07 - New Commandment Love — Ben Torrey

Good evening, this is Ben Torrey once again. Last week I spoke about the Church as the Body of Christ, and how each of us are members of it. I spoke about how much it hurts Jesus when we are divided from each other, just as it would hurt any of us if someone were to divide our arms or legs from the rest of our bodies.

New Commandment Love Holds the Body Together

Tonight I want to talk with you about what it is that holds the parts of Jesus' body together. That's love. More specifically, I want to talk about what I call New Commandment love. Last week we saw in 1 Corinthians 12, 13 that we are all baptized into one body by the one Holy Spirit.

The Church as the Christian Family

That is how we become members of this body that is the Church of Jesus Christ. We often think of this also as our Christian family. We are brothers and sisters, regardless of denomination. This month, we will look at what Jesus tells us is important for us as brothers and sisters to do, His New Commandment to us.

Jesus’ New Commandment to Love One Another

This is how the body is held together. Jesus said in John 13, 34, A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. The Old Commandment is that we love others as we love ourselves.

The Old Commandment and the Summary of the Law

Jesus himself repeats this in Matthew 22, 39 when he was quoting the Old Testament in what we call the Summary of the Law. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind.

This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. The New Commandment that Jesus gives us is that we love one another as He loved us, enough to suffer horrendous suffering and death for one another if necessary.

Love for Fellow Believers as Evidence of Love for God

Do you love your brothers and sisters that much? First John 4, 20. The one who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. We see that how we receive this command to love one another as Christ loved us is directly related to how well we love God.

Love as a Witness to the World

It is also directly related to our witness to the world. In John 13, 35, Jesus continues his New Commandment by saying, By this all men will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another.

Unity and the Gospel in Jesus’ Prayer

The unity that God wants us to have comes from this kind of love. It also bears witness to the Gospel. Jesus, in His great prayer to the Father for us in John chapter 17, prays this, I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, even as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they may all also be in us, so that the world may believe that you sent me.

The glory which you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that you sent me and love them, even as you have loved me.

Love Must Accompany Gospel Proclamation

Jesus commands us to love one another as He loved us. New Commandment love. As we share this love with one another, we can know that we love God and we can be confident that He is glorified as the world sees this love.

We know that we must preach the word of God for people to know of Him and receive His salvation. This is the great commission that Jesus gave to His church. However, if we are not demonstrating the love of Christ for one another, sharing New Commandment love, all that we say with our mouths about salvation becomes a lie.

Love’s Patience, Kindness, and Forgiveness

If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or clanging cymbal, 1 Corinthians 13. As we seek to achieve true unity in love, we also know that this calls for us to have great patience with one another, being quick to forgive and overlook that which bothers us.

1 Peter 4 .8. Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins. 1 Corinthians 13 .4 -5. Love is patient, love is kind, is not jealous. Love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly.

Brotherly Love in the Many-Membered Body

It does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered. And then Romans 12, verses 4 and 5 and then again in 9 and 10. For just as we have many members in one body, and all the members do not have the same function, so we who are many are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another.

Therefore, let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil, cling to what is good, be devoted to one another in brotherly love, give preference to one another in honor. Christ's new commandment love can be seen as the lifeblood of the body of Christ, of the Church.

New Commandment Love as the Lifeblood of Christ’s Body

Without this love for one another, all other protestations of unity and desire to proclaim God are nothing. In fact, without it we die, the body of Christ dies. It is that which by the breath of the Holy Spirit, breathed into the Church, gives life to Christ's body here on earth.

Prayer for Unity Through Christ’s Love

Our search for unity among all who are baptized into Christ's Church begins with this command to love one another as He loved us. New commandment love. Let us pray. O Lord, who has poured out Your Holy Spirit upon us and made us one with Your Son, as members of His body, enable us to love one another with the same love that He had for us, the love that willingly and lovingly suffered the horrendous death of crucifixion for our sake.

He prayed that we might be one and called us to love one another that the world may know that He has sent us. We have failed so miserably in showing His and Your love to the world. Forgive us. Cause Your holy love, the very power that unifies the Holy Trinity and that is the life blood of Christ's body, cause it to flow in us and from us to all around us that they may know the same wonderful and precious love.

In the name of Your Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ, who loved us and died for us. Amen.