Love One Another (John 15:9-17)

Before we jump in, I'm just gonna give you a big spoiler alert.

The thing that I hope that we leave here with today is understanding that God's love is in his law.

Got it?

God's love is in his commands.

Okay?

So before we even read this, and before we even start thinking about this passage, I want us to think about that as we're going through this together.

So if you're able, would you stand for the reading of God's Word?

John chapter 15, verses 9 through 17.

John 15:9–17

As the Father has loved me, I have also loved you.

Remain in my love.

If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commands and remain in his love.

I have told you these things so that my joy may be in you, and your joy may be complete.

This is my command.

Love one another as I have loved you.

No one has greater love than this, to lay down his life for his friends.

You are my friends if you do what I command you.

I do not call you servants any more, because a servant doesn't know what his master is doing.

I have called you friends because I have made known to you everything I have heard from my father.

You did not choose me, but I chose you.

I appointed you to go and produce fruit, and that your fruit should remain, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he will give you.

This is what I command you.

Love one another.

Let's pray.

Thank you so much for the Gospel of John, for all that we've been gleaning from it, all the things that you've been teaching us through it.

Pray that you would continue that here this morning.

That we would come to you in all humility, just recognizing, as we talked about last week, that we can do nothing without you.

So Lord, I pray that you would speak to us, that you would change us, and that you would make us more and more like you, that you would use these pruning shearers that is your word, Lord, to shape us into the people that you want us to be.

So, Lord, we just want to come to you as clay this morning, just allowing you to mold us and to shape us, to pull the things off of us that you don't want anymore, or to convict us, to encourage us, to do all the things that you desire in us here this morning.

We pray these things in Jesus' name.

Amen.

You may be seated.

So, the first thing that I want to point out as we kind of zoom in on these passages is that once again, the verses we're covering here are surrounded by verses of the promise of the Holy Spirit.

Because once again, what Jesus is telling his disciples is something that they are not going to be able to do on their own.

Under their own strength, under their own power, they are not going to be able to do it.

It's only through the person of the Holy Spirit in us, in them, that we as his disciples can do what he's calling us to do in these verses.

You know, even his disciples that he's talking to in these verses, these 11 that are left, they're not able to do what he is commanding them.

And Jesus knew this going into this.

They had been floundering to understand Jesus to this point.

They were arguing about who is going to be the greatest disciple this very evening that Jesus, you know, in this upper room that Jesus is talking to them in this passage.

But when they are finally indwelled by the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, 50 days after Jesus' resurrection, that's when they are finally able to follow through on everything that He's commanding them.

And even to understand what Jesus is commanding them in these verses, and that's when the Spirit of truth comes and indwells them.

You know, and I keep mentioning this because, like I said, we're zooming in on these verses.

Last week we zoomed in on the first part of chapter 15.

Now we're zooming in on this middle part.

But the Holy Spirit is all around this.

You know, obeying Jesus' words here and the commands that he mentions in these verses, it will only be attainable through the power of the Holy Spirit.

Through a loving and abiding relationship with Jesus and us recognizing that we can do nothing without him.

So just keep that in mind as we go through this.

It's going to be the strength of the Holy Spirit inside of us that will allow us to do what Jesus is commanding here.

So let's jump into verse 9.

It says, As the Father has loved me, I have also loved you.

Remain in my love.

So I think the first thing we have to ask ourselves is, how does the Father love Jesus?

And how does Jesus love us?

Well, it's perfectly, isn't it?

It's sacrificially the way that Jesus loves us.

It's always wanting and doing what is best for us.

That's how Jesus loves us.

You know, we even see his love, as I was saying earlier, in the law.

We see it in his commands, we see it with God in the Old Testament, with Israel as well.

You know, some of those commands that God gave to Israel, they seem so obscure, don't they?

If you're reading through the law and you're like, huh, that's a really weird one.

You know, but he never gives rules and commands because he simply wants control or he simply wants to exercise his authority.

He gave Israel commands for the sake of keeping them physically and mentally and spiritually safe.

It was always for their own good.

Whatever the command, whatever the law was, it was always for their own good.

