We have such a beautiful scripture for today: Jesus' commandment to his disciples as He said: "that you love one another as I have loved you." (v.12) It's especially meaningful to me that it falls this year on Mother's Day, because that was the last thing my mother said to us, before she died, not that long ago. She didn't say it as a commandment, of course, but as her last wish and gift to us. And I think that was how Jesus meant it as well. It is a command so full of power and promise, we can hardly hear it as a demand, but rather as an empowerment and blessing. Look at the reason Jesus gives them for this "commandment": "so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete." (v.11) It can hardly be considered a burden to be commanded to do something that will fill you with joy.

So, we have good reason to desire with all our hearts to follow this commandment to love each other, even as Jesus loved us. We know first how much He loved us, and he told us secondly that as we follow this commandment, our joy will be full. We owe it to Jesus, we owe it to ourselves and to each other to obey this commandment to love. I owe it to my mother in a very special way now, and in a real sense, we all owe it to our mothers. God gave us life, through them.

I want to say a word today then, about the "love connection" and a word about mothers -- both awesome subjects, at once very simple and very complex.

This passage, at the heart of John's gospel, is about the ultimate connection, the connection to life; from the beginning, now, later and always, which is love. Jesus begins his teaching on this in the first verse of this 15th chapter of John by saying "I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine grower." God is the source and Jesus is the living connection to the Source, and the connection is made through love. We are the branches. "Abide in me," Jesus says, "as I abide in you." (v.4)

Now we know that this connection can be broken. Like the fragile intravenous line of life, the love line can become clogged, blocked, pulled out, and then people wither and languish and if it goes unconnected long enough, in our spirits, we die. We can lose touch with the renewing, sanctifying power of love. John Wayne Gacy is some mother's son too. Something went wrong there.

We also know that while we still live, at any time, we can be reconnected, grafted back into the vine, by an infusion of love, from wherever, in God's great providence, God chooses to send it into our lives. When we feel a bit of disconnectedness, we need to pray urgently and turn our-selves most earnestly to God, seeking that renewal of life and love in us. It is the most important index for us to watch in our lives, and we need to be more sensitive to it, than to anything else: more careful of the measure of love to which we are connected and from which we can give to others than of anything else. It is our lives. We know God loves us very much. But if we're not feeling that love, we'd better check what might be causing the trouble in our transmissions, because that problem is a matter of life and death to us.