[Click here to listen to the sermon.]

Through the months of autumn parish leaders have been listening to one another as they prayerfully sought to discern God’s Vision for our parish. A lot of hard work and careful listening has resulted in a new Vision Statement that will help the Vestry bring greater focus to our mission.

The new Vision Statement is:

St David’s Church is a covenant community where no one stands alone.
Together, we are learning to love one another as we learn to be loved by Jesus.
Any time. Any place.

Our vision challenges us to learn how to love others the way Jesus loves us. This is an impossible challenge until we can experience what it means to be loved by Jesus.

This raises an important question: What does love really mean?

The word love has a frustratingly vague nature. In the course of a Saturday afternoon one may hear the word used in a variety of contexts. “I love pizza.” “I love Fido.” “I love my children.” “I love my wife.”

And then, come to church the next day and hear the challenge about “learning to love one another as we learn to be loved by Jesus.”

What does this word “love” really mean? I’m sure I know what I mean when I say, “I love pizza.” I’m not at all sure I know what I am being asked to do when I am challenged to, “love God.”

In today’s reading from the Gospel of Mark Jesus says all the commandments can be summarized in the statement: Love God. Love Neighbor. What does he really mean?

The commandments refer to the Ten Commandments found in Exodus 20, and repeated in Deuteronomy 5. The Scripture describes the Ten Commandments as consisting of “two tablets.” The first relates to one’s relationship to God, the second with one’s relationship to other people.

Place the two tablets of Ten Commandments side by side, five commandments on each tablet. One readily sees five sets of paired commandments.

Ask: Is this a random collection of commandments? Or is there a hidden rationale that informs the meaning of the commandments? A simple answer emerges. Each paired commandment is an articulation on one common characteristic of Love.

There are 10 Commandments instead of 5 Commandments, because the focus of each of Love’s attributes take on a somewhat different focus directed to God or to other people. But in both cases, these five elements teach what it means to Love.

This is why Jesus says all the commandments can be summarized in the statement: Love God. Love Neighbor.

In other words, the Ten Commandments provide consistent principles that guide relationships characterized by genuine Love.

• The first and sixth commandments have to do with the value of an individual in one’s own right. Love values a person for who they are, not for what they do.

• Commandments two and seven point to the value of commitment. Love must commit to the long term health of the relationship to be genuine.

• Three and eight hold up the importance of personal boundaries, or autonomy. Love lets the other person be who he or she is, without manipulation or a desire to control.

• The fourth and ninth commandment secures the importance of truth-telling. Love cannot tell a lie.

• The fifth and tenth commandment calls us to remember the importance of history, or memory. Love remembers the past, learning from mistakes and celebrating successes.

Through the month of November we will be exploring the genuine meaning of Love as expressed by the prophets of Israel, as modeled by our Lord Jesus, and as rising up out of the heart of God.