Even the command of not eating pork was for their own good.

You know, God could have told them, you know, be careful with pork because it can give you trichinosis, you know.

So make sure you keep it in the fridge, you guys.

You know, it's like, you know, make sure you use an internal thermometer and you bring that internal temp to 145 degrees Fahrenheit or 62.8 degrees Celsius, you know, and then you'll be fine eating your pork.

But then they would have asked, like, uh, what's a thermometer?

You know, I mean, like, or what's this Fahrenheit and Celsius you're talking about?

You know, God, what's an internal tip?

And what on earth is trichinosis?

You know, instead of God trying to walk them through, it's just like, you know what?

Just avoid pork.

You're gonna you don't have refrigeration, you don't have internal temperatures, you don't know how to handle this meat right, just avoid it.

Same thing with shrimp, it's poisonous part of the time of the year, and instead of telling them like you can eat it now and this, but the tide needs to be like it's just you know what, just don't eat shrimp.

You're gonna be a lot better off that way.

So I think God was just like, you know, giving them these instructions for their own personal safety out of love for them, you know, and it was these commands that set them apart from their neighbors and from every other religion.

And it was to help them be identified as God's chosen people, and it was all out of love that he gave every single one of his commands.

But it was all based on keeping them safe and healthy.

So God the Father's love is in his commands.

God the Father and Jesus are one, as we've been talking so much about here in John.

Therefore, Jesus' love is in his commands.

And conversely, his commands are filled with his love, which is gonna help us really understand the rest of this passage, especially verse 10.

So look at verse 10 with me.

If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my father's commands and remain in his love.

You know, Jesus already told us in chapter 5, verse 19, he said, Truly I tell you, the Son, speaking of himself, is not able to do anything on his own, but only what he sees the Father doing.

For whatever the Father does, the Son likewise does these things.

You know, this is part of how Jesus remained in the Father's love.

And part of Jesus remaining in the Father's love was fulfilling God's love-filled law perfectly.

You know, it's like we saying so many times this last December, his law is love and his gospel is peace.

Now, if you look at this verse and you take it out of context and you only look at it by itself, it could really sound transactional, couldn't it?

Do what I say and I will love you.

You know, we can read it and read it that way.

But Jesus' love is in his commands.

I'm gonna say that a bunch today, so just get used to it.

His commands are filled with his love.

That's why verse 10 is not transactional.

If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love.

Because his commands and his love are the same thing.

You know, one of the ways to experience his love for us is obeying him.

You know, and that really should be a no-brainer because his commands are what's best for us in the first place, aren't they?

There's no downside to obedience to Jesus Christ.

Doesn't always mean obedience is going to be easy, but it's always best.

It always helps us.

Obedience always helps us experience the love of God.

You know, and if we're truthful, I think it's hard for us to remain in the love of Jesus because of sin.

And what sin comes down to is acting out on the temptation that we know better than God and therefore don't obey Him.

You know, going all the way back to Adam and Eve, we see this.

God gave them incredible freedom in all that they could do.

I mean, all freedom except for one thing that they had to do.

And he gave them that one command to stay away from the tree of the fruit of good and evil in order to give them free will.

And that was the only loving command that he gave them.

Don't eat of this one tree in the whole garden.

Everything else, freedom.

Do what you like.

But Satan tempted them with, he's restricting you.

You know, he doesn't want to have, he doesn't want you to have something that's gonna make you more like him.

He's so unloving in his one command that he's given you.

That's why he's restricting you.

He doesn't really love you, he doesn't really want what's best for you.

And that was the temptation all the way back to Adam and Eve.

Satan made them question God's love for them by making his command seem like a restriction instead of God's expression to love to them.

And his tactics haven't changed at all.

He loves to put questions in our minds, doesn't he?

You know, we've said this before.

It's okay to ask God questions, but it's not good to question God.

And Satan's strategy is to get us to question God's love.

You know, he'll come at us with things like, you know, why did God tell you not to get drunk?

Doesn't he understand that you just need to blow off some steam right now?

Don't you doesn't he understand that you need to numb yourself to these crazy life circumstances right now?

Doesn't he know how hard things are for you right now?

