enough food, if you have rushed to
someone’s aid in the middle of the
night, if you have held strong when
someone was weak and needed you to
be strong, then in those moments you
have given up your quality of life for
the sake of another.
We read in the doctrine of the New
Church:
When anyone looks with love on
someone in distress . . . a feeling of
compassion comes over them. And
since the feeling is stirred by the
Lord, it is an alerting by Him. Indeed
when people who are perceptive have
feelings of compassion they know that
they are being alerted by the Lord to
offer help. (Arcana Coelestia 6737)
I submit that each
and every one of us
is called to service for
the love, uplifting and
protection of our friends
and neighbors. We are
called upon to defend
and protect all that is
good and innocent and
truly loving. And the
greatest expression of
this is selflessness.
We stand here today and we can
see the world of nature, we see innocent
children and each other, we see our
community’s park, and our country’s
flag flying over this monument to service, which sits on the edge of picnics and
games as a sentinel of peace and safety. Just over there we see a great cathedral
representing a faith system in which the Lord calls us to consider all things of
revelation more deeply, more spiritually.
God doesn’t call us actually to die. God is life and is about all things living.
What needs to die spiritually is the sense that we are better than others. The
remarkable words of the Lord that are being cited all over this nation today
are these: “Greater love has no one than this: than to lay down his life for his
friends.” (John 15:13)
Yes, the willingness to serve and protect to the point of death is to be
honored as a great gesture of love. We now call it the “ultimate sacrifice.” But
the words of the Lord here in this gospel are talking about the laying down of
our own ego and self-interest for the sake of the people around us.
I submit that each and every one of us is called to service for the love,
uplifting and protection of our friends and neighbors. We are called upon to
defend and protect all that is good and innocent and truly loving. And the
greatest expression of this is selflessness – the laying down of self-life and the
lifting up of the spirit of life that the angels have, that is, to truly live for the
sake of others.
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