Love One Another

On the night in which we was betrayed, Jesus gave a new commandment rooted in the new covenant: "Love one another, as I have loved you." The love one another part is not new. What makes it new is the addition of "as I have loved you." How exactly has Jesus loved us, and what does that mean for our love for our neighbours? 

Transcript

John 13:34-35
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.  By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

John was the last of Jesus’ apostles to fall asleep. Jerome wrote this about his death: 

The blessed John the Evangelist lived in Ephesus until extreme old age. His disciples could barely carry him to church and he could not muster the voice to speak many words. During individual gatherings he usually said nothing but, "Little children, love one another." The disciples and brothers in attendance, annoyed because they always heard the same words, finally said, "Teacher, why do you always say this?" He replied with a line worthy of John: "Because it is the Lord's commandment and if it alone is kept, it is sufficient." (Jerome's Commentary on Galatians, 6:10._ 

This shouldn’t be surprising, coming from the evangelist who would only refer to himself as “The one whom Jesus loved.” The key phrase in Jesus’ new commandment is not “love one another,” it is the “as I have loved you.”

What does Jesus’ love look like?
- Sacrificial: it costs him more than it costs the people to whom it is given
- Gracious: it is given most freely to those who KNOW they don’t deserve it
- Didactic: it is refused to those who believe they are entitled to it

Before you can “love one another,” you must with full confidence be able to say
“I am the one whom Jesus loved – to death, in his resurrection, in my baptism”

Tertullian: Roman theologian and Church Father from Carthage, 160-225 AD
‘Look,’ they say, ‘how they [Christians] love one another’ (for they themselves hate one another); ‘and how they are ready to die for each other’ (for they themselves are readier to kill each other). 

How do we show that to one another? We should not be known as those who hate those others love, but rather as those who love the ones others hate. We love:

- Sacrificially: it costs! (if you love only those who love you, what credit is that to you?)
- Gracious: it does not seek a reward or pay back (Jesus tells of a wedding feast where those invited are those who cannot pay you back)
- Didactic: the world does not understand true love. Love is not an emotion. It is a verb, and it requires action. 

You will have the chance to love one another while I am on sabbatical. Who will take up the offering? Make sure communion is ready? Keep the building standing? Make sure people are checked in on? That they are prayed for?

Another story about John:
“When John was aged, he trained Polycarp who later became Bishop of Smyrna. This was important because Polycarp was able to carry John's message to future generations. Polycarp taught Irenaeus, passing on to him stories about John. Similarly, Ignatius of Antioch was a student of John. In Against Heresies, Irenaeus relates how Polycarp told a story of John, the disciple of the Lord, going to bathe at Ephesus, and perceiving Cerinthus within, rushed out of the bath-house without bathing, exclaiming, "Let us fly, lest even the bath-house fall down, because Cerinthus, the enemy of the truth, is within." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_the_Apostle) 

What did Paul famously say about love? “[Love] does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth” (1 Cor. 13:6, ESV).” 

This is the “new commandment.” To love one another.  AS JESUS LOVED US.
A sacrificial love, a costly love, a clear-headed, right-hearted love. Amen.