Love, abide, joy, friends

This morning, CCSC hosted a breakfast for its clergy, and each table discussed the verse of scripture below. Initially, each person shared the word that stood out to him/her in the reading of the passage; then we discussed the passage more in-depth.

It was a rich discussion, so I'm sharing some of the words my table highlighted along with some questions I took away in hopes it will cause you to also look deeply within.

• Love
• Abide
• Joy
• Friends

What does it mean to lay down your life for your friends, especially since most of us won't be called to sacrifice our lives for our friends?

How is joy different from happiness?

How do people who suffer find joy?

Does your life bear fruit?

How do we show love to the people in are lives who are difficult to love?

John 15:9-17

⁹As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. ¹⁰If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. ¹¹I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. ¹²“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. ¹³No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. ¹⁴You are my friends if you do what I command you. ¹⁵I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. ¹⁶You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. ¹⁷I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.