Elsewhere
the letters say that perfect love drives out fear; fear is the opposite of love.
What does it mean, “abide in love” or “abide in Christ?” Go on pilgrimage to a Holy Place? Seek a monastery and a life of seclusion? Work for social justice and end poverty? Perhaps, if these are what God places in your heart. But “abide in me, in my love” means more.
The verb translated as “abide” here, meno, simply means to be present, and to continue to be present. What Jesus is talking about is not place, but presence. Not location, but vocation. Not activity, but attentiveness. Not sentiment, but sentience.
Jesus is talking about being present to God in our midst, to love in our lives, to those we love.
Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh discusses what it means to be
present: attentiveness, responsiveness, and openness. Having an eye
that sees, an ear that hears, and a heart that feels.
Accepting who you are, learning authenticity and integrity in being that
person, knowing your limitations and strengths, all these are a prerequisite to
being present to anyone else.
“Abide in my love … love one another as I have loved you.”
Jesus here is talking about a genuine love, where one is present to the
beloved. He is not talking about the mess of emotions we often confuse
with love, those goal-oriented and self-absorbed affections and desires that
seek to change the beloved and conform him to our will.
Thich Nhat Hanh says, “If our love is only a will to possess, it is not love.
We must look deeply in order to see and understand the needs of the person we
love. This is the ground of real love.”
Thomas Merton writes, “The beginning of love is to let those we love be
perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image.
Otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them.”
As Saint Paul says,
“What is love? When you love someone, you are patient and kind with that person. You are not jealous of those you love, and you don't try to show them up. You don't talk down to them or act rudely toward them. You don't try to have your own way at their expense, nor do you get annoyed or resentful at them. You don't get pleasure at any injustice done to them or by them, but rather you rejoice when truth prevails. When you love someone, you put up with whatever they do, you trust whatever they say, you hold every hope for them, and you are willing to endure anything for them. When you love, you never stop loving.”
Abiding love means sincerity and truth in feelings, consistency in actions
regardless of feelings, integrity in our relationships, and of being honest
about our own needs and those of the beloved. It’s why we
discourage two people who are not self-aware from getting married
prematurely. We encourage counseling to develop self-awareness and mutual
attentiveness.
This process of counseling and preparing for marriage is very similar to the
process of discernment for religious vocations, where you and your community
seek God’s guidance and the self-awareness to recognize, in the words of
Presbyterian theologian Frederick Beuchner, where your deepest joy meets the
world’s deepest need.
That is why I am so very glad to be here today, celebrating this Marriage you
two, my dear sons and brothers. Both of you know yourselves well and
honestly recognize that this public joining together of two men in love and
commitment is the path you both are called to by God speaking in your hearts,
despite the disapproval of some bigots, whether the religious right or the
militant left.
I am thankful that the Episcopal Church has followed God’s call in blessing and
honoring such unions as yours, such love as yours. I am thankful that folks
here at St. Mark’s gave me happy thumbs up and “thanks be to God!” when I told
them what we would be doing in the church today.
I am thankful for all this because love comes from God. Your love
comes from God.
St. Irenaeus of Lyons famously said, “The glory of God is a fully alive human
being.” God made us for joy, for full life, and for love. As Thomas
Merton taught, joy is the infallible sign of the presence of God. Anything less that joy and full acceptance of
who we are is a detraction, a departure, a diminishing of God’s intention.
May you find the full joy of growing old together. It is one of the sweet
blessings of our life, even with all its costs and occasional pain. And
it is sweeter, and less painful, when we remain present for each
other.
Abide in this love God has given you. Be attentive to each other. Recognize when the beloved needs more space. Listen and watch. Be true to the beautiful image of God left in you when you were created. Look to see it in each other. When tiredness or annoyance rob you of attentiveness and being present, don’t beat up on yourselves, but simply act as if you still had them. They will return. Share your joys and sorrows with each other. When things go wrong, ask each other for forgiveness and forgive each other, again and again. Be present for each other. And share that being present with others in your life, whether guests, friends, family, neighbors, or pets.
Abide in this love. Be present.
In the name of Christ, Amen
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