Platform Admin
Verse Thoughts
The Lord Jesus said, “If you love Me you will keep My commandments,” and one of the tests of a real love of God is willing obedience to His Word, a genuine trust in what He says, a readiness to believe His precious promises, and a desire to obey His commandments.
As the Cross of Christ loomed ever closer, we find the Lord Jesus saying to His disciples, “A new commandment I give to you – that you love one another as I have loved you.” What a sublime and impossible command, for in so doing the Lord Jesus commands us to display the same depth of love to one another as He Himself demonstrated to us.
How bound up and interlinked in this test of love is our love for God, our willing obedience to do His will, and a genuine love for our brothers and sisters in Christ – for love of the brethren and keeping His commandments encapsulates the test of our love towards God. If we are to keep the new commandment He gave to us all, we will love God’s children with the same depth of love that Christ Himself loved us, and Christ loved the Church so dearly that He gave himself up for her.
If we walk in the way of His love and live a life filled with His love, we will be following the example of Christ Who “loved us and gave Himself for us as a willing sacrifice, a pleasing aroma to God.” But only the life that is walking in spirit and truth, a life lived in humble submission to the leading of the Holy Spirit, can love others as Christ loved us.
Only when the old self life remains nailed to the Cross and the new life in Christ feeds on Him in our hearts, by faith with thanksgiving and praise, can that love of Christ be manifested towards others: “And this is the way that we will know that we love God’s children, if we love God and obey His commandments.”
“Love as I have loved you.”
My Prayer
Heavenly Father, what amazing love You have for Your children. Help me to love You more and more so that I may walk in genuine trust and willing obedience to all You have commanded in Your Word. Help me to love others in the same way that You have loved me and gave Yourself for me. In Jesus’ name I pray, AMEN.
Bible References
2 By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God, and keep his commandments.
28 And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.
1 And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins;
2 Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:
3 Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.
4 But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us,
5 Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;)
6 And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus:
7 That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.
8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.
10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.
11 Wherefore remember, that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called the Circumcision in the flesh made by hands;
12 That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world:
13 But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.
14 For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us;
15 Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace;
16 And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby:
17 And came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh.
18 For through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father.
19 Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God;
20 And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone;
21 In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord:
22 In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.
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