A New Kind of Love

John 13:34-35; 15:9-17

THE NIGHT THAT JESUS WAS betrayed to death for our sins, when the supper had been eaten and Judas the betrayer was gone, Jesus began to teach His disciples one last time.  As He counseled them He says, "A new command I give you: Love one another.  As I have loved you, so must you love one another.  By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."

    This command of Jesus was not just for the eleven disciples in the upper room.  It is also for us who claim the name of Jesus today, for us who gather around this holy Table.  But there is something about this command to love that should cause us to stop and question.  First of all, how can our Lord say that a command to love is "new"?  And secondly, what kind of love does it command?

    "A new command I give you: Love one another."  But what is new about the command to love?  As far back as the days of Moses in the desert, God's people were commanded to love one another.  In Leviticus 19, verse 18, it says, "Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against one of your people, but love your neighbor as yourself."  Again in verse 34, we read, "The alien living with you must be treated as one of your native-born.  Love him as yourself, for you were aliens in Egypt."   Jesus Himself said that after the command to love God with all our being, the greatest commandment is to love our neighbor as ourselves, and that these two commands sum up all the Old Testament Law and Prophets!  How can Jesus now say that the command to love is new?

    But there is something new about Jesus' new mandate. The old command to love said, "Love your neighbor as yourself."  Jesus' new command says, "Love one another, as I have loved you."  Obedience to the old command depends totally on our imperfect and fruitless efforts to keep God's law.  Obedience to the new command hangs wholly on the fruitful love of God given us through Christ Jesus our Lord. 

    Verse 9 says, "As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you." And as He has loved us, so we are to love one another.   In his commentary on John, John Calvin warns us against getting into speculations about the mystic love between the Father and the Son in the fellowship of the Godhead.  That wouldn't have been helpful to the disciples and it isn't helpful to us.  Jesus calls us to participate in the fruitful, joyful love of God.  For that we need another human being, a true Man, to show us what the love of God is like and teach us how to love like God.  And so Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, was born of woman and took flesh, and became a real human being.  During the three years of His earthly ministry the disciples witnessed how the Father loved the Son and how the Son loved them.  It was a love they could see and hear and handle.  It was a love they could refer to and say, "Yes, this is how we are to love one another!"

    But what kind of love is this that Jesus commands in John?  What kind of love did He display in all the gospels?  There's a peculiar factor in this love, which we mustn't ignore.  Look at verse 10:  Jesus says, "If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father's commands and remain in his love." 

    Let's read that again: "If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father's commands and remain in his love."

    I admit:that as Reformed Christian and as a human being still struggling with sin, when I simply read that statement, I'm troubled by it.  And I suggest that we all have to wrestle with this text, or we're likely to misunderstand the kind of love Jesus is commanding us to love.

    The Reformed Christian problem first.  I want to ask Jesus, "Lord, are You saying that You'll love us only if we obey all Your commands?  Lord, I remember those commands, and You made the Law of Moses even stricter!  But didn't your servant Paul write that by keeping the Law no one could be saved, and that if we try to earn Your love by keeping the commandments, we're still under the wrath of Your Father?  Lord, how can You say, ‘If you obey My commands, you will remain in My love'?"

   And from the Gospel, the Lord makes reply.  Look at the larger context for this verse.  Jesus had just taught the disciples that He is the Vine and they are the branches.  They-- and that means we as well-- must remain in Him if they are to bear fruit and know the joy of receiving whatever they ask from the Father.  Did the disciples or we get into the Vine by our own work or our own volition?  Absolutely not! 

    In the same way, it is Jesus Christ alone who brings us into His love. As He reminds us in verse 16, "You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit-- fruit that will last."  Jesus already loves us!  As we can read in Ephesians Chapter 1, we were chosen by God in Him before the creation of the world!  In love God predestined us to be adopted as His sons and daughters through Jesus Christ! 

    No, the keyword in John 15:10 is "remain."  Again, that might look like it's all up to us to keep Jesus loving us and not lose our salvation.  But see again what our Lord says in verse 16.  He has appointed us to bear fruit, fruit that will last.  Do you think God the Son can appoint anything that isn't going to happen?  Perish the thought!

