Jesus Commanded Us to Love

The one greatest thing Jesus wants from all his

followers is for them to become love. In Matthew 22:36-40 Jesus is asked, “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” Jesus replied: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the prophets hang on these two commandments.” Jesus commanded us to love.

These are the two greatest commandments, but we spend very little time talking about what they mean and what they look like.  This article will discuss our command to love, and also what is the definition of love used throughout the Bible.

Do you love yourself?

This is one of the first places to start, because if you do not love yourself then you cannot love others.  God thinks you are lovable, and it takes laying down our pride to come into agreement with what God says about us.  This is a huge step to receiving the love of God.  You can only give to others what you have for yourself.  Jesus thinks you are awesome, so you should too.  As you see yourself as lovable you will be able to go confidently before the Lord and thank Him for loving you.  As you get filled up with God’s love it will overflow from you and you will be able to give love to others, even the ones who do not deserve it. No longer will your tank constantly be on empty trying to get filled up by other people who also have an empty tank. God is love, and He has an endless supply to give you. He is a good Father. Maybe you did not have a father that knew how to love, but God will teach you and bring healing to all the broken places.

I was preparing for a Bible study class I was leading on this topic and asked the Lord to help me clearly communicate His heart.  The verse Zephaniah 3:17 came to mind “The Lord your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you; in his love he will no longer rebuke you, but will rejoice over you with singing.” God sings over you!!  He delights in you!  I asked the Lord to share with me the song He sings over me.  I should have written it down, but it was such a beautiful moment I did not want to ruin.  It made me weep, and I know this probably sounds fruity, but God wants all of us to know His voice.  In the song He expressed His joy in me coming alive in Him and knowing Him.  Joy, that I heard His voice and ran after It, and now I get to grow up in the purpose and plans He created me for.  Then He shared His heart’s cry for all His children to know Him in this way.  He said that He prays over each one of the little lives He creates before placing them in their mother’s womb. I saw the image of him tenderly holding a little life and lovingly speaking over it. His hope is always that through all the distractions, through all the lies of the enemy, and all the traumas life brings that this little one will hear His voice and return to Him. Imagine loving your child so much and then sending them into a broken world. By this time, I was bawling my eyes out.  If we could only understand the depths of God’s love.

So, what is so powerful about love?

John 14:21 “He that has my commandments, and keeps them he it is that loves me: and he that loves me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him."  Matthew 22:40 NKJV "On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.” Love accomplishes all the commandments, all the prophets spoke, and love embodies all the “fruits of the Spirit.”  If you obey and surrender to God Fathering you into how to become love, Jesus says he will manifest himself to YOU! This is why the Christians who see clearly the call to become love and purify themselves through obedience and reliance on the Holy Spirit have a character resembling Christ.  As you die to yourself, go all in without looking back at the old life, and seek to become love as Christ is love; HE will continue pouring HIS love into you.  True love is laying down your life for those you love.  Jesus can only bring new life to the areas of the old man you are willing to crucify on the cross. As a result, Jesus will come more and more into the areas of your heart you surrender to His Lordship, enabling you to LOVE MORE LIKE HIM!! Growing you, strengthening you, and lastly empowering you to go do the same things Jesus did! This is amazing! My friends it also does not have to be a long drawn out process. Surrender your life today and go all in for Jesus. It does not have to be 20 years of hanging onto your old life with white knuckles slowly prying one finger off at a time. There is freedom in surrender.

In John 14:16 Jesus says, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father except through me.”  The way of salvation is through Jesus, but if we look closely at his life and follow his example we will be walking in love.  The old saying, “What would Jesus do” used to be popular, unfortunately it became a saying with a lack of understanding of how to apply it. Often, I try to stop and ask Jesus what he would do in that situation or what he would say.  It is always much better than however I would respond naturally.

The Power of Abiding

John 15:1-17 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes[a] so that it will be even more fruitful. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples. “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now 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 this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. This is my command: Love each other."

The root word “abide” in the Greek is “meno” which means: stay, remain, dwell. The author of the book of John is known to have one of the closest intimate relationships with Jesus and emphasizes the command to become love within his writings.  John is also recorded as laying his head on the chest of Jesus, showing the closeness of their friendship. John also marks love as the only indicator of whether or not you know God. (Read “Knowing God” to learn more.) We must stay soft hearted and yielding to the Lord Fathering us. Humility is key, and honoring others above ourselves are ways to display love. For myself I have not arrived, but I can confidently say I have grown and am completely different from who I was even 3 years ago.  John 15 is a special chapter in the Bible for me.  One I would often read when the storms of life would come, and I could only see the disaster in front of me. I would rest in the presence of Jesus and focus on the new life I had because of what He did on the cross for me.  Just as Moses lifted the serpent and all who looked at it were healed (Numbers 21), I would look to Jesus. I would also read the books of John and 1 John, and just rest in His presence. As I did this more and more, I became aware of the moment His presence touched me. As I spent more time in this place that presence would stay with me longer. It stayed with me as long as I would keep my focus on Him.  If something changed and my eyes shifted back to my problems instead of standing in faith trusting Him, I could feel that presence lift and almost a heaviness on my chest. There was a time I had 2-3 weeks solid of that sweet presence filled with peace, love, and joy that lasted morning till night. Regardless of the ups and downs of life, He carried me. I learned how to receive love from Jesus, how to love Him through intimacy, and how to carry that love to the people around me. Jesus is always with you and me, but you will know the difference when His manifest presence enters the room. You also do not need a worship band to experience His presence. You can go to your room and shut the door.

