Fruit of divine mercy, mark of true faith: Luther on friendship in John 15:14–16

Abstract

My task is guided by a question relevant to the specific theme of this issue of Pacifica, yet also of wide ranging ecumenical importance: how may Luther contribute to a 21st-century discussion by Christian theologians on the question of friendship, and perhaps even point the way for us to deepen ecumenical friendships at this point in history when we have cause to reconsider – somewhat painfully – 500 years of western Christianity in schism? My goal is to offer some of Luther’s reflections on the passage in John’s Gospel in which Jesus addresses his disciples no longer as servants, but as friends. They occur in a sermonic commentary on the Johannine Farewell Discourse compiled in 1537. In expounding on friendship with Christ, with its concomitant duty to keep the command of love, Luther here expresses his deep conviction that faith in Christ is concretely indistinguishable from identification with the church-community. The Christ who elects his own and calls them his friends is essentially a totus Christus, that is, simultaneously object of saving faith and Spirit-filled, embodied sacramental community.