Jesus' Dying Gift John 13:31-35 May 9, 2004, Year C, Easter 5 The Rev. William V. Livingston, Rector Church of the Resurrection, Starkville, Mississippi My grandmother, my dad's mother, lived in Louisville. While I was a Mississippi State student, I almost always stopped to visit her either going or coming on my trips home to Vicksburg. On one such visit during my senior year, as I was leaving, she handed me a box containing two crystal lusters - rose color pillars from which hung a series of crystal prisms and which now sit on top of our china cabinet. As a child, I had spent many hours removing the prisms and holding them in front of the window, mesmerized by the rainbow of colors they created. Also, I would lightly strike them and hear the music that fine crystal makes when struck. Some of the prisms bear the scars of my sometimes over zealous percussion. I later learned that around that same time, she had given my brother her antique Ming vase he had long coveted, my parents her antique French what-not table my mother had admired and other prized possessions to my cousin and aunt and uncle. Although, to our knowledge at that time, she had no serious medical problems, shortly before my graduation, she died. For many, when possible, a natural part of the dying process includes passing on their most prized possessions to those they think will most value them. "I am with you only a little longer." Jesus breaks this hard news to his friends as they gathered together the last time around the meal table. When we love someone deeply, words such as this come with heartbreaking poignancy. "No!" we want to shout in reply. "Don't go!" It was clearly too soon for him to leave. Jesus spoke less poetically yet more insistently in his final words to his disciples. As my grandmother did and many of your loved ones have, Jesus passed his most prized possession on to those he thought would most value it. What was it that Jesus gave them - a big house, a fancy car, a collection of edicts, a list of criteria of who should receive part of his inheritance and who shouldn't? No, what he gave them was his most valuable possession, and he gave it to them in the simplest way he could, "Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another." He didn't even tell them how to do it. Once again, Jesus says, "Just do it!" We shouldn't need "love" defined, but I fear we must. We throw the word around so glibly we have lost its essence. This love is not an emotion but an action that places one's needs after that of the other, extends a humility that counts the other as better than oneself, creates a gentleness that waives one's rights for personal gain, practices a patience that makes allowances for the other's shortcomings. This love is inseparable from forgiveness - a forgiveness that has as its goal not merely healing of one's emotions from an offense or a hurt but the reconciliation with the other. Love fundamentally reconciles; that is it's character. Love is an unconditional gift which is impossible to be repaid. In Chicken Soup for the Soul, there's a story about a man who came to his car and found a little boy from a nearby housing project looking with great admiration at his new vehicle. The little boy said, "Does this car belong to you?" And the man said, "Yes, in fact my brother gave it to me for Christmas. I've just gotten it." With that the little boy's eyes widened. He said, "You mean to say that somebody gave it to you? And you didn't have to pay anything for it? That it came without any strings attached?" And the man said, "That's right. My brother gave it to me as a gift." With that the little boy let out a long sigh and said, "Wow, I would really like..." And the man fully expected the boy to say, "I would like to have a brother like that, who would give me such a beautiful car," but instead the man was amazed when the little boy said, "Wow! I would really like to be that kind of brother. I wish I could give that kind of car to my little brother." Somehow that child valued Jesus' last words with his friends. Today, we are the friends who will gather with Jesus around the meal table. How will everyone know we are his friends? Will it be by the Episcopal shield decals we have on our cars, by the building at 105 North Montgomery, by the liturgy, hymns or musical instruments we use in our worship, by the fancy vestments our bishop wears, by whom we include or exclude from our ranks, by catchy slogans we stick on our cars, by of our prosperity, by of our avoidance of controversy, by our respectability? "By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." A natural part of the dying process includes passing on our most prized possession to those we think will most value it. Jesus made perfectly clear what his most prized possession was. The question is do we value it.