As I was reading this passage, immediately a song came into my head. "Jesus loves me! This I know, for the Bible tells me so; Little ones to Him belong; They are weak but He is strong. Yes, Jesus loves me! Yes, Jesus loves me! Yes, Jesus loves me! The Bible tells me so." I can remember singing this song at vacation Bible school when I was young and with my mother while we were working around the house. It’s a simple song that captures so much of the gospel message – the message of love.

This passage from John’s gospel comes at a time when Jesus is preparing his disciples for his death. This is part of his farewell teachings to his disciples. And the theme that dominates is love: Jesus’ love for his disciples and the command that the disciples love each other. But what do these two loves mean? How do they impact our lives here?

It is one thing to sing, "Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so" but quite another to see the impact that love can have on our lives. Jesus doesn’t talk of love as a warm fuzzy feeling that he has for his disciples. Jesus leaves the description of the feeling of love to the poets and philosophers. For Jesus, love isn’t merely a feeling but it is completely an action. Love, for Jesus, is a verb – one of those "action words" that I learned about in grammar class.

Jesus doesn’t talk about "How do I love thee, let me count the ways." Nor does he compare the disciples to "a red, red rose newly sprung in June" or "a melody sweetly sung in tune." Love is not like that for Christ. Jesus describes love as laying down one’s life for others. For Jesus love is sacrifice and not just meaning that you sacrifice not going to your favorite restaurant in order to go to some one else’s favorite or letting someone else control the TV remote for a while. Love, for Christ, asks nothing more than complete and total sacrifice – such is the depth and height of Christ’s love.

So if Christ sees love as an action – where can we see love enacted?

This week, I was doing a little bit of reading about the writing of "Jesus loves me." I found out that the song was actually written to be included in a novel by Anna Bartlett Warner. This novel was about a young dying child and his Sunday School teacher. At the end of the novel, the Sunday school teacher carries the child and sings this song to comfort him. William Bradbury set it to music just a couple of years after the novel was published and it became a classic soon afterward. But can’t you picture the scene: the Sunday school teacher is carrying the dying child and singing to offer him comfort – love in action.

I got an e-mail this week updating me on some of the work that the PC(USA) is supporting around the world. In this e-mail I read about the Rev. Ibrahim Nairouz, an Episcopal priest living and working in Nablus, West Bank. In addition to serving as pastor of two congregations and helping to run a school, Ibrahim is working to improve relationships between Christians and Muslims in the West Bank. Many of the students at the school are Muslim and the school even donated some of its land to the mosque next door as a sign of the importance of fostering cooperation between the religions. Modern-day Nablus is located in what was called Samaria in Jesus’ time. At the well, Jesus was welcoming of a Samaritan woman. This crossed all the social boundaries at the time. Jews and Samaritans did not get along but Jesus reached out and broke down those barriers. Ibrahim is reaching across the boundaries between Christians and Muslims in the West Bank. He is reaching across in love and cooperation – love in action.

When a crowd had been gathered in a deserted place, listening to Jesus teach, the disciples noted the late hour to Jesus. "Jesus it’s getting late and the people are going to be hungry. Send them away so that they might try to find something to eat." No, you give them something to eat. So they took what they had and gave it to God and there was enough for everyone and leftovers to boot. This is love in action.

Sue Kinsler, a Presbyterian missionary in North Korea, noticed that there were many people who could not find work because of physical challenges. Mr. Nam Cheol Kang had lost the use of his legs when he contracted polio when he was very young. Sue helped Mr. Kang and others to create a center where they could work at sewing, repairing watches, and other activities despite their different abilities. Love in action.

I was listening to a podcast this week. A podcast is like a radio show that you download from the internet. On this podcast, well-known speaker and evangelist Tony Campolo was talking about joy. He mentioned that when he was growing up in Sunday school they had a saying or a song about joy. Maybe some of you have heard this before but it was new to me. So reach out and grab a pencil from the holder in the pew. Turn your bulletin over and write in big letters going down the page J-O-Y.

When I was growing up, we would sometimes make cards for special occasions. Many times we would take someone’s name or maybe the word "mother" or "father" and write it going down the page. Then for each letter of that word we would come up with a description of that person. So "dad" might be: dear, awesome, daring.

So have you got joy written down? Next to the "J" write "Jesus." Next to the "O" write "others." Then, next to the "Y" write "you." So that spells joy – Jesus, others, and you.

Jesus tells his disciples, "I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete." So in order to complete the joy that Jesus wants his disciples to have, we need Jesus, others, and you. So by loving one another – following Jesus’ command to love one another – we may have joy.

Just like love for Jesus is an action, joy for Jesus involves more than just you and Jesus. Joy comes from actively loving others. I admit that I get a little upset at some preachers and teachers who say that we can love people without liking them. I don’t think that is possible and I don’t think that Jesus would see it as possible either. If you love someone, you will show that in the way you treat them, you will show it in the way you speak with them, you will show your love for that person in some action and interaction with them.

Now you might not like some of the things that they do. But don’t confuse actions with the person. But if we are truly to love one another we will show that in actions we take toward them. It may be an act of love to stop another from doing something. It may be an act of love to stand by someone even when you have nothing to say. It may be an act of love to reach out to someone who you see as your complete opposite.

In the movie "A League of Their Own" Tom Hanks finds himself coaching a women’s baseball team. When one of the women on the team complains that it is hard, Hanks tells her, "It’s baseball. It’s supposed to be hard. If it wasn’t hard, everyone would be doing it."

Loving others is hard. If it wasn’t hard everyone would already be doing it. The same Jesus who commanded his disciples to love one another also told them to take up their cross and follow him. It is not easy. No one said it would be. But like so many other things that are hard, it is worth it. If we strive to love one another, Jesus tells his disciples that they will abide in his love. If we are able to love one another – to enact love for one another – then our joy might be complete. With Jesus, others and you, bound together in love, joy may be complete.

If we do not love one another it does not mean that Jesus stops loving us or that Jesus loves us less. It only means that we are not abiding in Jesus’ love. It means that we are not embodying Jesus’ love. It means that we are not enacting Jesus’ love.

We did not chose God. Before we were even thought of, God chose us. God chose us and selected us to bear God’s love in the world. It’s hard to enact love and even on our best days we will fail in some way. But with Jesus, others, and you we can work to act in love so that joy may be complete.