You can't choose Jesus! A manifesto on how to love.

Text: John 15:9-17

This may very well color everything that I write, but I can never talk about love without thinking about the wedding scene in The Princess Bride. Wuv, twue wuvwill fowwow you fowever… I remember having a professor show that in seminary as a warning against… well, I’m not exactly sure what. It may have been a cautionary tale against having a really funny lisp and holding an office involving public speaking. While The Princess Bride may not teach us much about love, we are bombarded with messages about what love is that are just as wacky as Peter Cook preaching on mawaige.

Where do we hear about love?

Books… stuff like Twilight (God help us!) and Nicholas Sparks.

The movies… but the classical romance stories of Casablanca now look more like cheap date night flicks that these days even require “crossover” appeal to men, which usually involves tanks, a bank robbery and the obligatory car chase.

The internet… surveys say that more than 20% of all relationships start online these days. Do we learn about love from personality inventories and catchy personal profiles?

Music… Do we learn about love from Justin Bieber or Mariah Carey? (Oy!)

Television… TV may be where most young people encounter something portrayed as “love.” Big Brother, Jersey Shore, Real Housewives of… fill in the blank—wholesome, family programs that teach us all about love. It’s enough to make a person want to give up.

Reality TV tries to tell us what love is. As far as television producers are concerned love is the Bachelor bringing in a cadre of attractive ladies and testing them out one-by-one until finally deciding that one is his “true love.” Reality TV tells us that love is really, really liking somebody; it is one-dimensional devotion with expected physical and emotional benefits. You don’t love somebody because you are willing to sacrifice for them—even if you might throw in a catchy phrase like “I’ll give them the world”—really you are looking for somebody who is your “dream girl” or “dream guy”—that perfect person that will fulfill your every want. Reality TV tells us that love is choosing that which always makes you happy.

I can just imagine Jesus giving this is a big facepalm.

Simply, reality TV is a fairy tale wrapped up in a horror story. Watch it for thirty seconds and you realize immediately that there is something fake in it; there is something that does not match up with actual reality. But dang it if the story isn’t compelling! We still want love to win, even when it’s a horribly fake, commercially-enhanced charade that only resembles love about as much as Cheez-Whiz resembles cheese.

There is a nugget of truth in these commercialized caricatures of love, just like there is something cheesy about Cheez-whiz, but it is woefully misrepresented as the actual thing. Jesus is about the real stuff. And at the risk of sounding... well... cheesy, he offers a version of love that doesn’t sell us short. “Love one another as I have loved you,” he says.

How did he love us? Did he choose us on a reality game show? Did he find us to be fascinating, fun and exciting people? I think now. I mean, look around you. If Jesus loves Scandinavian Lutherans it’s certainly not because we’re fun and exciting.

Luckily, Jesus doesn’t need you to be; he doesn’t need you to dance in the pews. He wouldn’t mind it if you did, but in this part of the country that would be a legitimate miracle. Thankfully, this is not the test of Jesus’ love nor the reason for it. Jesus loved us by taking up his cross and dying for our sake. You know this. You can probably even testify to what that means to you, but let’s not forget that this is a two-part responsibility. Jesus gave himself up to death in order to show us his love, and we are to love as Jesus did. That means dying, folks; straight-up death.

If you’ve ever wondered what it meant when Jesus said to take up your crosses and follow the answer is right here. To love as Christ loved is to die, but not just to pass away at the end of this life (that’s a really easy test that we are well on our way to passing). To love as Christ loved is to die to yourself, to give up your own wants and needs for the sake of others. Simple enough, right? Don't ever want anything for yourself. Don't ever put yourself before somebody else. Forsake your joy for the joy of others.

Easy... right?

Thankfully, Jesus knows us better than we know ourselves. So when we feel high and mighty about our ability to love, Jesus shows up to give us a reality check. “You did not choose me,” Jesus said, “I chose you.”

Love is being chosen. We can’t love Jesus in return; not as we ought. That is why we come back every week to confess our sins and receive forgiveness. If we were capable of choosing Jesus we would be capable of real love, as it is we try our best and sometimes get it right, though often we can't and won't get there, which is why we come back to receive a word of forgiveness.

But doesn't “love requires a choice?" I have heard it said. This is a frequent refrain for those who believe that our salvation depends on us choosing God, giving our hearts over to Jesus, or entering into a relationship with God--whatever the language. Love, they say, requires a response. They believe that in order for us to show our love—whether to God or fellow human beings—we need to be able to choose them.

I think there is an important distinction to make here. Love does require a choice, but it can only come from one who stands on equal terms. We cannot choose God, because we don’t stand as equals with God. If we did, then no problem, we could declare our love for God and God would love us back. By the way, these are similar reasons why a person who has been abused cannot love an abuser. They might think they love him or her, they might be very devoted and feel a deep connection, but it is not love. Love requires an equal playing field. There can be no power dynamics in love.

So as I said, love does require a choice, but it is the kind of choice only Jesus is capable of making on our behalf. Jesus wants us to know, very clearly, that love is not about us. Love is all about self-sacrifice, dying to ourselves for the sake of someone else and needing nothing in return. The expected return on investment for love is zero, zilch, and anything that is reciprocated is grace—a bonus. That’s why it’s hard to love; it’s hard to expect nothing for something that matters so deeply.

But this is also why it means so much more than the junk that’s on TV. I have no illusions that I am going to put the networks into financial ruin by proclaiming that Jesus’ love is better than the Bachelorette, but I do have some hope that dying to the self is still possible in this world. I hope that we can be God’s chosen people, which is to let go of our need to be the choosers. I hope, finally, that we can laugh at the mainstream caricatures of love. Wuv, twue wuv is so much better than that.