    It is right for us to want to avoid any hint of salvation by human works.  But when Jesus says, "If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love," He means something more wonderful and joyful than anything our worries might suggest.

    But the sinful world also has a problem with linking love and obedience.  Sinful man too often loves "Because."  I love you because you're pretty.  I love you because you do nice things for me.  I love you because you're rich and take me to fancy places.  I love you because you listen when I go on and on about my troubles.  But let you the beloved grow old and ugly, or stop doing the nice things, or become poor, or get tired of listening to the same sob story, then I, a sinful human being, will stop loving you.  We see this in the prodigious divorce rate in Western society.  This kind of sinner might say, "See, even Jesus says I don't have to love you if you don't please me!"  This interpretation is a crime against Jesus' words.

    So, thinking people, including unbelievers, say, no, true love is unconditional.  It doesn't matter how cruelly the beloved behaves or how filthy and repulsive he or she is to the lover, the true lover must keep on loving and expect nothing, nothing in return.  And really (I once heard a sermon that preached this idea), if the beloved does return the love, even the littlest bit, the lover is no longer showing true, unconditional love.

    But here we have Jesus saying, "If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father's commands and remain in his love."

    "Wow, Lord," we say, "that sounds awfully conditional to us!   Not only do You seem to be saying that our remaining in Your love is conditioned on us obeying Your commands, but also that You have to obey God the Father's commands in order to remain in His love!"

    But remember what we learned.  It is God through His Son who elects us into His love and appoints that we shall remain and bear fruit.  Again, God does not love us if we do this or that, He loves us in His Son.  And the Father does not love the incarnate Son if, He loves Him because Christ is His Son.  But because Christ is His Son and God is His Father, Jesus joyfully obeys His Father's commands and the Father takes joy and pleasure in the Son's obedience.  Whoever said that love expects nothing in return?  Not our Triune God!  Whoever said that love that's reciprocated is not love at all?  Not the holy Scriptures that testify to Him!

    No, the love with which Jesus Christ has loved us, the new kind of love He charges us to bear towards one another, is a love where joy is obedience and obedience is joy.  It is a mutual love where we strive to outdo one another in taking care of one another, in listening to one another, and in anticipating one another's needs.  It is the love shown by Jesus our Master when He knelt down and washed the feet of His disciples at the table that night, even though that was the job of the lowest of slaves.  It is the love He showed when He willingly laid down His life for us on the cursed cross, despising the shame of it (as Hebrews says) for the joy set before Him, the joy of becoming the Author and Perfecter of our faith. 

    God takes pleasure in receiving this obedient love.  At Jesus' baptism, God's voice from heaven said, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased."  At His transfiguration, Christ's disciples heard the Voice from the cloud say, "This is my Son, whom I love.  Listen to Him!"  True divine love is never reciprocated?  The love of God has no expectations?  What Christian can believe that?  The love of God is all about eager expectation!  In our verses from John, Jesus commands us to joyful obedience and He calls us His friends.  Beloved, there is no contradiction here.  What are friends for but to know one another's hearts?  And our Friend Jesus shares with us everything He has learned from His Father, and in prayer we may share everything with Him.  What are friends for, but to be willing to do any good thing for one another in love, as Christ has shown the full extent of His love for us in His death?  A servant obeys because he has to.  A friend fulfills his friend's commands because he wants to, and he receives his friend's joy and pleasure in return.

    This kind of willing, obedient love is the same love we in the church are now to show one another:  Loving each other mutually, eagerly, joyfully-- drawing always on the love of Christ continually being poured into our hearts by His Holy Spirit.

