To see the world differently sometimes you have to downshift.
I downshifted this past week to an average speed of about 12 mph.
This was Bike to Work week in KC and so as often as possible I rode my bike around town.
You see things differently at 12 mph than you do at 70 or even 55.
A few of the things I saw this week:
A fully decorated Christmas tree on the sidewalk,
A man who befriends, names, talks to, and feeds the birds,
A man who is living on a pedestal 50 ft above the Kansas river.
This last one was the most amazing thing I saw.
It was early on Thursday morning and I was on the bike bridge that crosses the river underneath I-70. At about 7:30 am a man was lifting his old clunker of a bike over the bridge railing from the river side.
I wasn’t sure what was going on.
Then I saw that he had a bedroll and a backpack and he hoisted himself up onto the bridge from the river side of the railing. He had spent the night sleeping on the concrete bridge post suspended about 50 ft above the Kaw River.
You see amazing things when you slow down.
Your vision has to change to adjust to the new speed.
In the scripture today, Jesus has slowed down the disciples.
No longer are they out running around Galilee and Judea.
They are at the last supper with Jesus.
He has stopped the running and he is offering them a new vision, a new way to look at each other and the world.
Sometimes we have to slow down.
Jesus is about to leave them and he spends about 4 entire chapters of John’s gospel giving them instructions.
Sometimes we just have to slow down.
The heart of the instruction that he gives them is this:
“Love one another as I have loved you.”
You’ve got to slow down to hear that.
“Love one another as I have loved you.”
Peter had to slow down when Jesus gave him the visual when the dinner started.
Remember how at the beginning of the dinner Jesus had washed the disciples feet.
Peter’s mind raced as he saw Jesus wash the other disciples feet.
“He shouldn’t be washing our feet. He’s the Lord, he’s the Messiah, he’s the Jefe.”
Jefe’s don’t wash the feet of the day laborers.
This is a new vision and Peter doesn’t like it.
When Jesus gets to him, Peter says, “No way. I’m the one who should be washing your feet.”
And Jesus says, “If you can’t accept this new vision, then you can’t accept me.”
And Peter’s racing heart and mind slows down and accepts the vision, “Not just my feet, Jesus, I need you from head to toe.”
This new vision requires us to slow down.
Even 12 mph is too fast.
What does Jesus mean when he says we are to “Love one another, as I have loved you.”
We’ll never get it if we are always on the run.
Friends slow down for each other.
Friends stop for each other.
Friends wait for each other.
And that’s the new vision Jesus gives us.
Friendship.
He says, “There is no greater love than to give up your life for your friend.”
Then he says that amazing thing.
You are my friends.
Have you slowed down enough to hear it?
You are my friends.
Has your mind stopped racing about whatever your plans you have for tomorrow?
You are my friends.
This is the new vision.
Jesus is our mutual friend and by him we become friends with one another.
Jesus is your ultimate Facebook connection.
Your search for friends begins and ends with Jesus.
Through him you can be friends with anybody.
Through him you can love one another.
After all, that’s what friendship is about. Love.
The Greek word used in this passage for friends is philos which literally means “Loved Ones.”
The new vision that we need is to be able to look around this room first of all and see only philos, loved ones.
We must realize that we didn’t choose to be friends with Jesus. Jesus chose to be friends with us.
We didn’t choose the philos that Jesus would bring into this room. Jesus chose them for us.
And so that makes this commandment to love one another more than a Facebook thing.
If Jesus recommends a friend to you, it really isn’t in your best interests to reject the friend.
Being friends in Jesus’ social network is not really about liking. It’s about being among the chosen.
That makes this friendship thing in Jesus’ world a new vision.
It’s a new vision that we must slow down to get.
Because this friendship, this love that Jesus is talking about is not an ethereal, other-worldy concept.
This new vision requires hard work.
Maybe you look around here and you see some people you like, some you don’t know and some you don’t like.
It doesn’t matter.
Because Jesus has slowed each of you down enough to get you in the same room together.
You are, each one, his philos, Friends – his Loved Ones.
And Jesus says that the vision of friends is to look out for each other.
To give up what you want --- for your friends.
Now that’s not hard to do with friends that you choose.
The hard part is to do that for friends that Jesus has chosen for you.
In his sermon on the mount Jesus said, “If you love only those who love you, what’s so special about that?”
This is a new vision. New, not because I just said it. It’s new because you have to stop to get it.
This kind of friendship Jesus is calling us to is the kind that doesn’t run away.
This kind of friendship keeps promises made even when it is inconvenient.
This kind of friendship keeps promises made in the name of the mutual friend Jesus.
Each year we have potential deacons and elders who stand before us and in the name of Jesus promise to be faithful friends doing the work of the church side by side.
And each year, along the way, some of these friends disappear.
They’re too busy. They’re going to fast. Somebody offended them so they run.
It doesn’t matter. This new vision is not about them.
It’s not about you.
It’s not about me.
It’s about us and this new vision of friendship.
The friendship Jesus is talking about is about partnership and risk, responsibility and conversion, pain and difficulty.
True friends slow down and stop even when it hurts to do so.
True friends don’t cut and run.
Friends of Jesus are in it for the long haul. Not by or for themselves, but by and for others.
The new vision is not easy.
But it greatly expands your social network.
No one gets rejected.
Not even people who put their Christmas tree on the sidewalk in May.
Not even crazy old men who talk to the birds.
Not even people who spend their nights suspended above a river sleeping on a concrete post.
Open your eyes.
Open your hearts.
Slow down.
Live by faith, not by sight.
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