The Love Standard (Part 1) - [John 13:31-38]

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You know, there are, you guys know what truisms are, truisms are things that are like mostly true, you know, like,

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I don't know, the grass isn't always greener on the other side of the hill, you know, I mean, there are truisms for a reason, because they're usually true, they're not always true, but they're usually true, here's the truism, imitation is what, the highest form of flattery, you know that one, but like I said, truisms aren't always necessarily true.

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I mean, if you think about it a little bit, I'm going to go to London here in a few weeks, and if we go to the

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British Museum, where they've, by the way, the Brits are very, I guess, they're very, what's the word

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I'm looking for, they're engineer savvy and all that, because they went around the world, you know, when they were the empire, and they stole stuff and brought it all back to this museum.

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Am I being recorded? They have thousands, tens of thousands, you know,

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I mean, entire steels that they've taken from, you know, these places in the Mideast and stuff like that, you know, huge walls that they just removed the front of and brought back to London, but all kinds of things like that, tens of thousands of them.

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Now, imagine that they were to advertise themselves as having tens of thousands of artificial artifacts, you know, nobody would go there, right,

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I mean, that's not really going to impress them, or how about this, you tell your friends,

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I don't know why I want to say your Bible believing friends, you tell your friends, hey, I once saw the Fab Four in concert.

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Really? You saw the Beatles in concert? No, the Fab Four, that, you know, imitation

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Beatles band, you know, that tribute band, is that going to impress people? They really sound like the

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Beatles. Okay, great. That's imitation, that's, you know, the faux

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Beatles, the fab faux, you know. Thank you. Thank you very much. But there are times when it's good to be an imitator.

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The Bible calls us to be imitators. For example, in Ephesians 5, it says, be imitators of God.

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That doesn't mean to be a fake God, it means to follow after Him, to try to imitate

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His characteristics. Hebrews 13, 17 says, remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God, consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith.

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1 Corinthians 11, 1 says, Paul writes this, he says, be imitators of me as I am of Christ.

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So being an imitator isn't always a bad thing, can be a good thing. And this morning,

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I think what I want us to see is that imitating Christ in the manner of the way

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He loves us as believers is a good thing. We want to love others as Christ has loved and does love us.

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So with that said, we're going to start reading John chapter 13. I'm going to start in verse 21 to give us some context and then read to the end of the chapter.

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After saying these things, Jesus was troubled in His spirit and testified, Truly, truly,

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I say to you, one of you will betray me. The disciples looked at one another, uncertain of whom

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He spoke. One of His disciples, whom Jesus loved, was reclining at a table at Jesus' side.

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So Simon Peter motioned to him to ask Jesus of whom he was speaking. So that disciple, leaning back against Jesus, said to him,

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Lord, who is it? Jesus answered, It is he to whom

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I will give this morsel of bread when I have dipped it. So when he had dipped the morsel, he gave it to Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot.

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Then after he had taken the morsel, Satan entered into him. Jesus said to him,

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What you are going to do, do quickly. Now no one at the table knew why he had said this to him.

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Some thought that because Judas had the money bag, Jesus was telling him, Buy what we need for the feast, or that he would give something to the poor.

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So after receiving the morsel of bread, he immediately went out, and it was night.

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That's where we left off last time. When he had gone out, Jesus said,

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Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him.

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If God is glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and glorify him at once.

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Little children, yet a little while I am with you. You will seek me, and just as I said to the

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Jews, so now I will say to you, Where I am going, you cannot come.

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A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.

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By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.

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Simon Peter said to him, Lord, where are you going? Jesus answered him,

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Where I am going, you cannot follow me now, but you will follow afterward.

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Peter said to him, Lord, why can I not follow you now? I will lay down my life for you.

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Jesus answered, Will you lay down your life for me? Truly, truly,

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I say to you, the rooster will not crow till you have denied me three times.

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Now, we're in the upper room discourse, so called, because they're in an upper room.

