Read John
13:1-35
What a wonderful call for the world…However, this call to believe will only become life changing if our belief is in the One who is love. That is, the only way for the world to unite in believing in love is if it comes to believe in the One who is love…Jesus Christ.
As the church, we are called to give the world the truth of life. We are called to give the world the reality of what it means to be alive. When the world asks us to believe in love it is asking us to give it love. And as followers of Christ we must know that there is only One who is love-Jesus Christ.
And when we say we believe in Christ we are saying that we believe in His truth of life. As the first century church father, Tertullian, said:
“It is our practice of loving-kindness that brands us in the eyes of many of our opponents. ‘Look,’ they say, ‘How they love one another! Look how they are prepared to die for one another!’”
This type of love is anything but superficial or vain…I wonder how often non-followers of Christ would describe modern Christians like this?
How many people today could look at the church and say “yes, there in the church of Jesus Christ I see love.”
Today, we who follow Jesus need a wake up call. We need to come to grips as to what it means to be a disciple of Jesus. The world is looking in on our lives and our lives need to be a witness of the crazy insane love of Jesus—a love that elevates the other over self…
Yes, as followers of Christ we are called to go beyond ourselves so as to care for the other. We are called to “wash one another’s feet,” so as to step into life with each other and stretch ourselves to go beyond living simply for self. We, who follow Christ, are called to imitate His life:
As Jesus was quite prone to remind us that “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (v. 35).
Today do we believe in love? That is, do our lives live out His love by our love of the other?
How many people today could look at the church and say “yes, there in the church of Jesus Christ I see love.”
Today, we who follow Jesus need a wake up call. We need to come to grips as to what it means to be a disciple of Jesus. The world is looking in on our lives and our lives need to be a witness of the crazy insane love of Jesus—a love that elevates the other over self…
Yes, as followers of Christ we are called to go beyond ourselves so as to care for the other. We are called to “wash one another’s feet,” so as to step into life with each other and stretch ourselves to go beyond living simply for self. We, who follow Christ, are called to imitate His life:
“For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you” (v 15).As servants of Christ, we are called to be servants of one another. The only way for the idea of “believing in love” to become the truth of this world is if the church begins to live out the truth of Jesus. That is, the world will only come to understand the belief in love when the church becomes infected to its core with the love of Jesus such that who we are becomes the truth of living for the other. Yes, when people begin to understand the church as those who sacrificially live for the sake of the other.
As Jesus was quite prone to remind us that “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (v. 35).
Today do we believe in love? That is, do our lives live out His love by our love of the other?
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