He's restricting you.

He doesn't know better than you.

Just drink away, numb the pain.

This is what's gonna be better for you in the end.

And that's how he gets at us.

He makes us question God's love for us.

Or, you know, why did God tell you to not have sex outside of marriage between a man and a woman?

Doesn't he understand your needs and your desires?

Doesn't he understand how much love you have for this person?

You know, why does he set up these crazy, unrealistic, unloving restrictions in your life?

You know, you know better than he does.

Your circumstances don't apply to his commands.

And he puts that doubt of God's love in our mind.

His tactics and lies have not changed since Genesis.

He tries to make us question that God's love is in his commands.

So we sin, and then that draws us further from God, and that's his plan all along.

And it's all based on a lie from Satan.

So look at what Jesus tells his disciples in verse 11.

He says, I have told you these things, these commands that he's given, so that my joy may be in you, and your joy may be complete.

So that your joy may be filled to the full, is what it means here.

This word for complete means filled to the brim.

So raise your hand if you would like more joy in your life.

We're doing a lot of hand raising here, aren't we, you know?

I've never met anyone that was like, you know, I just have too much joy.

I just I need to cut back.

Can you pray for me about this?

Maybe keep me accountable for this.

You know, this is becoming a problem in my life.

Like, never.

I mean, it's comical because it's so ridiculous.

Nobody ever says that.

Jesus is giving us the answer to more joy right here.

And not really happiness, you know, that can be fleeting, that comes and goes based on circumstance and emotions, but joy, the joy of the Lord that's not based on circumstance, but is based on Jesus.

That's what Jesus is talking about.

You know, James tells us that we can have joy even in our trials and our tribulations.

Joy is one of the fruits of the Spirit who is residing in us.

You know, 1 Thessalonians tells us to rejoice always.

And you can't rejoice without joy, can you?

And we're to rejoice always, to always have joy.

And notice the disciples didn't question what this joy was, you know, to Jesus.

You know, like, well, Jesus, will you define what you mean by your joy?

Like, give us a definition.

I think they were just like, oh, his joy.

Jesus was a joyful person.

I think so often we think he's stern and always mad at his disciples.

He was a joyful person.

So they knew exactly what Jesus' joy was.

You know, they had experienced his joy for three years of following him.

And now he's telling them how they can have the same joy that they have witnessed for all these years, that he has exemplified to them.

You know, and this isn't that phony joy.

If you ask somebody how they're doing, and they're kind of dying on the inside, and they're like, yeah, I'm doing great, you know, the joy of the Lord's my strength.

But on the inside, you know, they're really, they're just dying on the inside.

You know, I think joy is a deep, deep knowledge of who God is and who we are in relation to Him.

Knowing, having that deep knowledge that we are sons and daughters of the Most High King.

That we are the bride of Christ.

And as we're gonna see, that we are friends of God.

You know, the knowledge that he holds everything together and he cares for us more than we care for ourselves.

That is the source of joy that is the joy Jesus had.

You know, all the way to the cross, he had that joy and wants us to have that same joy as well.

The joy, his joy, the joy that he had, has.

And we get to experience the joy of Christ if, what?

What has he told us so far?

If we remain in his love and if we keep his love-filled commands.

You know, this is starting to sound works-based at all, like, you know, if I want God's love and if I want joy, I need to do, I need to obey, I need to earn it.

Don't put the cart before the horse.

That's not what we're talking about here.

These verses are surrounded by love, surrounded by abiding in Jesus, surrounded by walking in the Spirit.

And obedience then becomes a result of those things.

So often we want to turn that around and try to do, do, do, to earn, earn, earn, but that's not how it goes.

You see, you never earn God's love through obedience, but you experience his love through obedience.

There's a big difference there.

You never earn God's love through obedience, but you experience his love through obedience.

So Jesus commands to remain in his love.

And then in verse 12, here's another command.

This is my command.

Love one another as I have loved you.

Again, love-based.

Another command that's love-based, not works-based.

It's another love-filled command.

Love one another as I have loved you.

And just as his joy was the measuring stick of their joy, his love is to be their measuring stick of their love.

