Sermon Tone Analysis

Title

Love

Outline

Love, as a former mentor of mine used to say, is not live shivers

By that he meant that love is not an emotion, not something that one can fall into and fall out of, for you cannot command feelings.

Feelings just are, and they depend on our endocrine system and its interaction with our nervous system

Love is, as Thomas Aquinas said, “Seeking the good of the other” or, as expanded, “Seeking the good of the other as other”

God requires that I love each and every one of you, among others whom I should love.

The fact that I do indeed like you is a bonus that flows from doing as God would have me do.

It is a bonus that God as God does not have, for he has no endocrine system.

On the other hand, God does not just love, but rather he is love - his essence is the seeking the good of others and thus the necessity of the Trinity.

Now the failure to understand the true meaning of love is the root of much of the mess that the world is in

Jesus lives love

In our Gospel Jesus is confronted with a crowd when he had wanted a retreat or rest with his disciples

Rather than rejecting them as a bother, he sought their good and therefore felt compassion, since he realized they were lacking the good.

“God sent his only Son into the world so that we might have life through him” - and while ultimately that would mean expiation for their sins, at that time it meant dealing with the needs of the moment.

Now, after, hours of “teaching them many things” and undoubtedly healing many people, the disciples suggest that he send them away so they could seek their own good, which at that time meant food.

Jesus replies, “I did not come to send people to acquire their own good, but to seek their good myself.”

“You give them something to eat.”

They essentially say, “Do you want us to do the impossible?”

It is unlikely that they carried 200 days wages with them.

His response is simple: “What do you have?”

God had his Son, so he gave his Son.

They had five loaves and two fish.

Jesus had the people organized for a meal.

Jesus prayed over the food so all would know where their good came from.

Jesus broke and gave them to the disciples - still only 5 loaves and two fish - and told them to give what they had.

And in the end all were filled - we could say, were saved, for other gospels suggest some would not have made it home otherwise - and the baskets full show that there was more at the end than at the beginning.

It was no wonder that all were full.

The disciples were in the process of learning that “everyone who loves is begotten by God and knows God” - they were learning that God is love and that they too could be love if they were living in relationship and under the direction of Jesus.

So let us do more than get warm feelings when read 1 John.

Neither this community nor any other runs on feelings, but it can run on love.

St Therese chose to act in love, not because she liked every sister, but because she wanted each act to be an offering to God.

Love is drawn from God, for as we enter into God we know that the good of others truly is

Love is directed by God, for only God knows how he wishes to produce the good of others

Love costs us all we have - no more, no less - for we lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters just as Jesus did for us.

Love in the end reveals God, for God working in love through us becomes visible to others.

Let us constantly repeated to ourselves, “Beloved, let us love one another, because love is of God.”

And when we repeat it, let us then seek God’s direction to do it.

Reading

FIRST READING

1 John 4:7–10

7 Beloved, let us love one another, because love is of God; everyone who loves is begotten by God and knows God. 8 Whoever is without love does not know God, for God is love.

9 In this way the love of God was revealed to us: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might have life through him.

10 In this is love: not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as expiation for our sins.

RESPONSE

Psalm 72:11

11 May all kings bow before him,

all nations serve him.

PSALM

Psalm 72:1–2, 3–4, 7–8

1 Of Solomon.

2 O God, give your judgment to the king;

your justice to the king’s son;

That he may govern your people with justice,

your oppressed with right judgment,

3 That the mountains may yield their bounty for the people,

and the hills great abundance,

4 That he may defend the oppressed among the people,

save the children of the poor and crush the oppressor.

7 That abundance may flourish in his days,

great bounty, till the moon be no more.

8 May he rule from sea to sea,

from the river to the ends of the earth.

GOSPEL ACCLAMATION

Luke 4:18

18 “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,

because he has anointed me

to bring glad tidings to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives

and recovery of sight to the blind,

to let the oppressed go free,

GOSPEL

Mark 6:34–44

34 When he disembarked and saw the vast crowd, his heart was moved with pity for them, for they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things.

35 By now it was already late and his disciples approached him and said, “This is a deserted place and it is already very late.

36 Dismiss them so that they can go to the surrounding farms and villages and buy themselves something to eat.” 37 He said to them in reply, “Give them some food yourselves.”

But they said to him, “Are we to buy two hundred days’ wages worth of food and give it to them to eat?” 38 He asked them, “How many loaves do you have?

Go and see.”

And when they had found out they said, “Five loaves and two fish.”

39 So he gave orders to have them sit down in groups on the green grass.

40 The people took their places in rows by hundreds and by fifties.

41 Then, taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, he said the blessing, broke the loaves, and gave them to [his] disciples to set before the people; he also divided the two fish among them all.

42 They all ate and were satisfied.

43 And they picked up twelve wicker baskets full of fragments and what was left of the fish.

44 Those who ate [of the loaves] were five thousand men.

Notes

ON THE SAME DATE | CHRISTMAS

JANUARY 8

YEARS 1 & 2 | ROMAN MISSAL | LECTIONARY

On the same date: Saturday after Epiphany

First Reading 1 John 4:7–10

Response Psalm 72:11

Psalm Psalm 72:1–2, 3–4, 7–8

Gospel Acclamation Luke 4:18

Gospel Mark 6:34–44

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