God Loves Everyone, Everywhere

The topic I’ve been asked to speak on today is “God Loves All of His Children Everywhere”. What a wonderful topic. On the surface, it seems obvious. We have scriptures which many of us have heard enough times that we could ace a test on them. I bet you didn’t expect a pop quiz in sacrament meeting. Try to fill in the blank for these verses: “God is no respecter of (persons)” (Acts 10:34), “For God so loved the (world)” (John 3:16), “God is (love)” (1 John 4:8), “all are (alike) unto God” (2 Nephi 26:33). Then there are the sayings of Jesus that likewise ring true here:

• “Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies.” (Matthew 5:43-44)
• “the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.” (John 17:23)
• “[God] maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.” (Matthew 5:45)
• “[Which] of you, having an hundred sheep, if [ye] lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until [it is found]? And when [ye] hath found it, [ye] layeth it on [your] shoulders, rejoicing.” (Luke 15:4-5)
• “Greater love hath man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13)
• “A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you” (John 13:34)
• And some of his last words in his mortal ministry embodied this radical love: “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:34)

I’m tempted to stop there and say “Amen.”. Leaving us edified, pondering the words of Jesus. But we’d also be left pondering what to do with the 15 minute gap I just created in sacrament meeting. I imagine the most earnest of that pondering would be done by some up here on the stand. So, to avoid that situation, I’d like to explore three topics on God’s love: 1) how God’s love transformed Paul the Apostle’s life (as it can ours), 2) how God’s love shows us The Way, and 3) how we can extend that love to all God’s children, everywhere (as difficult as that may be).

1. Paul the Apostle

I’ll start by reading a scripture written by Paul in Romans 8:38-39:

38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, 39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Paul wrote these words towards the end of his life – a life often stretching early Jewish followers of Jesus to accept outsiders. It is a perspective completely opposite to where Paul started in life.

I won’t spend all of my time talking about who Paul was, just enough to highlight just how different Paul started off.

• Paul was a student of two different rabbis who led competing Jewish schools of thought – often hotly contended (Gamaliel & Hillel)
• Paul ultimately was drawn to a more zealous school of thought that emphasized that if God would establish his reign, Israel would need to pray harder, read their scriptures more, obey with more exactness, purify themselves for the temple, and be ready to rise up against those who opposed them
• At the time, there was rising zeal that Israel’s ancient covenant and political power needed rescuing from Rome and unworthy or corrupted Jews
• From this perspective, people following Jesus - with their talk of a New Covenant, and Jesus having more authority than temple - were a threat and corruption that needed to be cleansed
• Paul was totally caught up in this zeal: this was his world, this was what he thought God needed in his day - warriors willing to get rid of enemies

As we know, he was met by the resurrected Lord on his way to Damascus. Through this experience, his faith, philosophy, and zeal were turned upside-down:

• He saw how Jesus fulfilled the law - but that fulfillment contradicted the way Paul had understood it
• Paul had been right in his zeal for God - but completely misunderstood what God’s will was
• He was right in his dedication to God’s law - but wrong in the meaning of that law
• His desire for righteousness was good - but it was also misdirected and crowded out God’s love

It’s like having a telescope but looking through the wrong end of it. Paul had the instruments of law, loyalty, and zeal to bring God into focus. But looking through the wrong end, God’s love was impossibly small, and impossibly far away. This is all of us at times. We’re convinced we’re right, surely standing on higher ground than those others, only to have God show us how we’ve got things backwards – sometimes requiring God to knock us off our high horses to get through to us.

2. Love is The Way

Early Christian followers, including Paul after his conversion, were often called followers of The Way. “The Way” is mentioned in the gospels several times:

• Matt 3:3 - “Prepare ye the way of the Lord” (spoken by John the Baptist)
• Matt 22:16 - “Master, we know that thou… teachest the way of God”
• Matt 31:32 - “For John came unto you in the way of righteousness” (Jesus about John the Baptist)
• John 14:6 - “Jesus saith… I am the way, the truth, and the life”

Whenever I need to refocus on Jesus and the core of what He taught, I turn to the Sermon on the Mount - perhaps the same Sermon that was relayed to Paul by the disciples in Damascus. In it, Jesus is teaching His “Way” and notes that “narrow [is] the way, which leadeth to life” (Matt 7:14). Think about all the different ways mankind has tried to prove their worth in life. I myself have tried several different attitudes, philosophies, orthodoxies, and ways to prove my worthiness. Some time ago after decades of trying to prove my worthiness, I came to the conclusion that God never asked me to do so. I had been looking through the telescope backwards.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus lays out His higher law – look for when He says “ye have heard it said… but I say unto you…”. But if we come away seeing it as merely an updated checklist of commandments, with that ultimate, uncheckable checkbox of “be ye therefore perfect” (Matthew 4:48), we will have missed the point.

