The Spacious Love
Text: John 15:9-17
Love. It’s one of the words we have to clarify. I like Rev. Angel Kyodo Williams’ definition of love. Rev. Williams is a Zen priest, activist, and teacher. She describes love as spaciousness. “It is developing our own capacity for spaciousness within ourselves to allow others to be as they are.” I believe all of us can reach that maturity of love, however difficult it may be.
To understand the vastness of love, we must understand first the smallness of our love. We use the word, love for almost anything we like from chocolate, coffee, favorite dishes, our car, house, or community. We express our appreciation based on what these things do for us. A love that privileges only a few while ignoring the rest is a self-serving love. We also use the word, love, in our relationships so effortlessly that it loses its power. Sometimes, we express our love only when we see a benefit in what we love. It’s a conditional love.
Love as spaciousness is self-emptying and unconditional. It’s bigger than any of us. No one can own it. We can only fall into it. At least we got the expression right: falling in love. We can’t fall unless we risk ourselves. Real love is rare and difficult because most of us don’t want to be vulnerable.
The good news is that when we acknowledge our common need – the need to be, to be loved, and to belong, we will know love is all around us. Love as spaciousness is a love that connects us to others, sharing in the same joy and sorrow. Such love reassures us that there is enough space for everyone and everything. All we have to do is say yes to that love, entrusting ourselves and those we care about into God’s continued care. Love as spaciousness invites us to continue to grow, evolve, and change.
Love and fear can’t coexist, as the Bible says, “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear.” (1 John 4:18) And we can’t be satisfied until everybody in the world can find their place in that love. to truly love our neighbours we must first face structural obstacles or systemic injustice – poverty, racism, etc. – that make this kind of love more than an act of individual will. bell hooks says, “Love is profoundly political. Our deepest revolution will come when we understand this truth.” We need a life-giving love that can nurture and enliven us all.
“Abide in my love.” Jesus is talking about love as spaciousness. Putting those words into context, we can have a better understanding of what he meant. The passage we heard today was part of his long farewell speech. Knowing his hour had come to depart from the world, Jesus gathered his beloved friends together for a ritual that would make a life-long impact: washing their feet and wiping them with the towel. Then he began his farewell speech. “Abide in my love.” That’s how the one, who loved to the end, said goodbye, which is not really about an ending but about a new beginning.
Those of us, who have experienced a loss, understand that there is no such thing as closure. There is no such thing as moving on. The truth is that the relationship continues in a new way. It just feels different, and sometimes even strange because we can no longer see our loved ones. But somewhere deep inside us we seem to know that the departed are not far from us, nor are we far from them. Oddly enough we can feel their presence in their absence, and intimacy despite the incomprehensible distance between life and death. There is no way for us to describe such irony other than to say we belong together. Yes, Jesus is right. We can still abide in the love of those who once shared life with us. We belong to them as they belong to us. Today we celebrate a love that never dies: the spacious love in which you and I have found a place to dwell. The nurturing and life-giving love that make the river flow, the sun shine bright, and life beautiful!