Today, our reading from the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 8:5-8, 14-17) moves us further on from the simplicity of those very earliest days after the Resurrection, when the apostles and a small group of disciples were still all based in and around Jerusalem.
Now the church is starting to be dispersed over a wider area. We haven’t yet got Paul traveling all over the Middle East (he’s still persecuting Christians at this time), but Philip is traveling by himself in Samaria. And we start to see the regularization of initiation into the church, with baptism followed by the laying on of hands by those in authority in the church. This is very different from the earlier time when we hear of people receiving the Holy Spirit with no involvement from the apostles (c.f. Acts 10:47) – then Peter recognizes that non-Jews are also called into relationship with God, as witnessed by the gifts of the Holy Spirit.
When we hear from John’s gospel (John 14:15-21), he however has no interest in the mechanics of this process. John, as usual, wants to dig much deeper into what underlies all of his. So we hear again about the three-way relationship which links Jesus and the Father and ourselves together. That relationship is simply love – that love of Jesus and the Father which is founded on and demonstrated by following Jesus’ commandments. And those commandments are that we love and serve each other – completing the circle. There is nothing beyond love, nothing more than love. It is love and only love that binds us together, to one another and to God.
In that relationship we receive the power of the Holy Spirit, who gives us hope (as we hear Peter tell us – 1 Peter 3:15-18). Hope born of the knowledge that we are loved.