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Love and friendship with God in Christ
by the Right Reverend Thomas Clark Ely, Bishop of Vermont
Mountain Echo, February 2011

“I have called you friends…” John 15:15
I write this Mountain Echo column at the conclusion of my three-day retreat at Emory House in West Newbury, Massachusetts, in the company of the brothers of the Society of Saint John the Evangelist (SSJE). It was a timely and significant three days of prayer, rest and reflection for me. Setting aside the many things on my work plate and shutting off access to email for a few days is never easy. The blizzard that hit Boston and other parts of the Northeast on Wednesday, January 12, made sure that I stayed put in order (I think) to pay closer attention to God and my relationship with God. The blessing from such a Sabbath is substantial.
In the course of the daily eucharistic celebrations during these days at Emory House, the brothers and those of us on retreat celebrated the feast days of Aelred, Abbot of Rievaulx (died 1167), Hilary, Bishop of Poitiers (died 367), and Richard Meux Benson, founder of SSJE (died 1914). The theme running throughout the homilies these days was that of friendship with God through our relationship with Christ and rooted in love. It was a theme I needed to hear, and if I didn’t know better, I could convince myself that the brothers planned it all that way just for me!

The 15th chapter of the John Gospel is one of my favorite portions of Scripture. That’s the chapter with the imagery of the vine and the branches; the chapter that talks about life with Christ rooted in self-offering love; the chapter where Jesus calls his disciples friends; the chapter that talks about abiding, about joy and about bearing fruit; and the chapter where Jesus reminds the disciples that they did not choose him, but that he chose them. Image after image in this text draws us more and more into the intimate nature of the friendship Jesus has with God and with his disciples—and the friendship they have with God as a result.

This is no casual, superficial acquaintance we’re dealing with here. This is intimate friendship—the rare kind of close friendship in which trust is so high that anything can be shared. This is friendship born of quality time spent together. This is friendship that has traveled the smooth and rough places of life. This is friendship that knows struggle and celebration. This is friendship for which one is even willing to die.

In the course of my prayer and reflection I realized that I came to this retreat yearningfor a renewal of just this sort of friendship with God—a deeper and more intimate awareness of God’s love for me and of mine for God. And I came away reminded that if I was to have any portion of such a close friendship, I needed to spend more time in my life cultivating that friendship through prayer and engagement with God’s Word. Simply wanting it would not suffice.

The John Gospel reminds us that love is at the center of this type of friendship. One of the brothers reminded us in his homily that love is both the formula and the formation for the relationship Jesus has with his disciples, a relationship he invites them (and indeed all of us) to have with one another and with all of creation. To cultivate such friendship with Jesus and with God is my desire. It is also something I hear in the hearts and stories of so many people with whom I have contact, both within the church and in other spheres of life. Perhaps it is part of the hunger and thirst of those who are searching for meaning in their lives, of those who call themselves “spiritual, but not religious?” Could it be that friendship with God is their journey’s destination?

In speaking about the nature of this love and friendship with God in Christ, the Rule of the Society of Saint John the Evangelist draws on the relationship of Jesus and the Beloved Disciple John at the Last Supper. In the Rule we read, “The image of the trusted friend lying close to the breast of Jesus is an icon of the relationship we enjoy with the Son of God through prayer. It is by being close to him that we are reunited with the Father.”

I know that there is no way to the depth of friendship I long for with God apart from paying attention to the relationship. For me, that means carving out sufficient time for prayer, reading and reflection on God’s Word, and for “being” with the One with whom I want to have such friendship. I also know that God is ready to welcome me and you to that deeper friendship because God loves us—always has, always will!

“I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” Ephesians 3:18-19

In the friendship of Christ,
+Thomas