042416 Loving One Another

John 15:12-13 This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. ¹³ Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.

John 13:34-35 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. ³⁵ By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.

We are commanded to love one another several times in scripture. In fact, Jesus is the greatest evidence of the love of God to us. In the light of His great love it is easy for us to go on a guilt trip. How could we ever measure up to that? Besides, when we are commanded to love how can we really feel like loving? Well it seems we are to do this the same way God does.

We see god's great love in Christ. In fact, Jesus was the demonstration of God's love. The Bible says that God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8) Love that will cause one to die for another is far beyond what the average person calls “love”.

We often see that love as creator to creation. We can see the love of God in the beauty of the world. However, that is pretty precarious, nature often turns its wrath upon us. In fact a major natural disaster is called, “an act of God”. Wouldn’t it be nice if an especially beautiful day were to be called “an act of God”?

The love of God was given in Christ to call us back to a relationship deeper than that revealed in nature. It is the relationship of one rescued from the ultimate consequence of his or her sin by One who loves them beyond their imagination.
God's love grows out of God's friendship. Normally we do not think of God as being our friend but He is the greatest friend a needy person could ever have. In the Bible God calls Abraham and Moses His friends. Jesus called His disciples "friend" and through them He passes that friendship to us. In fact, Jesus prayed for those who would believe in Him. This includes all true Christians. I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, ²¹ that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. (John 17:20-21) This prayer did not stop with His loving us and our returning that love. This prayer went on to ask that we be one, just as God is One. The hurtful divisions in the Christian Church today are a rebuke to that prayer of Jesus.

His friendship should be the basis of our friendships. Those who observed His life called him a friend of sinners. Jesus ministered to people as friends and we should too! The only ones who felt His rebuke were the religious hypocrites. He never turned aside the hurting or the spiritually needy. This was His example to us to be a part of the answer to the problems of our world rather than a part of the problem.

When we have found the friendship of God in Christ we must share our good fortune with our friends and family. We need to be like the woman in Jesus’ parable of the lost coin. In that story a woman had lost one of her ten silver coins. When she found it, she called together her friends and neighbors, saying, “Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin which I had lost!” In the same way we are to reach out to our friends and family to share our faith with them. Not because we are somehow superior to them but that we have found a great treasure and wish to share it.

A deep desire for a friend is born in each of us. That is designed to draw us, ultimately, to God. As a result of finding that friendship we are granted the joy of befriending others on earth and receiving friendship from them. Let's make a commitment to make friends here among the people of God fulfilling Jesus’ command to love one another. Let’s then go out and make friends for the kingdom of God among those we meet everyday. No one is too far away to be received as a friend of God.

We need to share the gospel as a sign of our love.

The gospel is called the ‘good news’ because it addresses the most serious problem that you and I have as human beings, and that problem is simply this: God is holy and He is just, and I’m not. And at the end of my life, I’m going to stand before a just and holy God, and I’ll be judged. And I’ll be judged either on the basis of my own righteousness–or lack of it–or the righteousness of another. The good news of the gospel is that Jesus lived a life of perfect righteousness, of perfect obedience to God, not for His own well being but for His people. He has done for me what I couldn’t possibly do for myself. But not only has He lived that life of perfect obedience, He offered Himself as a perfect sacrifice to satisfy the justice and the righteousness of God.

There are at least three things that must happen in order for the gospel to be clearly presented as the good news from God.

First, there needs to be an exclamation of the facts concerning salvation. And those facts are: A) all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (Romans 3:23)

 B) the wages of sin is death! (Romans 6:23) C) Jesus Christ died to pay the penalty for our sins. (Romans 5:8)

Second, there needs to be an invitation for a personal response on the part of the individual who repent of his or her sins and place their trust in Christ. Jesus himself said, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls (Matthew 11:28-29). This is a personal invitation that seeks a personal response from each one who hears it.

Third, there needs to be a promise of forgiveness and eternal life. God promises, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16).

Along with these three things there needs to be an assurance that Christ will accept all who come to him and sincere repentance and faith seeking salvation: “whoever comes to me I will never cast out.” (John 6:37)

Please, be sure your unsaved friends and family members hear the gospel and have an opportunity to respond to it.

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