Love Is...

Today's Scripture

Let’s play a little game of sentence completion. I’ll start a sentence and you can provide the appropriate conclusion. Here it goes: “No one has greater love than to... Oh, you nailed it. When we hear this quote from Christ in John’s Gospel today, we most commonly think of Jesus laying down his life for us in the crucifixion, or anyone who dies to save another. This is not always the case. Sometimes laying down one’s life is a day-by-day process where acts of love and sacrifice are a continual laying down of one’s life for another.

The Apostle John, who shares this quote with us, has the distinction of being the only apostle to not have died a martyr's death. He is also often referred to as the Apostle of Love. This is an interesting twist, the Apostle of Love does not show the greatest love in the traditional sense. Instead, he laid down his life for many years, day after day, for his friends. He lived a long life and writings outside of Scripture tell us that he was nearly a martyr on more than one occasion, so it wasn't for a lack of willingness or faith. I’d like to share a story from Clement that illustrates John’s way of loving. The story appears in C. Bernard Ruffin’s book “The Twelve, The Lives of the Apostles after Calvary.”

When St. John was in his 90’s, he left a young convert in the care of the bishop of Smyrna for spiritual development and told him that he would come back after his journey to check on him. When the time came, John visited the bishop and inquired about the young man. He learned that not only was he no longer being brought up in the faith, but the young man strayed mightily and became the leader of a band of violent criminals.

When John learned of this, he jumped on a horse and entered the territory of the band of criminals, offering that they could take whatever he had as long as he could see their leader. When they brought John to the young man, John did what any 90-year-old would do, he jumped down off his horse and began to pursue him.  The young man tried to escape him, but John physically chased down the young man, promising him aloud that Christ loved him, and that he, John, would do everything in his power to intercede for him with Christ. The young man eventually broke down in John's embrace. John brought the young man back with him, forgave him, and then gave him a penance of many days of fasting and service to the poor until he was restored to the church. Then John joined him for every day of his penance. That’s truly laying down one’s life.

You see, John was not only the Apostle of Love, he was also known as the Son of Thunder, and he loved with bold action for his friends.  I hope and pray that I can learn to lay down my life for my friends in the way that John did.