To Be At Home in God’s Love
by Bishop Chris Giesler
Preaching Text: John 15:9-17
To say that you abide in an abode is another way of saying that you live in a house. My home is where I know I can simply be me. Not that my pastoral presence is that much different, but home is where I don’t feel I need to wear a tie. It is a place where I can relax completely.
To say that you abide in an abode is like saying you live in a house. “As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love” (John 15:9). Abide is not a word we use very often in our speech patterns today, but here it means allowing our souls to rest within God’s presence. It means allowing ourselves to come and dwell and live within God’s embrace and influence. It also means quite the reverse: we allow God’s love to come and abide within our hearts. This means allowing God’s love to reside in your life.
To carry this forward and allow God’s love to dwell in you is to express the fact that God’s love is better than anything. Love is better than:
Spend a few moments pondering the words on this word cloud. Do you abide in any of those places? Do they abide in you? It is easy to allow any of these emotions to come and make a home in our lives, but love is better than any of them.
From our births, God’s love is stamped deep within each of us; it lives there. Part of our mission in life is to allow God’s love to define us. It is also our mission to make our primary residence in God’s heart and to allow God’s love to be the primary resident in our hearts and in how we view others in the world.
