SPEAKER_00: There's a line in today's first reading that's so simple, but if you understand it, it changes how you see the church forever.
SPEAKER_00: It says, it is the decision of the Holy Spirit and of us.
SPEAKER_00: Not just we decided, not just human agency, strategy, debate, and compromise.
SPEAKER_00: No, the Holy Spirit and us.
SPEAKER_00: That's the mystery of the church.
SPEAKER_00: Fully human, real arguments, real confusion, real personalities, and at the same time guided, sustained, corrected by the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: And look at the effects of that decision.
SPEAKER_00: They send a letter, they clarify the truth, they remove unnecessary burdens, and what happens?
SPEAKER_00: It says when the people read it, they were delighted.
SPEAKER_00: Delighted.
SPEAKER_00: That word matters because truth, when it is when it is really from God, does not crush the soul.
SPEAKER_00: It liberates.
SPEAKER_00: These people had been disturbed, the text says.
SPEAKER_00: And then the church speaks clearly, authoritively, and the result is not opposition.
SPEAKER_00: It is this sigh of relief.
SPEAKER_00: That's how you know the difference between a burden God never asked for and a command that actually comes from him.
SPEAKER_00: Now, if we go to the gospel, Jesus brings it to a higher point.
SPEAKER_00: He says, This is my commandment, love one another as I have loved you.
SPEAKER_00: And if we're honest, we hear that and we try to soften it immediately.
SPEAKER_00: We turn it into be kind, be patient, be generally a good person.
SPEAKER_00: But that's not what he's saying.
SPEAKER_00: He says, as I have loved you, or as I love you.
SPEAKER_00: So now you have to ask, how does he love?
SPEAKER_00: Well, he says, No one has greater love than this to lay down one's life for one's friends.
SPEAKER_00: That's the standard.
SPEAKER_00: Not convenience, not preference, not when it feels right, sacrifice.
SPEAKER_00: And this is where most of us quietly redraw the line.
SPEAKER_00: We like the idea of love until it costs us something real.
SPEAKER_00: Our time, our pride, our comfort, our plans, our need to be right, our wanting to control every relationship and every context.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is not offering a vague emotional ideal.
SPEAKER_00: He's defining love in concrete, costly terms.
SPEAKER_00: To love like him, to give yourself away.
SPEAKER_00: And then he says something that should stop us.
SPEAKER_00: I no longer call you slaves, I have called you friends.
SPEAKER_00: That's incredible.
SPEAKER_00: He gives a command, a demanding one, love like I love.
SPEAKER_00: And in the same breath he elevates you, not slaves, friends.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Well, because a slave obeys with understanding, without understanding.
SPEAKER_00: A friend is brought into the heart of the one who commands.
SPEAKER_00: I have told you everything I have heard from my father, he says.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, Jesus is not asking blind obedience.
SPEAKER_00: He's inviting you into his own relationship with the Father, his own way of loving, his own way of giving himself.
SPEAKER_00: This is not about following rules from a distance.
SPEAKER_00: This is about sharing a life.
SPEAKER_00: But here's the tension we have to face honestly.
SPEAKER_00: That line does not sit comfortably in modern ears.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because we want intimacy without obedience.
SPEAKER_00: We want closeness with God without the cost of actually living what he says.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus refuses to separate the two.
SPEAKER_00: Friendship with him is not sentimental, it is a lived reality.
SPEAKER_00: And then almost quietly he reminds you of something that grounds everything.
SPEAKER_00: It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you.
SPEAKER_00: Before you ever responded, before you ever tried, before you ever got anything right or wrong, he chose you.
SPEAKER_00: And he chose you for a purpose.
SPEAKER_00: To go and bear fruit that remain that will remain, he says.
SPEAKER_00: Not temporary impact, not service level influence, something lasting.
SPEAKER_00: So here's the question that we have today.
SPEAKER_00: What does your love actually cost you?
SPEAKER_00: Not what you feel, not what you intend, what does it cost?
SPEAKER_00: Because that is where you will find out if you're living the gospel or just admiring it.
SPEAKER_00: And if you're honest, most of us have room to grow.
SPEAKER_00: But the imitation is real, not to be servants who keep ourselves at a distance, but to become friends who love the way he loves.
SPEAKER_00: And that kind of love, costly, concrete, self giving, is the only kind that actually lasts forever.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.