One of the things that always struck me as interesting when I was practicing law was how often clients came to my office and just wanted to be told what to do. The situations they presented to me were often complex, multi-layered, and fact-dependent. Usually there wasn't a clear answer-- all options involved risks and required balancing costs and benefits. Yet, most of the time, the clients just wanted a clear answer. "What is the law," they'd say, "and what does it require me to do." If only it were that simple, but it rarely was. That desire for certainty, to be told what to do, seems to be a common human need. It is easier to have someone else go through the mental pain of figuring out the right thing than to suffer the brain damage ourselves, we seem to think. But that isn't reality, and it certainly isn't Christian reality. We are called to make our own decisions, and to use our God-given brains to figure out how God is working in our lives and what path is in the direction God wants us to take. That's why Jesus today (Jn 15: 9-17) says He no longer calls us "slaves" but "friends." A slave doesn't know what his master is doing, Jesus notes. A slave just follows orders. A slave is told what to do and his or her job is to do it. But that's not our role, much as we'd sometimes like it to be. Jesus tells us that He has told us "everything (He) has heard from (His) Father." And as Jesus' friends-- not slaves-- we use what we have learned about the Father and the Father's plans to work out how we should love God and love our neighbor, the fundamental Christian command a part of which Jesus repeats today when He tells His disciples to "love one another." It takes work, prayer, contemplation, energy. Much easier just to be told what to do. But no one said being a Christian would be easy.