One of the most haunting stories I’ve ever read is from Jim Wallis, in his book, Call to Conversion.

Wallis describes something that happened at a conference in New York City on social justice that included religious leaders of all kinds.

“At one point,” he recalls, “a Native American man stood up, looked out over the mostly white audience, and said, ‘Regardless of what the New Testament says, most Christians are individualists with no real experience of community.’

He paused for a moment and then continued: ‘Let’s pretend that you were all Christians.

If you were Christians, you would no longer accumulate.

You would share everything you had.

You would actually love one another.

And you would treat each other as if you were family.’

His eyes were piercing as he asked, ‘Why don’t you do that?

Why don’t you live that way?'”

Let’s pretend we are all Christians.

What would that look like?

How might it be different from the way we live today?

This story haunts me because it is true.

Most of us, me included, who call ourselves Christian, really have no idea what it really means to be Christian, to live the way that Jesus is calling us to live in this passage from John today.

Now, we have friends, even friends at church.

We love others, particularly our family members.

But we see friendship and love as a matter of attraction and choice.

Those we are friends with are people we feel a connection with.

Perhaps we have something in common, or we just find it easy to talk with one another.

These are the people who become our friends.

While it can be difficult at times to find time for these friends, it is not difficult to be friends with those we like and feel connected too.

The same is true for love.

There are times when we don’t feel love towards a member of our family or friendship group, but by and large love for family and friends comes pretty naturally.

By and large, we are able to share with those in our family and friendship circle.

By and large we are able to set aside our own needs in order to provide for the needs of our friends and kin.

And certainly, Christians are called to this kind of love.

But this is not what Jesus is talking about in our passage from John for this morning.

Jesus is calling us to something much more difficult.

Jesus is calling us to set aside our concern for ourselves and to show love and friendship to everyone in our community—even those people we don’t like, even those people we don’t feel a connection to, even those people we would rather have nothing to do with.

Being a part of a Christian community, in light of this passage from John today, isn’t about getting something, but is instead about giving without thought for what we might receive in return.

I think that was what the Native American man from Jim Wallis’ story was trying to get at.

Think about it for a moment.

In today’s world we choose a church much in the same way we choose a friend.

Does the church have something to offer us and our family?

Is there a good Christian formation program for our children?

Do they have fellowship events we want to be a part of?

Do I feel connected to their theological views?

Is the building aesthetically pleasing?

Do we like the music?

Does the liturgical style meet my needs?

In other words, we approach Christian community from the very beginning by asking ourselves, what does this community have to offer me?

Now a little caveat here—I’m not suggesting that feeling connected to your Christian community is unimportant, of course it is important.

I simply want to try to move all of us beyond this to a deeper place, a place that Jesus is calling us to.

But once we are a part of a Christian community, do we really understand, do we really grasp that we are called to love and care for everyone in that community?

A few chapters earlier in John, Jesus said to his disciples, “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, that you love one another.”

I know that our lives are very busy and full of many activities.

I know that the idea of having to add another thing to our lives often seems like an impossibility, but along with that Native American man that day I wonder what our lives and our community would be like if we were to pretend we were Christians as Jesus calls us to be Christian.

People flocked to the first Christian communities because they could see the love that the members of those communities had for one another.

I am afraid the same cannot always be said of us today.

So that is my challenge for all of us for today and for the coming week.

Let us fake it until we make it as the expression goes.

Let us, each and every one of us, pretend, just for the next week that we are Christians.

For one week, let’s see if we can love each other with the love that Jesus had for his friends.

A love that asks us to set aside our needs in order to care for the needs of others—a love that is not about receiving but giving.

A love that calls us to look past what we think or feel about those around us, and to simply love because Jesus commanded us to do so.

The good news is this—when we love one another as Jesus loves us, we do receive something magnificent in return—we receive joy!

We might have less time for our previous activities.

We might have to share the material goods we have accumulated.

We might have to work through our judgment and frustration with those we wouldn’t normally choose to be around.

But what we receive in return is a gift beyond any other gift we could possible receive—we receive the joy of Christ!

And in the words from our second reading for today, “And his commandments are not burdensome, for whatever is born of God conquers the world. And this is the victory that conquers the world, our faith”—through our love.

Amen.