Love God, Love OthersSample

In Us And Flowing From Us 

In some older versions of the Bible, all the words that Jesus speaks are printed in red color instead of the normal black so that they stand out. Look, it’s all the word of God, but some publishers want to highlight the actual words that Jesus spoke while on earth. And though there are some very significant teachings and prayers and sayings and even ‘mere’ utterances from Jesus between this passage and His resurrection, this is important as it carries the air of a final reminder, sort of a ‘famous last words’ discourse, from Jesus. 

And what does Jesus choose to highlight? Love. 

John 13:34,35 - “A new command I give you: love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are My disciples, if you love one another” (NIV).

 

The love Jesus showed His disciples they are commanded to show each other. Let’s camp out here for a few moments. 

These are astounding words. As Jesus loves us, we are commanded to love each other. It is similar to later on in the meal (the ‘last supper’) during which Jesus speaks with the Father these words, ‘the love You have for Me may be in them’ (John 17:26). In that bit Jesus is asking that the disciples will love Jesus like the Father loves Jesus! In both cases we’re talking about divine love IN us and flowing FROM us to others (not just God!). This requires a miracle.

And Jesus continues that it is this love for one another that is going to authenticate their discipleship to everyone else. Fast forward to today and activate in us – that means the only way that our friends and neighbors and family members who don’t follow Jesus will know that we are disciples of Jesus is if this divine love is in us and flowing from us to others. 

It’s both authentication of our discipleship and strategy for the great commission. And it is nothing that we can ‘gin up’ by pulling up our bootstraps or psyching ourselves up. It’s got to be miraculous. 

We’ve found out earlier in our reading plan that because God is good, what God commands, God enables. So, for us, in this text, the fact that Jesus commands this of us guarantees that He enables it in us. We just have to press in for that enabling. 

How might that look? Well, among other things, if Holy Spirit is going to fill us up with divine love, we might want to empty ourselves of everything that is incompatible with divine love.