Easter 5 Yr C What's Love Got to Do With It? Everything

+In 1984 Tina Turner had a blockbuster hit song called “What’s Love Got to Do With It?” Now she wasn’t speaking about today’s readings, but the tag line sure fits. For what does Love have to do with it?
Everything.
Absolutely Everything.
In today’s Gospel Jesus has just finished washing the feet of his friends following the Last Supper. The disciples’ heads are spinning, their hearts are racing, their worry, doubt and fear is building. Jesus’ return  to Jerusalem is coming to a head…His message of love and peace is about to collide with the world’s message of fear turned to anger and hate.
Instead of plotting his escape, instead of assuring his followers that he has a plan to overthrow the Romans and establish his reign on earth, instead of getting ready for the fight, Jesus drops to his knees, lovingly washing the feet of his friends and giving us a new commandment to Love One Another.
What’s Love got to do with it?
Everything.
In our reading from the Acts of the Apostles Peter blows everyone’s minds by eating with people who are not Jewish. Now remember, in the Jewish faith then (and still with the orthodox and Hasidic Jews of today) non-Jews—gentiles, goyim—are considered unclean. The daily ritual of an observant Jew includes extensive purification rites, ritualistic washing before meals.
But, all the washing in the world can’t purify someone who eats with the “other.” But before the temple authorities in Jerusalem could get organized for a stoning of Peter, he explains why he ate with Gentiles---because God told him too. Because God said, “I’ve begun an altogether new thing here, it’s all about Love. It begins in Love, it abides in Love, it ends in Love.”
What’s Love got to with it?
Everything.
Our reading from the Book of Revelation is familiar; it’s very often read at funerals. The reading is full of promise, a comfort for those who are experiencing great loss and sadness. The promise? The promise is this: God came to dwell among us and remains with us through the Holy Spirit. God dwells among us to wipe every tear from our eyes; in other words God is with us in every single thing. God is with us in our suffering and our doubt as well as our celebrations and our hope. God cries with us and laughs with us, God is with us, in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health, for better of for worse.
What’s love got to do with it?
Everything.
The spiritual teacher, lecturer and author Marianne Williamson remarked: the way of the miracle worker is to see all human behavior as one of two things: either love or a call for love. If you believe, as we profess in Christianity, that God is Love, this comment fits in nicely with today’s readings and our faith in general: the actions of humanity are either expressions of God’s Love or pleas for God’s Love. Think about how profound this simple statement is: all our behavior is either loving or in some way a request for, a demand for, a plea.  For Love.
We see examples of this all over the place.
Like in the profound story of the Man in the Cowboy Hat. You probably heard it:
Carlos Arredondo was at the Boston Marathon finish line handing out American flags. When the bombs went off he ran…not to safety as most of us would instinctually do, but, much like the 12 volunteer first responders in West Texas who lost their lives fighting the massive inferno at the fertilizer plant, Carlos ran toward the carnage.
As he knelt comforting a young woman who was injured he saw Jeff Bauman who had lost both his legs in the blast and was bleeding profusely and, I might add, fatally. That is until Carlos and several other rescuers wheeled him to safety. Jeff never would have survived the transport to the ambulance, let alone the hospital if Carlos hadn’t pinched his femoral artery, stopping the fatal flow of blood.
There are people like that. People who see danger and run smack dab into the middle of it. Why?
Love.
That’s why.
What’s Love got to do with it?
Everything.
Last Sunday hundreds of people gathered in Delaware Park for a run, a run of solidarity with those in Boston. Did they run for the exercise? Did they run for the companionship, did they run for the fun of it? Sure. But they also ran for the Love of it.
What’s Love got to do with it?
Everything.
Perhaps you heard this story as well:
Cameron Lyle, a University of New Hampshire track and field athlete who has given up the rest of his collegiate athletic career to help someone else. A stranger. You see Cameron is registered on the national bone marrow registry and a few weeks ago, he was notified that he was a perfect and
rare match for a 28-year-old with acute lymphoblastic leukemia, an aggressive often fatal cancer.
When asked if he thought about all he was giving up for this perfect stranger, Cameron admitted that yes, he did think about it. But, as Cameron said, the stranger, the ill man? Well he’s DYING.
What’s Love got to do with it?
Everything.
Yes there is evil in this world, darkness fueled by fear that is manifested as hate. There is intolerance, there is horror and there is tragedy. But for every intolerant comment, for every experience of horror, for every tragedy that befalls us individually and corporately there is Love.
How do we respond to heinous acts that, as Marianne Williamson posits, are calls for love?  We respond with Love. We respond in Love, we respond as Love.
From Newtown to Columbine, from West Texas to the lower 9th ward, from Fallujah to Baghdad, from North Korea to Syria, from Gaza to Nazareth, from Buffalo to Boston, love has EVERYTHING TO DO WITH IT.
Amen.