Sermon for the First Sunday after Trinity
“We love him because he first loved us”
St. John’s First Epistle is a treatise on love which complements and underscores the love which his Gospel proclaims. It cannot be emphasised enough, it seems to me, that we enter into the mystery of the life of God through the eyes of John. This epistle intends, as do so many of the epistles and lessons, the application of the Gospel message, particularly the Gospel proclamation that “God is love.” Love is of God and so we ought also to love one another. But what is that love?
That love is the communion of God with God in God – the communion of the Trinity. This is the love by which we have communion with God and so with one another. Our loves find their place and meaning in God’s love. “He that abideth in love abideth in God and God in him.”
This is, as it were, the recurring refrain of the Trinity season: “God is love and he that abideth in love abideth in God and God in him.” This is the love which the Church is empowered and compelled to proclaim. But more than that, the Church is to be the place of the indwelling love of God, the place where God’s love is called to mind, and the place where that love takes shape in us. The Church is to be the place where we seek the perfection of our love in the grace of Jesus Christ.
The Church refers to more than merely a building, just as the building points beyond itself. These holy places signify a greater purpose and one which extends into the stuff of our daily lives with the intent that they should be holy lives. We are called to love out of the love which has been shown to us.