And our measuring stick of love as well.

Not against each other.

Like, how am I loving in comparison to the person next to me?

It's like, how am I loving in comparison to Jesus?

Because Jesus loved perfectly and sacrificially.

You know, our culture has accepted this lie that you have to love yourself before you can love others.

But Jesus tells us to put our focus on loving God and loving others.

His commands are the opposite of what this world's telling us.

He tells us to get the focus off of ourself and off of self-love, and this is how.

This is how his joy may be complete in us, and our joy may be complete.

Now you would think that our joy would come with putting ourselves first.

That's kind of like how our flesh thinks, doesn't it?

Like, I'm gonna get what I need and put myself first, and then I'll be happy, and then I'll have joy.

So I want you to think right now, a little test here.

Think about the most joyful person that you know in your life.

And take a moment.

Who is the most joyful person that you know in your life?

And now ask yourself if that person is self-focused, you know, selfish, or are they others focused?

I already know the answer.

They're gonna be others focused.

Never seen a joyful person that was self-absorbed.

I've just never seen those two things before.

You know, the key to joy is remaining in the love of Jesus and then loving others in the way Jesus loves us, sacrificially and unselfishly, like we're gonna see here in verse 13.

No one has greater love than this, to lay down his life for his friends.

You know, there's really two things here: the immediate application, and then Jesus literally doing this the following day.

He's telling them to lay down their lives for each other, to wash each other's feet, if you remember in chapter 13, to serve one another, and to love each other like he loves them.

You know, like Philippians 2 3 tells us, it says, Do nothing out of selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility consider others as more important than yourselves.

But Jesus is going to be the perfect example and fulfillment of this command the very following day.

He's literally going to lay down his life on the cross for his friends, and not just these eleven that he's talking to right now in this upper room, but here today as well.

He laid down his life for each and every follower of Christ here today.

You know, think about it.

He held our eternal life above his own physical life.

And no one has ever shown greater love than to do that for his friends.

And look at what he says next.

Verse 14.

You are my friends if you do what I command you.

Again, you know, we need to keep this in context, otherwise, this can sound transactional, can it?

You know, if you Do what I say, then you can be my friends.

That's not what he's saying.

I think we all knew a kid like that in kindergarten, didn't we?

If you do what I say, then you can be my friend.

That is not what we're looking at here.

Context.

Keep it in context.

Jesus is saying, You are my friends if you remain in my love and obey my love-filled commands.

Because it's what's best for you in the first place.

You know, and when you think about it, who doesn't want a friend that always acts in your best interest and continually lays their life down for you?

I mean, that's like the ultimate friend, isn't it?

Jesus goes on in verse 15.

He says, I do not call you servants anymore, because a servant doesn't know what his master is doing.

I have called you friends because I have made known to you everything I have heard from my Father.

Now I hope we can all just stop for a second and understand the magnitude of what Jesus just said.

Jesus' words right here are revolutionary.

The creator of the universe that spoke everything into existence, that is the that is one with God the Father, offers any human that believes in him to be his friend.

Think of the magnitude of that.

You know, aren't you glad God the Father wasn't like, Jesus, uh, you shouldn't hang out with those guys?

They're a bunch of bad apples.

You know, you need to choose your friends more wisely.

You know, I'm so glad God never told Jesus that.

It was more like you should go around up the worst of sinners, make them all your friends, and then we're gonna help them become more like you.

I mean, that's really what they did.

You know, aren't you glad Jesus isn't trying to find these perfect, shiny, clean people that have it all together and then ask him to be his friends?

No, he extends the invitation to anyone that wants that relationship with him.

He extends his hand down to those laying in the gutter of the world.

And he looks at him and he says, Follow me.

You know, there's a misconception that we need to get things together.

We need to get our affairs in order and keep appearances up, and then we will feel worthy to follow Jesus.

But that's the opposite.

We just need to reach up and grab a hold of his hand from the gutter and say, Yes, I'll follow you.

And then it's just abiding in him, and he's gonna take care of the rest.

It's not about what we can do to prepare ourselves to follow Jesus, it's about what he does to us after we start following him.