    The old command, "Love your neighbor as yourself," only served to show us how badly we failed at keeping God's law.  We not only didn't love our neighbor as ourselves, we couldn't love ourselves according to the image of God in us.  But Jesus' new command says, "Love each other as I have loved you."  By the blood of His cross He has already brought us into His love, just as He is always and eternally in the love of the Father.  The love of Christ is already here for us and in us, in all its fulness.  Now let us discover the secret of enjoying and blissfully living in His love: Let us love one another, as He has loved us.  The more we obey His new command, the more we will know the pleasure of God.  The more we know the pleasure of God, the more we will discover of His love and the more we will want to obey.

    Brothers and sisters, let us love one another.  Not some idealized imagining of what the ideal friend would be like, but one another, just as we are, in all our faults and annoyances and failings.  Let us love one another not only in thought and sympathy, but in service and action.  People, love your preachers, and we preachers, let us love the people.  Officers, love the laity, and laity, love your officers.  Love the member who has to do everything or she complains, and love the member who never seems to pitch in at all.  Love, yes, love even those in the church who are cranky and obstructive and never seem to love you back, because it was while we were still God's enemies that He commended His love towards us and sent Christ to die for our sins.  Loving church member, maybe God will use your obedience to soften the heart of that other person and bring him or her into the joy of our Saviour's love!


    "No greater love has any one than this, that He lay down his life for his friends."  This is love of God in Christ shown to us in this holy Supper.  Here we know the solemn joy of divine blood shed for us and divine flesh broken for us.  Here we experience the fullness of love, the love of Christ that dwells within us, the love of Christ that daily teaches us how to love one another, as He has loved us.

    May His joy be in us, and may our joy in Him and each other be complete.  Let us strive to outdo each other in eager, obedient, mutual love.  This is our Lord's new command: Love one another.

    In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Everything to Do with Me

Texts: Isaiah 53; Luke 22-23

"DO YOU HAVE A MINUTE? I need to tell you what happened to me, only a few months ago.

"Oh! My name is Rivkah bas Yaakov, and I live with my husband and three children in Sepphoris, about five miles north of Nazareth.

"This is the first year I’ve been able to come up to Jerusalem for the Passover. My two eldest are finally big enough to make the journey, and my youngest, I left with her grandmother. And so, I came.

"It was very exciting travelling with the crowd of pilgrims along the road. We were all looking forward to going up to the Temple and eating the Passover lamb.

"We reached the outskirts of Jerusalem late on the first day of the week. Ahead of us was another crowd of pilgrims, singing and shouting even louder than we were. Something about 'Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!' I thought they were just being really enthusiastic with one of the going-up-to-Jerusalem psalms. But word drifted back that it was the rabbi, Jesus of Nazareth, who was causing all the commotion. Seemed He was riding into Jerusalem, and people wanted to crown Him king.

"Well, that was interesting, but nothing I needed to get involved in. I had enough to do keeping my boys from getting lost somewhere. Whatever Jesus was up to, it had nothing to do with me!

"(You may not believe this, but up in Galilee I never got around to hearing Jesus preach. I was too busy with the house and the children and all. I was glad to hear that this Teacher could do miraculous cures. But I didn’t need healing. His miracles were nothing to do with me.)

"Anyway, that day coming into Jerusalem, the commotion over Jesus of Nazareth died down by the time we reached the City gate. The next few days went by quickly. There were old friends to visit and provisions to buy for our Passover meal-- I hardly had a minute to sit down.

"Which was why I was so annoyed, five nights later, to be awakened by the roar of a mob, a few streets over. My husband opened the lattice and saw a fellow running by outside. 'What’s all the noise about?' my Reuben asked. The fellow replies, 'Oh, they’ve arrested Jesus of Nazareth for sedition! They’re taking him to the high priest’s residence, to be tried!'

"Oh! That was really too bad. I’d always heard Jesus was a good man. But I supposed it was only to be expected, the way He kept running up against the authorities. I was sorry He’d been arrested, and I hoped they’d decide to let Him go. But I figured Jesus would have to take care of Himself. I wanted my sleep--- and anyway, it had nothing to do with me!

