THERE is a temptation to bypass the first seven verses of this Gospel and go straight to verses 16-17 and 26-27, in which Jesus refers to promising the disciples the gift of the Holy Spirit. On Pentecost Sunday, it makes sense to see Jesus’s words about bestowing the Spirit as our principal objective: where else should our attention be at such a moment? After all, that Spirit marked us as Christians at the beginning of our discipleship, and goes on shaping our lives ever afterwards. While God the Father and God the Son are ever before us, our relationship with God the Holy Spirit renews annually, on this birthday of the Church.
All the same, there is a value in embracing the wider scope of this Gospel. When we consider the statement that precedes the promise of the Spirit, it is initially reassuring: “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” But a warning is implied, too: if we fail to keep Christ’s commandments, we may also fail to receive the promised Spirit.
What are “my commandments”? Jesus could be referring to everything that he has taught the disciples. But I think it more likely that the word “my” confirms that he means his new commandment (contrasted with the ancient ten), expressed at 13.34: “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.”
If this is right, though, why use the plural, “commandments”? I am not certain, but I think it likely that the single commandment, “love one another”, works like a collective noun (“government”, “family”), to incorporate every detail of our thoughts and actions. It could be, effectively, both singular and plural: one all-embracing idea.
Jesus already stated the new commandment in chapter 13. Now, like a wise preacher giving his listeners time to absorb a new idea, he circles back to it in chapter 14, making them ready for this moment, in the Pentecost Gospel, when he joins his new commandment to a further new element, not previously mentioned.
Among the Ten Commandments, one stood out from the rest, because it came with a consequence. The fifth commandment led on to a promise: “Honour your father and your mother, so that your days may be long [my italics] in the land that the LORD your God is giving you” (Exodus 20.12).
I came across an article examining sermons preached on Exodus 20.12 which observed that, over the past 60 years, the interpretation of that commandment-promise has shifted. Earlier sermons spoke of the need for small children to obey their parents. More recent ones used the text to call for older children to care for elderly parents.
Moving from a message of control and obedience to one of love and care is no bad thing, and it undoubtedly reflects, as sermons should, shifts in the way we view society. But what would happen if we tried a similar exercise on John 14.15? It, too, is now revealed as a commandment that carries with it a promise: if we love the Lord, and keep his commandments, we will be given the gift of an Advocate to be with us for ever.
There was a time when Christians would have expected loving God to be expressed through obedience, acceptance of God’s control. The fear of God — so vital a part of the divine-human relationship in scripture — had a proper part to play in this picture. Perhaps, once, love meant (over-simplifying) doing as you were told.
Now, we are more likely to see love as the outward expression of an inner conviction: a feeling that is spontaneous, voluntary. If so, we are fulfilling the Deuteronomic vision: that love is more than mere obedience, that it is the instinctive, reflex response of a human heart in tune with God.
The first message of the Pentecost Gospel is that, if we accept the love-commandment, and try to live it, we will receive a gift from God. The final verses of the Gospel unwrap the gift, and show us what we have received. And this is what we are given: one who speaks for us, whose essence is truth, who is both with us and within us, who teaches us, and — perhaps most precious of all — who keeps us mindful of everything that Jesus has said to us. A precious gift indeed.