You know, our own efforts to look better and be better are of no value to Jesus anyway.

Our own efforts are worthless, filthy rags in comparison to what Jesus wants to do with us.

You know, the beauty is that he doesn't want to lift us from the gutter just to make us servants.

You know, somebody that just takes orders and only speaks when spoken to.

He wants us to be his friends that desire his love and obey him because we love him so much.

You see, there's a big difference between obedience out of love and obedience because of fear.

You know, I want to take this back to marriage one more time.

We've been doing that a lot lately as we're going through this section in John, but marriage is the earthly relationship that reflects our relationship with Jesus as his bride.

And Ephesians 5, verses 22 through 26 says, wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.

Ephesians 5:22–26

Because the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church.

He is the Savior of the body.

Now, as the church submits to Christ, so also wives are said to submit to their husbands and everything.

Husbands, love your wives just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her to make her holy.

You know, when I'm doing marriage counseling or premarital counseling, I like to ask the couple of few questions regarding this verse.

To the wife, I like to ask him, do you think it would be hard to submit to your husband if he loves you just like Jesus?

Laying down his life daily for you and never once acting in selfishness for himself, always wanting what's best for you.

And every single time, so far, they say, No, I don't think that would be hard at all.

If I was being loved in that way, I don't think it would be hard to submit.

And then I like to ask them, which do you think is harder?

The wife submitting to her husband, or the husband loving the wife as Christ loved the church.

And so far, I've only heard them answer, loving as Christ loved the church.

You see, when we're being loved perfectly by Jesus, submission to the all-knowing, perfect, loving Savior should be a no-brainer for us.

He never demands submission, saying, you know, just do what I say.

I'm the master, you're my servant, no questions asked.

We never see anything like that.

You know, he just said in verse 15, I have called you my friends, because I have made known to you everything I have heard from my father.

You know, would he say that and do that if he was a slave driver and only saw us as servants that carry out tasks?

Think of his treatment to these disciples in this upper room.

Think of how he's loving them and how he's preparing them.

He's letting them know what is to come and how to prepare for it.

He's treating them as friends, as a loving husband to his bride that he's madly in love with and only wants what's best for them.

This is unlike any other God in any other religion that you could ever find.

Have you ever read Greek mythology before?

Nothing like what Zeus does.

That guy's a head case.

But look at the difference of Jesus wanting his disciples to be his friends.

And then Jesus reassures them again by reminding them of something.

Look at verse 16.

You did not choose me, but I chose you.

You know, so many people want to read this and start talking about predestination.

You know, see, we didn't have a choice.

Jesus chose us.

But is that at all what Jesus has been talking about in context here in these verses?

You know, we always have to look back to context.

He's been talking about how much he loves these guys and wants them to be his friends and obey his love-filled commands for their own good.

He's been assuring them of so many things and preparing them for what is ahead.

So he just reminds them that he chose them.

That he didn't come or that they didn't come and ask him, hey, can we follow you?

Which was normal in these times, for a disciple to find a rabbi and ask if they could follow him.

Jesus came to them and said, Follow me.

They could have said no, couldn't they?

You know, Jesus, I got this really good fishing business going, so I'm gonna have to say no to you.

He called them.

He asked them to follow.

They still had a choice of whether they followed him or not.

You know, I think here he's reminding them that he desired them first, knowing all of their faults, knowing this group was full of abandoners and a denier, knowing their future sins against him.

And he still said, Follow me.

And don't just be my servant, like other rabbis treated their disciples.

He said, Be my friend.

Jesus goes on, the second part of verse 16, he says, I appointed you to go and produce fruit, and that your fruit should remain, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he will give you.

Now, this goes back to last week's message of abiding and bearing fruit through that abiding relationship with Jesus.

The fruit is born in righteousness.

And fruit that is born in righteousness has eternal reverberations.

You know, if we carry out the Great Commission, you know, making disciples of every nation, those disciples will be part of God's eternal kingdom, won't they?

If we use our spiritual gifts to serve and to strengthen the body of Christ, that has an eternal impact as well.

You know, our righteous fruit that's born through abiding is eternal fruit.

