Jesus is speaking to disciples who have witnessed his loving Way. He tells them “I will ask Abba” to “give you” the Spirit, an “Advocate to be with you always.” “I will not leave you orphans… I live and you will live.” In Acts, the disciple Philip keeps Jesus’ loving Spirit alive in an area judged enemy territory, Samaria, “For unclean spirits, crying out in a loud voice, came out of many possessed people.” ‘There was great joy in that city.”
Jesus and disciples give witness to a Spirit of love as the power of God. Across history and cultures theologians claim God has always been a God of love. When Jesus calls God Abba, theologians incorrectly interpret Abba as ‘Father’ or ‘Daddy’ who they claim is the Old Testament Father God, Yahweh. But Yahweh, whose fuller name is Yahweh of Armies, is not a loving Father God but an abuser. Father God Yahweh repeatedly declares himself to be a “jealous God,” who takes possession of people, “You are mine.” He inflicts “wrath” upon the people he possesses to keep them. Misinterpreting Jesus’ Abba as Father, which persists in today’s Gospel of John, keeps us possessed by the abuser Father God that War Lord men decided to invent ages back. When Jesus calls God Abba, which is intimate and means love, he is freeing humanity from that abusive possession. We too can experience “great joy.” We can face the truth that we are currently being governed by a cult of War Lords who are abusive fathers. They willfully refuse to love. They keep spreading abuse as they keep fighting intimacy. We need each other to embody intimacy, “I will live and you will live” – in love.
Intimate Abba is exactly the experience of God men need. Like a Mother’s love, a Father’s love is intimate. In love, as a Father is in love, as a Mother is in love, we give our hearts away. We feel our hearts move through the world in the flesh of another, our child. Too, we receive another’s heart inside us. We feel our child’s heart beating within our flesh. Our love is embodied, fully so. We share beating hearts with mothers and fathers in Iran whose daughters were killed by abusers bombing schools. We share beating hearts with partners and co-workers of neighbors killed by abusers commanding ICE operations in Minneapolis. We share beating hearts with families of unarmed Black people perpetually killed by abuser police. We share beating hearts with so many people. Will we share beating hearts with the abusers who kill the daughters, the neighbors, the unarmed?
Prayer: Beloved Spirit, energize us in our greatest challenge for which we need each other, to love abusers into healthy intimacy.
Question: Love is the power of God. Is it my power?
May 10, 2026 Gospel John 14:15-21 Sixth Sunday of Easter