"The next morning, I needed to go to the market to buy the bitter herbs for the Passover meal. I was told I could find good produce at a stall near the palace of the Roman governor. But as I came nearer, I could hear shouting, angry voices from the palace courtyard. I was beginning to think that Jerusalem was nothing but mobs! I asked a passerby what was going on, and she replied, 'Oh, it’s terrible! They’ve taken Jesus of Nazareth before Pilate, and they want permission to have him crucified!'

"And as she spoke, the uproar rolled towards me like a wave and out of the confusion I could hear voice after voice screaming, 'Crucify him! Crucify him!'

"Oh, no. I’d seen a crucifixion once, and never wanted to look on one again. What a hideous, unjust fate to fall upon someone like Jesus! I felt totally sick about it, and hurried straight back to our lodgings. After all, what could I do about it? Nothing! Besides, if Jesus went to the cross, what did it have to do with me?

"But I still needed my bitter herbs. So later that morning, I set out again. I was heading along Market Street, thinking hard about everything I’d seen and heard in Jerusalem, when I came to the intersection with the street that leads to the western gate.

"A crowd lined the way. This crowd was not raging, or roaring. They were just standing in stunned silence, or weeping. I looked down the street and saw a Man, or what was left of a Man, lashed, torn, bleeding, struggling under the weight of a massive cross. I could hear the whispers: 'It’s Jesus, the prophet from Galilee. They’re taking Him to be crucified.' 'It’s Jesus-- He told the high priest He was the Son of Man spoken of by the prophet Daniel.' 'I hear He told Pilate He was our true king, the king of the Jews.'

"I looked, and there on His brow was a crown woven of thorns. Placed there as a joke, no doubt. But as I looked, I could see majesty and patience reflected on His face, struggling through the blood and the pain. And it went through me like a knife: What if it’s true? What if this Jesus really is the Messiah and our promised King? We have assassinated our prophets and kings before! What if we were about to crucify God’s Chosen One? What would become of Israel then?

Just then, He fell under the weight of the cross. The Roman guards yanked a sturdy-looking man from the crowd and put Jesus’ cross on him and made him carry it behind that bleeding, broken Figure. I found that I was standing with a group of other women, most of them from Jerusalem itself. They were mourning and wailing for Him. Me, I was too stunned to do anything but stare. Because it was as if Jesus had been reading my thoughts. He turned His blood-streaked face to us and said, 'Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me; weep for yourselves and for your children. For the time will come when you will say, "Blessed are the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed!"'

"There was no vindictiveness in His countenance, no spite; only love and grief for us, for what would someday happen to us. And the thought came into my head, 'Rivkah, you must get your Passover lamb.' Oh! How could I think of shopping at a time like this!? But then, another Voice was in me, saying, 'Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world!'

"Yes, that’s what they said John the Baptizer had said about this Jesus. 'Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world!'

"And I watched Jesus of Nazareth stumble towards the western gate, with the poor wondering countryman carrying the cross behind Him. Going to be crucified. No-- Going to be sacrificed. Like a Passover lamb-- For the sins of my people. For my sins. For me.

"All these years, I had thought Jesus and His doings had nothing to do with me. Nothing to do with me? Oh, Lord God, forgive! Jesus and His doings had everything to do with me! It was my sins who put Him on this road! It was my sins that cut open those wounds on His chest and back! It was my sins that laid that cross upon Him, that cross He was now too lacerated and broken to bear!

"He was my Passover Lamb, whose blood could ward off the condemnation rightly coming on me. Destruction would come, Jesus had just said. But Scripture said the blood of the Lamb would keep the angel of death away.

"But how? How could the blood of this crushed and dying Jesus save me?

"I didn’t know how, that day in Jerusalem. I know now that the cross was not the end for Him. It’s a story you need to hear. But right now, I want you to accept in your heart the same truth the living God burned into my soul there in the street to the western gate: That Jesus is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world. He is our Passover sacrifice, whose death will keep eternal damnation from us and those we love.

"And now I plead with you, feed on Him in your heart and be saved from the judgement your sins deserve. For His innocent death has everything to do with me. And it has everything to do with you."

Lord, have mercy upon us. Amen.

[Preached at the Tenebrae service, Maundy Thursday, A.D. 2007]