Reflection on John 15:9-17

 

What a friend we have in Jesus. 

We sing the words so easily, probably because we know it to be true.  Jesus is not just our teacher, though he is.  Jesus is not just our savior, though that is the root of our faith.  Jesus is more than God, come down from heaven to us, living and walking among us, though that is what sets the truth of Christianity apart from other beliefs.  Jesus is our dear, trusted friend.

But, when we say that Jesus is our friend, it is obvious that we Christians must mean something different by “friendship” than the wider world.  After-all, we go dine with our friends, we jog with our friends, we watch movies together with our friends, we play games with our friends, and we share secrets with our friends.  Our friends are our companions in life who we love and with whom we drink beers and play cards.

These friendships are great by the way.  These friendships are gifts from God which make the struggles of life bearable and, maybe, even a little more humorous.  Who else has your back, or more to the point, your bottoms when the waterslide takes your shorts right off?  Not that such an embarrassing episode ever happened in front of my friends when at the waterslides in south Omaha. 

But, when we think about these God-given friendships, it is already apparent that we must mean something different when talking about our friendship with Jesus.  Jesus is not right there with us, in the flesh, for us to see and feel.  He is not there to guzzle a drink and sing at the top of our lungs when on a road trip. 

Even so, our friendship with Jesus is essential to our lives.

Luckily for us, the gospel of John helps us to understand the true meaning of friendship, and it guides us as we seek to be friends in the same ways that Jesus is our friend. 

In John, 13:15, Jesus teaches us that “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”  That is an amazing sort of friendship.  It is a radical sort of friendship; “laying down one’s life.”  Though we say, “I’m there for you, no matter what,” I can think of countless times when I, as a friend, was not. 

My mind wanders to a particular time in school.  Though I thoroughly enjoyed most of my years in school, I could not care less if seventh grade fell off a cliff.  You know 7th grade, the grade where everyone picks on everyone else, and you cross your days off on the calendar, just hoping to get through the year without too many scars? 

Well, I had this good friend in 7th grade: Aaron.  We played games together, we shared the titles of books we enjoyed, and we simply enjoyed each other’s jokes.  No one else got our jokes.  No matter.  We got them and that is all that mattered.  We were friends.

And then the day came when I saw that the school bully was out for blood.  He was making fun of random people as he walked down the hall, seeing if he could get any reaction. 

I despised that kid.  He made our lives a living hell.  He was the reason that we marked our calendars, hoping to get to the end of the school year. 

Soon, he had gathered a following of classmates who were encouraging his taunts, and he heaved himself near Aaron and me.  Fortunately for me, my locker happened to be a number of feet further down the hall than Aaron’s, so he saw Aaron first.  When he did,  he went in for the kill. 

Remember the old adage: “You do not have to be faster than the bear, just faster than your friend.”?

Reflecting back now all these years later, what I would love to say is that I stood in front of Aaron and took the abuse myself, thereby protecting my friend.  But, that would not be true. 

The truth is that I acted out of self-preservation.  The truth is that I walked to the back of the group of taunting kids, out of the bully’s sight.  I had failed as a friend.

You have no idea how many people have come and talked to me about their struggles with their friends, or maybe I should say, “Former friends.”  They talk about how they have been let down, and abandoned, and hurt by those who they thought had their backs.  And, each time I hear these stories, I think about Aaron, and how surface our worldly friendships can be.

And, then I think about Jesus as a friend.  I think about how, just before he was to be betrayed and denied, Jesus got down on his hands and feet and washed the disciple’s feet.  Jesus even washed the feet of Judas, the one who led Jesus’ killers right to where he could be found.  Jesus even washed the feet of Peter, the one who made himself out to be Jesus’ staunchest, most devoted friend, and who abandoned Jesus to death like a school kid who abandons his friend in the face of a bully.

“No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends,” Jesus says. 

For Jesus, friendship does not have so much to do with enjoying the same pastimes together, as it has to do with this unconditional love, as the Bible puts it, this “agape” love, that would stoop down to wash dusty feet like a servant, and who would go to the cross to save those who would betray and deny. 

That is what true friendship looks like.  That is what true love looks like.  It looks like Jesus choosing to love us anyway, even when we betray.  It looks like Jesus choosing to love us anyway, even when we deny or ignore. 

“You did not choose me but I chose you,” Jesus reminds us.  Jesus is the friend who sticks with us, even when we fail to stick with him.

But, more than that, the Bible also teaches us in John that a good friend is one who does not hold anything back. 

Jesus says, “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.”  In other words, Jesus is the friend who gives you too much information. 

Who here has the friend who has no problem telling you how last night’s Mexican meal affected them through the night?  That is Jesus, but in a good way.

God the Father has let Jesus in on all the secrets of life, and Jesus has shared all that important stuff with us, his friends.   His life is an open book.  He knows the truth: that serving others and dying for them is the way to redeem the tough situations in life and to redeem the tough situations of the world.  Though the world would disagree, Jesus lets us in on the truth that unconditional love, agape love, is where we will find life, and meaning, and purpose. 

A true friend, according to Jesus, holds none of this heavenly truth back.  We have been given it all.  After-all, we are his friends.

Do you desire to be a friend?  Do you desire to be, not just a worldly friend who has a good time…once again, there is nothing wrong with that, those friends are certainly a gift from God…but a true friend in the Christian sense…in Jesus’ sense of friendship? 

Here is what Jesus has to say to you:

“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.”

And, Jesus continues:

“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.”

Christian friendships are unique.  They are friendships where unconditional love is shared without that love being earned. 

They are friendships where we lift other people’s burdens off of their shoulders, not because they deserve such compassion, but because it is the way of God. 

They are friendships where we give up our lives in small ways and large for the sake of another, even if that other is a betrayer or enemy. 

Christian friendships are friendships that do not hold back the truth of Jesus’ and his love. 

They are friendships that display to the world the love of God; inviting others to abide in that heavenly, joyous, unconditional love of Jesus Christ.

Aaron never held it against me; me not having his back that is.  A few days later when it was my turn to take the wrath of the bully, Aaron walked up behind him, called him a name that I should not repeat in polite company, and the bully immediately forgot about me. 

It was then that I realized what true love, Christian love, is all about.