Love One Another
John 13:34-35 "A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." (KJV)
John 15:12-17 "This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.
"You are My friends if you do whatever I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master does. But I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you.
"You have not chosen Me, but I have chosen you and ordained you that you should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain; that whatever you shall ask of the Father in My name, He may give it to you.
"These things I command you, that you love one another."
He saved this for nearly last. A NEW commandment. Part of how we know He claimed to be God was that He ADDED to the commands, restructured Scripture.
He did it for a simple reason: we had never existed before that time. No Christian was possible before his sacrifice. Afterward, a new race dawned on the planet and it needed a special rule, one specific to it. Jew and Gentile, man and woman, black and white and yellow and brown and red and every combination, all the BIG DIVISIONS, melted into Him. All that was once split and ruined and spoiled became officially new. Enemies became brothers. Borders vanished. Language became slippery. Deeds testified not to personal growth, but to depth of relationship with God. Moreover, the Zealot sat down with the Taxpayer, the Samaritan with the Savior, the Greek Doctor with the Roman Jew.
He told us the way to love: give your lives for one another. Give your beliefs, your hopes, your dreams, your passions all to the focus of the others. Obey everything he said, everything they saw him live out and recorded for us. Deeds testify.
We wear the same old moth-eaten coats of fading flesh. We change into other people.
John 13:34-35 "A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." (KJV)
John 15:12-17 "This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.
"You are My friends if you do whatever I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master does. But I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you.
"You have not chosen Me, but I have chosen you and ordained you that you should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain; that whatever you shall ask of the Father in My name, He may give it to you.
"These things I command you, that you love one another."
He saved this for nearly last. A NEW commandment. Part of how we know He claimed to be God was that He ADDED to the commands, restructured Scripture.
He did it for a simple reason: we had never existed before that time. No Christian was possible before his sacrifice. Afterward, a new race dawned on the planet and it needed a special rule, one specific to it. Jew and Gentile, man and woman, black and white and yellow and brown and red and every combination, all the BIG DIVISIONS, melted into Him. All that was once split and ruined and spoiled became officially new. Enemies became brothers. Borders vanished. Language became slippery. Deeds testified not to personal growth, but to depth of relationship with God. Moreover, the Zealot sat down with the Taxpayer, the Samaritan with the Savior, the Greek Doctor with the Roman Jew.
He told us the way to love: give your lives for one another. Give your beliefs, your hopes, your dreams, your passions all to the focus of the others. Obey everything he said, everything they saw him live out and recorded for us. Deeds testify.
We wear the same old moth-eaten coats of fading flesh. We change into other people.
