“If you love Me, keep My commands.” – John 14:15
In today’s day and age I think the seriousness of this verse can be lost, especially in the United States. The verse does not say if you love Me, it would be really nice if you kept my commandments. It doesn’t say if you love Me, keep the commandments that you are comfortable with or that your society agrees with. No, Jesus is giving us, as His disciples, a command. If we claim to love Him as our Lord and Savior, then we need to keep His commandments. Now, it would be easy to look at this and say, “well, that can’t be true, because we are sinful by nature so there is no way that we would be able to keep His commandments, even if we do love Him.” There would be some truth in this statement; as humans we are unable to do good, we cannot keep ourselves from sin. Yet, that is why Jesus starts His statement with “if you love Me.” If Jesus was not part of our lives, then this command would truly be even more impossible.
When someone loves something or someone, it is extremely evident in their life. Usually, they talk about that person or thing more than anything else, they make life decisions and sacrifices for what they love, they don’t care what others think, and they will change their lifestyles to fit that thing or person. Yet, so many times, even though we as Christians claim to love God, we aren’t willing to pick up our cross and follow Him. We are comfortable with how we live and if the world says it is okay, then why change? The world’s standard and God’s standard are so far apart, that I think it is easy for us to put our standard in the middle and think we are okay. But, the Bible says to be in the world, not of the world. How can we be the salt of the world, if we have no flavor?
Jesus knows, better then we know ourselves, that we will fall short on many occasions. He knows that we will not always keep His commandments and follow His will. That is why the very next verse says, “And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever.” He is speaking of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth. One cannot be filled with the Holy Spirit, unless they love God and have committed their life to Him. He says that He will not leave us as orphans: hopeless, alone and confused. Jesus is continually interceding on our behalf and He sent us the Holy Spirit, who lives within us. We love Him, because He first loved us. He came and died for us, so that we could have a personal relationship with Him. Because He loved us, Jesus obeyed the Fathers will and went to the cross. With all of the pressure of the world bearing down on His shoulders, with the knowledge that He was going to be separated from His father, Jesus sweat blood. He asked the Father that if there was anyway for the cup to pass from Him, let it be so. He wasn’t jumping up for joy at the idea of being crucified, but He loved the Father and said, “let Your will be done.” Jesus says, “If you love Me, keep my commands.” He commands us to not live as the world because He loves us. He asks us to keep His commandments because He loves us and because we (if we love Him) live to bring Him glory. How can I glorify my savior if the salt in my life has lost its flavor?
No comments:
Post a Comment