Friday 24 March 2023

Psalm 25:8-22

Background

An ‘i’ for an ‘o’? Do we live to love or love to live? John Wesley’s doctrine and theology, just like that of St Paul’s, could be summarised in this phrase: "Love sits upon the throne"’ . In his sermon ‘On Zeal’, after denouncing the violence that religious zeal can provoke, Wesley gives us a vision of a mandala. Mandalas are a form of art. They have circles and geometric patterns and can have a religious purpose. A labyrinth is a mandala. In this sermon, Wesley uses concentric circles, with one inside another, like a set of Russian dolls. As you peel each layer, you are elevated to higher levels of spiritual importance, going towards the final spiritual centre: the throne where love sits.

Spiritual maturity is to move increasingly from the circle of zeal for the Church universal, to the zeal for the works of piety, and even more elevated for the works of mercy, and the holy tempers (the mind of Christ), to ultimately arrive at the highest spiritual level: “In a Christian believer love sits upon the throne, which is erected in the inmost soul; namely, love of God and man [sic], which fills the whole heart, and reigns without a rival.” (II.5).

God is love and we are called to love as God loves (1 John 4:7-21). That is the meaning of the Wesleyan doctrine of ‘Christian Perfection’, or ‘Sanctification’. Being perfect in love, is not necessarily live without sin or limitations due to our human condition. It is instead to seek love and to strive to love as perfectly as God loves (Matthew 5:48). If Methodism has any value, it is the realisation that God and love are one.

Love is the most excellent way and if all that remains is faith, hope and love, the greatest of these is love. (1 Corinthians 13:13)

The motto of the Ghanaian Methodist Church is: ‘The Lamb is on the throne’, meaning Christ, the Lamb of God, who loved perfectly, sits on the throne. Therefore, love sits on the throne.

To Ponder:

• If you imagine endless ripples emanating from love as concentric circles, how would you name them?
• Can you pray with the names given to God? If love were the first, where would power be?
• How close to my soul is the love of Jesus? What is the path that leads to the affirmation: "Jesus lover of my soul'?

Prayer

Loving God, who showed us in Jesus Christ the centrality of love, how wonderful would it be to love as perfectly you do, to be so graced. In the name of the one who said, can you be baptised with the baptism that I am to be baptised with?