October 1, 2023
Beloved of God,
In his prayer for the church just hours before his arrest and execution, Jesus in John 17:21-23 prayed to God the Father that his followers would be “one” as he and the Father are “one”, and that people would thereby know that, as he said to the Father, “you have sent me and have loved them”.
Unity in mutual concern and support is essential for the church to sound out the Good News of God’s love and to fulfill the church’s mission to welcome in new people who will, as Jesus prayed to God in John 17:20, “believe in me through their word”.
From our human side of things, we attain that unity for which Jesus prayed by our loving. Our loving marks us as devoted followers of Jesus.
Jesus, in John 13:34-35, said, “Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
We therefore fulfill our purpose by showing our warm and grateful appreciation of others, both those already members of our faith family and those who are not yet connected with us in that way. We may convey how happy we are to know them in a variety of ways: Some we may hug. Some we may greet with a bright smile or a heart-felt hand shake. Some we may serve in concrete, helpful action. Some we may share our abundance with. With some we do all the above.
However we do it – and whether it be in person (at church, on a home visit, at the movies together or wherever), on the phone, by social media or old-fashioned letters – we are called by God to be as good to others as God has been to us; and maybe make them a little curious about what more God could do for them.
We each are called by God to let some specific people know how glad we are that they are in our lives and how, out of gratitude for them, we’d do most anything we could for them.
That affirmation of them from us might just give them a sense of how Jesus feels about them. And what discovery could ever be better than that?
In the grace of Christ,
Rob & Adele
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