It was through this intimate love relationship with Jesus that I became aware of sinful responses and habits I had that were outside of love. Even having an attitude of the heart that was less than Christ would cause that sweet presence to lift. Now, you live by faith and not by feelings, but as Christians we should be filled with peace, love, and joy which is evidence of the Holy Spirit within us. So now when feelings of offense, hurt, anger, frustration, feeling sorry for myself, stressed, being overwhelmed or complaining rears its ugly head I renounce it and nail it back to the cross where it belongs. It is His presence in my life I desire to cultivate daily and share with others.

Google: “Father Lawrence” to learn more about cultivating the presence of God.

So, what is love?

The world around us has twisted the definition of love to be all about oneself, lust, approval, affirmation, need and identity from others. Basically self centered and at other people's expense. This is why people fall in and out of "love," they were never in love to begin with. The need just ran out, because love never fails. There are two definitions in the Bible I have found regarding love. The first definition is Jesus, because Jesus was love. 1 John 4:16-18 “And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.  God is love.  Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them. This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgement: In this world we are like Jesus."  Hang tight as I come back to this and why there are so many crabby Christians with poor attitudes.

The second definition of love is found in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy; it does not boast. It is not proud, rude, or selfish. It is not easily angered, and it keeps no record of wrongs. It never delights in evil, but always rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, and always perseveres. Love never fails.”  Ouch! When I first started weighing my actions, responses, and attitudes through this verse; I wept when I realized I did not love my husband.  I had expectations of affection and affirmation.  I kept a record of wrongs as I would allow my mind to run with the piece of mind I wanted to give him. I would pick up my “rights” instead of laying my life down as Jesus did.  In fact, as I studied exactly how Jesus responded, all the wise people in this world would consider him a doormat, when in fact he is the only man with the strength to obey the Father perfectly. 

Not once on the cross did you hear Jesus complain about all the backstabbers.  He never acted like a victim when the world turned on him.  He also never stood up and said, I have had all I can take of you cowards. He did not sit on the cross and shame the people that worshipped him days before but were yelling "crucify him" then.  He willingly laid down his life, so those who received his sacrifice could have their sins washed away and be restored back into children with a purpose and inheritance.

So why don’t Christians love like Jesus?

This is a sobering question, and the Bible answers is clearly.  Before answering I do want to say this: There are many Christians who do love like Jesus.  There is often also much going on behind the scenes that you are not aware of.  I have wrongfully made judgements before, but when I had a chance to peek behind the curtain, I saw love displayed where nobody would ever see it. I had to repent for making wrong judgements without even talking to anybody. So, as you read this; focus on your own heart, and your own relationship with the Lord.  Often if our initial response is to point to somebody else, then we are the ones who need to hear it for ourselves the most. Let us look at scripture.

1 John 4:7 -8 “Dear friend, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.” We talked about crabby Christians with bad attitudes, but here scripture gives us the answer: they do not know God, at least not as good as they could.  Sometimes not as good as they want everyone to believe.  The motives of our heart can be impure, and we won't even know it unless we get before the Lord.  Sometimes we want people to see us as “religious” or “spiritual” and we like the attention.  Sometimes we even serve in church in a self-centered way to make us feel better about ourselves.  The other reason is simply because we compare ourselves to others instead of to Jesus.  When I shifted my focus from people to Jesus my life has been transformed. I can truly say the process is a joy. Sometimes painful, but truly freeing. I am thankful the process continues. Knowing God and receiving His love helps to correct these things.  Do not allow a quick devotional, prayer during your meal, doing ministry, Bible reading (for knowledge not relationship) or even going to church, replace knowing God.  The more you know Him, the more you will become like Him.

In the next post I will look at Jesus’s example of how to love. Especially under pressure.

Application:

 1) Open your Bibles to 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 and pray over this definition of love. Take the last conflict you had and pray through this verse and see if there was an area in your heart that was outside of love.

2) Thank the Lord for revealing His truth to you. Name what He pointed out to you, and repent by expressing your sorrow, ask Him to take the sin from your life. Thank Him for His forgiveness and nail it to the cross. Now ask the Lord to show you how to respond in love. Then we have to set our hearts on dying in that area so Jesus can be Lord.

Additional Reading:

John 14 & 15

1 John 2,3,4, & 5

1 Corinthians 13

Romans 12:9-21

Ephesians 3:14-21

Ephesians 5:1-2