I’ve been
asking the question, “What if Jesus meant what He said?”
He gave us a
new commandment when He was on the earth.
Surely that must be important.
His new commandment was for us to love one another.
Jhn 13:34-35
"A new commandment I give to you, that
you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By
this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one
another."
Jhn 15:17
"These things I command you, that you
love one another.”
Okay… love
one another… But what does that look like? Be nice to the people I see at
church and tell them to “Be blessed!”? What does it truly look like to love one
another? RIGHT after Jesus tells us to love one another as the new commandment,
He tells us how. He said, “…as I
have loved you, that you also love one another.”
Jesus will
measure our love for one another by HIS love for us. Whoa! And how did Jesus love us, you ask? I’m glad you
asked!! Check out verse one of that same chapter (John 13).
Jhn 13:1
Now before the Feast of the Passover, when
Jesus knew that His hour had come that He should depart from this world to the
Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end.
Jesus loved
His own to the very end!
Check out
David Guzik’s commentary on that phrase: (www.blueletterbible.com)
He loved them to the end: Jesus had loved His own. But He hadn’t
finished loving them. He would love them to the end. The idea behind the
phrase to the end is "to the fullest extent, to the
uttermost."
i. To the end means to the end of Jesus’
earthly life. Though the disciples gave up on Him, He never gave up on them.
Though they stopped thinking about Jesus, and were only thinking of themselves,
He never stopped thinking of them. Whose problems were worse - Jesus’ or the
disciples’? Who was concerned more for the other? He loved them to the end.
ii. To the end means a love that will never
end. Jesus will never stop loving His own. It isn’t a love that comes
and goes, that is here today and gone tomorrow.
iii. To the end means a love that reaches to
the fullest extent. Some translations have "He loved them to the
uttermost." Jesus poured out the cup of His love to the bottom for us.
What an
amazing demonstration of love. The
love that we are supposed to love each other with should be to the death, never
end, and reach the fullest extent of love.
And because
Jesus is full of object lessons, He gives this new command to love one another
RIGHT after He washes the feet of His disciples. If Jesus loves us by serving
us, we should love one another by serving one another. Of course… that is
easier said than done. Servanthood… Loving to the end… Laying down your life
and selfishness and own agenda down for another… It’s hard. But completely
necessary. It’s real love.
Jhn 15:13
"Greater love has no one than this,
than to lay down one's life for his friends.”
Love. Real
love. The God-kind of Love. The
love that is spelled out in 1 Corinthians 13. Love that displays these qualities…
1Cr 13:4-8
Love suffers long [and] is kind; love does
not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely,
does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in
iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things,
hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. But whether [there are]
prophecies, they will fail; whether [there are] tongues, they will cease;
whether [there is] knowledge, it will vanish away.
This is the
kind of love we are COMMANDED to love one another with! Mind-boggling! God
gives us the recipe of what our love for one another should consist of. All in
His Word, He gives us examples and qualities of what His kind of love looks
like. Like in 1 Corinthians 13,
like in Luke 10 with the Good Samaritan.
The kind of
love that “goes low.” A love that walks humbly. That puts others before oneself.
That is the love
that we are commanded… COMMANDED… to show to one another.
Why? Because
that is the very sign to the rest of the world that we are Christ’s disciples.
It’s pretty
simple. But easier said than done.
But what if
He really meant what He said… that we are COMMANDED to show love to one
another?
Do a quick
self-evaluation. How are you
doing? Are you walking in obedience to this commandment? Do you love others?
The God-kind of love?
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