It's lasting fruit.

It's fruit that remains through eternity.

You know, and as we talk about quite a bit last week, or as we talked about quite a bit last week, if we're truly abiding in Christ, truly growing in him and bearing fruit through that relationship with him, then it's impossible for us to disagree with him when we are abiding in that way.

That's why it says at the end of verse 16, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he will give you.

He will answer prayers when our desires are his desires.

You know how did Jesus teach his disciples to pray?

Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

You know, it's just back to that abiding relationship one more time.

And it's repetition.

Jesus keeps telling them these same things over and over.

If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you want, and it will be done for you.

That's what he told him in verse 7, and he's just repeating that again here in verse 16.

And our last verse here today, um, it's more repetition that we're gonna see with Jesus.

So it's gotta be important if Jesus keeps repeating it.

Verse 17.

This is what I command.

So remember, his loving command.

This is another way to experience Jesus' love.

This is what I command you.

Love one another.

Not a suggestion.

It's not like you should probably do this.

This is a command of Jesus to love one another.

You know, in next week's passage, Jesus is going to talk about how the world hates him, and if it hates him, how it's gonna hate us, his followers, you know, the people that are trying to be just like him.

So if we're going to be hated by the world, how much more important is it that we love each other?

If we can't find love and support and healing and acceptance within the walls of our own church, then there's nowhere else for us to find it.

You know, don't we have enough issues on the outside?

There's enough hostility out there already.

You know, we need to be able to come here and find love and support and people that want to support us in our abiding relationship with Jesus.

So Jesus reminds his followers once again, as he has been through the last two chapters, to love one another as he has loved us.

You know, and it's not just for us that we do that.

He already said in John 13, by this everyone will know that you are my disciples if you love one another.

So this is how a Tascadero will know that we are Jesus' disciples, by the love that we have for one another.

Which is rooted in Jesus first loving us.

You know, see how it's it's kind of cyclical in that way.

And he's calling us to follow him and to follow that example and to love him with all of our heart and then to love each other in that same way that he has loved us.

So I think these are our key takeaways for today.

The first one is remain in the love of Jesus by keeping his commands.

Which, as he said, that's going to ultimately lead to joy, to his joy being inside of us.

The second thing, love one another as Jesus has loved us.

By laying down our lives for one another, placing each other ahead of ourselves.

And I think the third thing is we just need to rest in the fact that we are friends of Jesus.

And he speaks to us as friends and not as servants.

You know, and that goes along with Jesus desiring us first and calling us and saying, follow me.

Not to be these servants that just do what I tell them, but to actually be friends with him.

Now I hope we leave here with our minds blown at how much Jesus loves us.

And that it would only encourage us, that knowledge would only encourage us to love and to serve each other in that same way that he has loved and served us.

Will you please pray with me?

Lord, we thank you so much for the love that you have poured out.

We thank you for the gift of Jesus, that he laid down his life for us, that he died the death that we deserved on the cross to pay the price for our sins that we accrued, that were deserving of death.

And he stood there and said, I will do that for you.

I will die the death that you deserve.

I will give you my righteousness in the sight of the Father, so that we could have this relationship with you, and that we could be friends with Jesus.

We could have the Holy Spirit indwelling us.

Lord, help us to not be callous to how crazy this is that you desire us this much, and that you want to be with us, and that you desire for us to be with you in all of eternity and perfection.

So, Lord, I pray if there's anybody here today that has not made that commitment, that has not reached up and answered that call of you saying, follow me, I pray today would be the day that they would just say yes to that call and enter into an abiding relationship with you.

Being friends with you for all of eternity, being shaped and molded to become more like you in an abiding relationship with you.

Lord, and it just all starts with belief.

It all starts with saying yes to you.

So I pray that today would be that day.

Lord, be honored and glorified in all that we do.

Show us how to love each other better, to put selfishness aside, and to love like Jesus.

And Lord, we pray as a result that our joy would be the joy of Jesus.

And we would experience that, and that our church would be known for the joy of Christ.

And our church would be known for being disciples of Jesus Christ that follow you with all of our heart.

Let this church be a beacon to your community here, we pray.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.