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They're in Jerusalem, in a place that they probably rented or borrowed for the evening.

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They're celebrating the Passover. This is a supper celebrating the beginning of Passover.

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And we're really in the last few hours of Jesus' mortal existence. And he's spending his time with the disciples, just equipping them, preparing them, for what is to come in the next few hours and even in the next few days.

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Because he is going to leave them, even as he said here. He's going to die. And we know from the context here, the beginning of the chapter, that his goal here was to do what?

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To love them to the very end. In other words, as long as he could be with them, he was going to love them and shepherd them through this time.

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If you recall, in chapter 13, Jesus had washed the feet of his disciples, both as an object lesson in how they ought to serve one another, and also as a picture of the spiritual cleansing that he would perform on each and every believer when he went to the cross.

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That he would cleanse them of all their sin by dying for their sins. And Judas Iscariot, as we just read, had been identified as the traitor.

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The one who had betrayed Jesus. And in fact, Jesus actually encouraged

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Judas to get on with it. You know, we read that and we say, what you do, do quickly, as if he should just walk a little faster or get out of Jesus' side or whatever.

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But the idea is that Jesus was not anxious, but he wanted to speed

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Judas up to get him in line with the time frame that God had laid out.

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And this morning, we're going to explore really, I think, a great subject. The love of the

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Lord Jesus Christ for his people. And ultimately, it's amazing how the reading,

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Scott's prayer, beautiful song by Lisa, how it all just ties in together because this really is about the love of Jesus Christ.

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And when I entitled this message, The Standard of Love, I really wanted to be like, not just the standard that Jesus set, but kind of like the word standard can also mean a flag.

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And it ought to be our flag, this love that we are to have for one another. And it means nothing more than imitating

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Christ, than viewing one another the way he views us.

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And I want to be clear about this. You and I are not explicitly in this text, right? He's talking to the disciples. However, the truths in this passage apply just as much to us, to those who are in Christ today, as they did to the disciples on that night.

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And I'm going to leave some of this text, or I'm going to deal with some of this text very lightly.

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And there's a reason for that. And that reason is because my intention, Lord willing, in the weeks that come, and there'll be a couple weeks where I'm gone here, but I want to deal with,

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Jesus deals with his disciples with some of their issues and some of their questions. And he deals with them, basically

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Peter, as we saw in this text. And then he's going to talk, or he's going to answer

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Thomas' issues and then Philip's issues. So we're going to see him deal with three individuals.

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But I wanted to really highlight this text this morning. This morning, basically, I'm going to go through several verses, but I'm going to camp out on 34 and 35.

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But this morning we're going to see three aspects of the love of Jesus so that we might understand the standard that he has set for us.

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And then I want to look at, basically, at true and false, what is true and what is false about the love of Christ, what it means, what it doesn't mean, and really kind of get into some application.

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We don't do a whole lot of application, but I thought it would be good to use some application for this passage.

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So, got it? Good. Let's go. First aspect of the love of Christ, the love of Jesus for his own, that is to say for the elect, for his followers, glorifies the

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Godhead. The love Jesus has for his own glorifies the

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Godhead. Now, first notice in verse 31 that Judas, as we said earlier, is gone.

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But John kind of reiterates that at the beginning of verse 31. He says, when he had gone out, and that he is

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Judas. When he had gone out, and he says, John writes somewhat dramatically, with like a double meaning, it was night.

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Not only was it evening, but there was a darkness about Judas. Satan had entered him.

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He was a very dark individual. It was night. But when he had gone out, now the clock is ticking.

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There's always like an emphasis on time in this passage. Why? Because we're really talking about hours before Judas leads the

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Jews to arrest Jesus. Jesus is tried and then crucified. I mean, we're talking about this is like Thursday evening.

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And by Friday, he's going to be crucified. Saturday he's going to be in the tomb, and Sunday he's going to be raised.