President Nelson pointed out in a 1995 Ensign article how we can misunderstand this Sermon:

“the term perfect was translated from the Greek teleios, which means “complete.” … The infinitive form of the verb is teleiono, which means “to reach a distant end, to be fully developed, to consummate, or to finish.” Please note that the word does not imply “freedom from error”; it implies “achieving a distant objective.”

There’s an additional way we can understand it. The Greek in that verse also has a future infinitive verb that can change the verse from a commandment to a covenant promise. The phrase “be ye therefore perfect” can be understood as “and thus you will become perfect” – that living this way is the way to perfection. Applying the observation from President Nelson, we could read it as “and thus you will be complete.” This lens turns the sermon from a checklist into a covenant promise that if we want to become like our Heavenly Father, we can do so by learning to love like Him and His Son. Seeing through the telescope this way, questions like “Am I worthy?” - and the question that always comes right along with that one, “Are others worthy?” - becomes replaced with, “What does God’s love require of me now?” This is how love fulfills the law. And it brings a whole new focus into life.

3. Extending God’s Love to All, Everywhere

But… sorry to say, there’s a “but” here… Love isn’t an easy answer. Why? Because love is scary. Love is vulnerable. Love hurts. Love can take us into the unknown. Love will sacrifice our egos. And all the things 1 Corinthians 13 promises; Or is it warning us of?

There are plenty of examples of God’s love working in the lives of people in scriptures – and I’d encourage you to read those thinking about that covenant “What does God’s love require here?”. I’d recommend reading the parable of the prodigal son and thinking about the father being an example of someone trying to find how to love in each situation he was presented with. But I wanted to share a few examples I’ve seen and experienced in my life that have helped me in trying to live that covenant of love.

One example I saw was from my mission president in South Korea. A cattle rancher, he had a deep sense of humility and pragmatism. Often, as we worked with wards and branches, we’d find this or that policy, practice, or tradition that wasn’t quite being followed. Focused on perfectionism, we’d complain and warn him about it. He’d calmly ask us: “Elder, is anyone being hurt? Is anyone apostatizing? Is anyone doing anything illegal?” The answer was never yes for what I had complained about. “Then stop worrying about it, and love them.” was his constant invitation. It took me a while, but I started to turn my telescope around and use it to love rather than judge. And it transformed my mission for the better.

Another example is in my own family. Families are complex, messy, and, yes, eternal. My family is no exception. Having queer kids has been something that has required me to lean on God’s love as checklists fail. I wish I had easy answers here. I do not. But I can share that nothing has better guided me through this and with any of my children than continually asking myself, “What does God’s love require of me?” There are unknowns, vulnerabilities, and hurts; but there are also joys, flourishing, and hope as we’ve tried, I’m sure imperfectly, to place God’s love at the center of what role faith plays in our family.

A final example I’ll give is something that happens in this Church – in this room right here: the sacrament. It is blessed and passed by young men in the ward to the pews. And it is all of us that pass it to one another in those pews. Passing these emblems to someone is deeply symbolic. What could it mean to offer someone next to you the sacrament? Think about the kinds of relationships you see the sacrament pass through: child and parent, siblings, couples struggling in their marriage, families struggling with illness or loss, visitors, strangers, the politically opposed, rich and poor, and the sinners in all of us. Do we allow these emblems to change our hearts as they pass through us to others? I think it’s significant that the sacrament is not passed to oneself. It is offered by another to us (even between the priesthood holders blessing and passing the sacrament). God’s love and atonement is always found in the context of a relationship with the other, just as is the sacrament.

Closing

I’ll close by returning back to something Paul wrote in Romans chapter 13 – summarizing a bit:

8 love one another: for [they] that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. 9 For [all the law] is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. 10 therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.

It’s my hope and prayer that as we come to know God’s love that we can see and feel how God is calling us to love everyone around us, then have the courage to do so.

In Jesus’ name, amen.