Love One Another

John 15:12-14  
This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. You are My friends if you do whatever I command you.

This is My commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you! If that was the only scripture in the New Testament (after Pentecost), I think verse 12 would suffice... IF we would accomplish it. And make no mistake... we CAN accomplish it by walking and living in the Spirit...by abiding in Christ.

The reason Jesus died on the cross for us, is LOVE... emanating first from God the Father Who LOVED the world so much that He sacrificed His Son Jesus to redeem us out from sin and death, and ETERNAL separation from the ONLY One Who truly loved us with a love that we, I don’t believe, fully fathom. And then, Jesus came to demonstrate the Father’s love and, indeed, Jesus’ love for us. Undeserving Love ...fully manifested by the rejection, persecution, mocking, threatenings, torture, and crucifixion of the Loving Savior by those who wanted Him dead. As a passive Lamb, humbly submitting to the hateful men lusting for His death. Jesus fulfilled the Law; Love your enemies.

Rom. 13:10
Love does no harm to a neighbor; therefore, love is the fulfillment of the law.
Who is my neighbor? Anyone who is in need. Love that fulfills the law is agape love. Agape translates to brotherly love, good will, benevolence. It is not based on emotion but commitment and an act of the will.

Phil. 2:3 Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility let each esteem others better than himself.
A mark of the believer is love. It is a love given by, defined by, and modeled by Jesus Himself.

Love is patient, love is

kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no account of wrongs. Love takes no pleasure in evil, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things,  believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails.   1 Cor 13:4-8

Jesus went about doing good... curing the sick, restoring the sight of the blind, making the lame walk, raising the dead back to life, feeding the hungry, and driving away demons from possessed people as he proclaimed the good news... that God loves us. Love is a dynamic...a Divine dynamic. By that I mean, “it is active, it is a force. It is God at work in us.

Anyone can look holy on the outside on Sunday mornings, but Love is a DYNAMIC on the inside... every day. It accomplishes the Lord’s will.

Now, we, the church, the body of Christ, must continue this ministry of Christ. Jesus’ ministry then... is His example of our ministry now. Those good deeds of Jesus must be continued by His church, by us. The work of Jesus before, is now the work of the Spirit working through the church, the Body of Christ.

2 Cor. 5:20 says We are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making His appeal through us as Christ’s representatives, pleading on behalf of Christ; BE RECONCILED to God.
If I say, “I love you, go in peace, be warm, be fed” to a person in need, and then walk away... I accomplish nothing except my own hypocrisy says James 2:15-16
It is the Love of God in us, at work through us, that “perfects” us.

1 John 4:12
If we love one another, God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us.
So... let the love of God have its perfect work in us.

OK... so I’ve used the word “perfect” 3 times in 2 sentences. I know some Bible translations don’t have that word in their text. They might have “complete” or “full maturity” or “consummate human integrity and virtue.” To me those all mean the perfection God wants us to have here on earth. It doesn’t say, “His love is perfected in us IN GLORY.” I have no problem with the word “perfect.” It’s in my Bible. And other translations I have state a clear meaning for what is meant by perfect.

James 1:4 for example says, let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. ESV.
It doesn’t say, “Perfect and complete IN GLORY!” It is our patience that attains it, but God’s love that creates it. Can’t do it, some would say? Well then... they never will.

My prayer for us is from God’s own Words...
Our Father in heaven, I thank you the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, and pray that You would grant us, according to the riches of Your glory, to be strengthened with might through Your Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in our hearts through faith; that we, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the width and length and depth and height; to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge; that we may be filled with all the fullness of God, to be filled with the knowledge of Your will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; to walk worthy of the Lord, pleasing You, being fruitful in every good work, with all patience and joyfulness. Now to You who are able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to You be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. In His Name, Amen.