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So we're just talking about a very short period of time over the next several chapters. And this is kind of a purge of sorts.

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When you think of purge, first thing I think about, I don't know about you guys, but when I think of purge, I think of the old

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Soviet Union and how they used to purge people, remove them out of the Politburo, just kick them out and throw them in prison.

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This is a purging of the one unbeliever. You know, there are 12 disciples in Jesus, and now the only unbelieving disciple is gone from them.

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He's the only one that Jesus is not going to die for, the only one that the Father has not elected, the only one whom the

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Father will not seal to the day of redemption. This is the unclean elements has now been purged from their midst.

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Also notice that really Jesus is glorified, and the text tells us, in his humiliation.

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Look again at verse 31. Jesus said, Now, now is the

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Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him. This is so contrary to the way we would think about it.

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We'd go, this is terrible. Judas just left. We should have stopped him, first of all, right? If I knew somebody was going to betray me, would

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I just let him walk off and betray me? Jesus does that because it's all part of the plan.

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But how could it be that now, again, notice that little time element, now Jesus is glorified.

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Jesus, how is he glorified in this? Because he submitted to the will of the Father. He, you know, even knowing what he knows, you know, there must have been just a moment where he thought, well, should

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I stop him? The answer is no. He submitted to the will of his Father. And he turned to preparing those that the

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Father had entrusted to him. These were the 11 men, so to speak, that he was going to build his church upon.

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These were the, as feeble as they are at times, these are the men who are going to establish the church.

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And knowing what Judas was going to do, he had to consciously decide he would do nothing to stop him. In other words, the all -powerful creator willingly proceeded to the cross because he loved those who would be the beneficiaries, because he loved them enough to die for them, and he sought to glorify the

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Father who sent him. Also notice in verse 32, in his crucifixion,

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Jesus will be glorified. In just a few hours, as he goes to the cross, he's going to be glorified.

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If God is glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and glorify him at once.

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Again, notice the time element, at once. The first verse, or the first word of that verse, if.

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It's used in the same sense as since, because this isn't a contingency. If God is glorified in him,

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God was glorified. So we could read it, since God is glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself.

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Notice that it says he's glorified in him. That is to say, in Jesus, not by him.

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It is in the very actions and the attitude of Jesus that the Father is glorified. He is glorified in the sense that his greatness, that is to say the greatness of God, is put on full display.

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How do you glorify something? You set it on full display. How do you put the humility, the love of Jesus Christ on full display?

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By having him submit to something as humiliating as being betrayed by Judas, being arrested, being tried unjustly, and then sent to the cross.

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Since the Father is glorified in the willing humiliation and crucifixion of the Son, so he will glorify the

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Son in the very near future by doing what? By raising him from the dead and seating him at his right hand.

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Hendrickson says this, he says, Whenever we think of Christ's suffering, we never know what to admire most, whether it be the voluntary self -surrender of the

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Son to such a death for such people, or the willingness of the

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Father to give up such a Son to such a death for such people.

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Which is greater? And the answer is yes. Which is greater, the submission of the

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Son, or the willingness of the Father to send his Son to such a horrible end, ultimately for the good of his people?

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And this is the love of God for his people. How much does he love them? He loves them enough to send his

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Son, and the Son loves them enough to die for them and to be humiliated for them.

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So that's the first aspect. The second aspect, the love of Jesus for his own is expressed.

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It's expressed, it's said, and it will be demonstrated. Look at verse 33,

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Little children, yet a little while I am with you. Now this is interesting because with the full knowledge of what was ahead for him, and how it would impact his disciples, those he loved, this is the only time in the

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Gospels that Jesus uses this Greek word that's translated here, little children.

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And it's like, I don't know about you, I mean, I love my kids, even though they're grown up now.

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I love my grandkids, but even, you know, no secret, we were at Storyland last week, and I would just see other little kids, and sometimes, you know, unless they were really being obnoxious or whatever,

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I just love little kids. And it's that same kind of affection for little children, that's what this term is meant to express, that just like little kids, you just love them.

