It’s Christmas time, and for many, this is a time when loved ones get a little closer, friends extend their best, and acquaintances show their appreciation with loving actions. Everyone wants to be loved. It’s a desire that God placed within us because we are made in His image, and I John 4:8 tells us God is love. If He is love, and we are made in His image, we have the capacity to love and the need for love. However, many go through life never experiencing real love. A love that they are confident is real. Maybe they once trusted someone that said they loved them and they were betrayed, out of fear they refuse to love again or allow anyone to get close to them. Jesus tells His disciples in John 14:15, that if they love Him, they will keep His commandments. Jesus was teaching them that the ultimate test of real love is obedience.
John 14:15 “If you love Me, keep My commandments”
This obedience is not done as an opportunity to gain favor, but it develops from a loving relationship. It is not merely a sentiment of emotion that acts upon feelings. Feelings can change and if we obey only when we feel like it, or when circumstances motivate us, we have not loved at all. While we recognize that emotion is a component of love, it cannot be the driving force that guides love. True love is a commitment, a decision to love no matter what happens. This kind of love pushes through the rough times and stays focused on the object of the love.
Real love will always have its challenges. Our love for God may bring suffering, it may bring heartache because others make us choose who will be first in our lives. We may suffer rejection by those who don’t know Him, or even death by those who hate Him or feel threatened, but real love for Christ will supersede our comfort. It is hypocritical to declare your love with words but live your life selfishly. Look at your life as if you were an outsider looking in. Are your actions showing that Christ is first? Have you deceived yourself into believing that as long as you are a “good person,” and you have said a prayer that everything is ok?
When Jesus gives them the commandment in John 14:15, it is in the middle of a conversation involving His departure to the cross. The disciples were not sure what was about to happen, but they didn’t want Him to leave. Christ challenges them to not show their love by mere emotions, but by true obedience. Just as James reminds us that real faith is shown in doing. Real love is shown in the same way.
James 2:20 “But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead?”
Jesus goes on to tell them in the next few verses that He will not leave them without a comforter. they will receive the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Their faith in Him and the showing of their love for Him will gain them much more than a friend on this earth. He tells them once He leaves and the Holy Spirit comes, they will each have Him with them wherever they go, and all at the same time. His physical body could only be one place at one time, but the Holy Spirit is not limited to one place nor one person at a time.
John 14:16-20 “And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you. Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also. At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.”
What a precious promise to those who obey. Jesus understood their grief, he understood they couldn’t see the big picture. We too are limited many times by what we can see, but obedience strengthens our faith, and out of our faith grows stronger love. Jesus wanted to assure them that greater things were coming. Their walk with Him was only the beginning of their relationship. Through their love and faith, they were embarking on a relationship that will last forever, and it only gets better as we increase our love through our obedience. If it sounds like I am talking in circles with love, obedience, and faith, I am. You can’t have one without the other.
This week as you celebrate Christmas make sure you celebrate the greatest exhibition of love. It was the love God had for us as He gave His only Son to come to earth so He could die in our place.
