Abide in My Love

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Scripture: John 15:9-11 (ESV)

9 As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. 10 If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. 11 These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.

Devotion:

            In these verses, Jesus is giving the disciples an intimate portrait of the love that exists between the Father and the Son and the Son and the disciples. These words were not recorded for the twelve apostles only. They apply to us as well. We know that the Father loved the Son with an extraordinary love. Without a strong bond of love, the power of God manifested in Jesus could not exist. What is the reason for this strong Father, Son love we see here? The keeping of commandments. It sounds strange to our 21st-century ears, but the love between the Father and Son is based on the Son’s obedience to the Father's commandments.

            What were these commandments? They are best summed up in Jesus’ own words. In Matthew 22:37-40, “37 Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’  38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’  40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”(NIV) Jesus, being without sin, could keep these commandments perfectly. Jesus calls on us to keep these same commands.

            Jesus urges us to keep these commandments so that we may abide in His love. Unlike those who do not know and follow Jesus, who must scramble and chase down scraps of what they think is love. Christians are assured of Jesus’ love for them and can rest in that assurance. The assurance of Jesus’ love for us affects all we do. We no longer have to try and please God through our works. Our faith in God and our love for God and our neighbors is enough. All the love the Father has for the Son is given to us as well.

            This assurance of love we have in the Son should well up within us as joy. Jesus has joy knowing that the Father loves Him, and He can rest in that love. Joy is one of the descriptions of life in Christ that is missing in large sections of the 21st-century church. We have gone after cheap substitutes, and as a result, the world sees a joyless and often lifeless church and ignores us as irrelevant and even foolish. The problem is you cannot manufacture true joy. True joy erupts from a heart filled with gratitude and love. Let us pray that we may be filled with true love and gratitude for all God’s blessings and that our joy may be complete.

Prayer:

            Father in heaven, teach us to be so filled with love and gratitude for all you have done for us that we will be filled with joy. Let that joy be evident to all who know us as a witness to the greatness of our God. May we truly love every individual we meet with a love that springs from you. May we glorify your Holy Name above all others and rejoice in all your goodness for us. Let our passion and joy overflow to a hurting and joyless world. Amen.

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