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Why? Because they're just lovable. And he just wants them to know that he loves them.

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So he calls them little children. This is like, well, I'll get to that in a minute, but it's just this term of affection.

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It's just like, you know, just like you want to hug a little child. This is the idea. And it's impossible for me to read this and to not just think about the affection that Jesus has for the disciples as he goes through this whole thing, his concern for them.

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Never for himself. Always for them. These men are dear to them.

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He chose them. He prayed with them. He traveled with them. He ate with them. He faced down mobs with them.

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But he poured his life into them for more than three years.

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And then, now, he's going to pour his life out for them. And when

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Judas showed his true colors and left, so did these 11.

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By doing what? By staying. They stayed, you know, when every other disciple left, they stayed.

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These are his men. These are the ones he's going to use to change the world.

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He also shows his compassion for them. In the second half of 33, he says, You will seek me.

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And just as I said to the Jews, so now I also say to you where I'm going, you cannot come. This isn't meant in some kind of like na -na -na -na way.

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He's saying, after I'm gone, after I die, you guys are going to miss me. And you're not going to be able to come to me.

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We're not going to be able to talk. You know, there's not going to be the physical presence of Jesus. When he said that to the

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Jews, and it was back in chapter 8, he said something else, and it is significant. Let me just read

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John 8, verse 21. So he said to them again, I am going away, and you will seek me.

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Same, right? But listen, and you will die in your sins. Where I am going, you cannot come.

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I mean, that's pretty major. You will die in your sins. He doesn't say that to the disciples. Why? Because they're not going to die in their sins.

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He's going to the cross. He is going to die for their sins so that they won't. How does he love his disciples?

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Over and above, you know, any love that he had for the nation of Israel or anything else, because he's going to die for their sins.

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But they are going to acutely miss Jesus, his physical presence.

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How do we know that? Because what happens when he dies? They just fall to pieces.

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They go their own separate ways. A third aspect of the love of Jesus, the love of Jesus for his own, commanded.

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In other words, he commands this love, and we'll see that here in a minute.

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Something new, he says in verse 34, a new commandment I give to you. And this is somewhat confusing.

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You know, if you think about loving one another, wasn't that already commanded? In other words, if I read you these verses, you'd say, yeah, why is this new?

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Listen, Leviticus 19, 18. You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

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I am the Lord, right? Love your neighbor as yourself. Matthew 22, 39.

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Remember, the first commandment is love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength and might and all that.

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But 39, and a second is like it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

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So we've already got these commands, right? Not exactly. And we should know that just from the word new, because it's the only time in the gospel of John that he uses this word new.

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It's not like he says, you have heard it said, but I say to you. He says, this is a whole new thing. This is of another kind.

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Something that has not been commanded before. Now, when you think again about how he's waited until Judas is gone, now it makes a little more sense.

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This isn't a general love. This is only for whom? For the disciples, for the believers, for those who follow

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Jesus Christ. It's not a reiteration of a commandment, an older, already given commandment.

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This is a new one, not to love all of mankind, but to love fellow believers.

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It's taking that previous command to a whole other level. And it's something to be imitated.

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Look at verse 34 again, the second half of it. That you love one another, and listen, just as I have loved you, you are also to love one another.

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So again, this is love commanded for the community of believers. But look at how high the bar is set.

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They were to love one another just as, in the same way, at that same level, as what?

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As Jesus loved them. And so we are to love one another, those in the body of Christ, just as Jesus has loved us.

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Leon Morris, biblical scholar and commentator, says this, he says, the new thing appears to be the mutual affection that Christians have for one another, listen, on account of Christ's great love for them.

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A community has been created on the basis of Christ's work for us, and there is a new relationship within that community.

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In other words, because Jesus has loved us in a special, sacrificial, redeeming way, we are to love one another, those whom he has purchased in a special and new way.

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And this is identified for us here in verse 35. It is a way that we will be identified throughout the world.

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Verse 35, By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.

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This is our flag. This is our standard. This should be the billboard. This should be the only sign we need out in front of the church.

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We don't need any, you know, phony kind of cool slogans out there. It would be right if the slogan outside the church said two things, you know, we preach the word, and the second one would be what?

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We love one another. He says, that's how you're going to be known. By this all people will know, the whole world will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.

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John, the beloved disciple, well, how did it impact him? Let's turn to 1 John 4.

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How did it impact John? When you listen to what I'm about to read, you'll just go, well, this is just like, this is him preaching a sermon about this verse.

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And I'm going to start reading chapter 4, verse 7. And I just want to stop before I even read the first word.

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Beloved. I start my emails a lot of times with that, and the only times I don't, by the way, is when

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I'm like, okay, this needs to go out now, and I'm on my iPhone, and I just can't, you know, I can't iPhone.

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So, it's a verb I just made up. Beloved.

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Why beloved? Because we are to love one another. Why? Because we are in Christ. This is, he's addressing believers here, nobody else.

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You know, if you read that word, and you're not moved by it, you should be. Why? Because it's like, it's not code language, but it should tell you that who he's talking to are our genuine adopted brothers and sisters in Christ.

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Those who have been brought in by the power of God into the same family. So that we are adopted, so that we can look at each other and say, you really are my brother, you really are my sister, because you love the same

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Lord, you have the same Father. Praise the Lord. You are beloved.

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I love you. Why? Because God loved you first. Because Jesus loved you first.

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Because he died for you. So you are beloved. That's why I start my emails like that.

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There you go. Okay, starting in verse 7. Beloved. Let us love one another.

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For love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know

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God, because God is love. You want to know a mark of a Christian? He loves other

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Christians. Verse 9, In this, the love of God was made manifest among us.

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It was displayed. It was put on full display. That God sent His only

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Son into the world so that we might live, that is to say, we might have spiritual life through Him.

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In this is love. Not that we have loved God, but that He loved us. We often say,

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God goes first. He has to go first. He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins, the satisfaction for our sins.

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Beloved, if God so loved us, and He did, it's so since, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

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No one has ever seen God. True, because God is Spirit. If we love one another,

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God abides in us and His love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us because He has given us of His Spirit.

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And we have seen and testified that the Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world. Listen, whoever confesses that Jesus is the

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Son of God, God abides in him and He in God. In other words, if you really believe, if you say that Jesus is the

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Son of God and you really believe it, then God abides in you and He in God. So we have come to know and to believe that the love of God or the love that God has for us,

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God is love and whoever abides in love abides in God and God abides in Him.

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By this is love perfected with us so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment because as He is, so also we are in this world.

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How are we going to have confidence on the day of judgment because God has loved us perfectly and has granted us that love.

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Verse 18, There is no fear in love but perfect love casts out fear for fear has to do with punishment and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.

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On judgment day, you will not fear God. Why won't you? Because you'll have the full realization of His love for you.

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Verse 19, We love because He first loved us. If anyone says, I love

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God and hates his brother, he is a liar for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love

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God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from Him, whoever loves God must also love his brother.

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John reminds us that anyone who does not love other Christians has not experienced the love of God.

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He has not been born again. No one can say, I love God, I've been born again,

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I'm redeemed by God and yet hate his brother or sister in Christ.

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He also reminds us, and by the way, the parallel there, the parallelism that's used, it's not like hate.

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It's, he says hate but then he also says love. So there's this concept of taking it to an extreme just so that you understand that if, that we ought to, basically to boil it all down, if we don't love our brother and sister in Christ, then we don't love

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God. He also reminds us of why we must love each other because Jesus was sent to pay the price for our sins and remove the wrath of God forever.

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When we look around this room, when we look around the sanctuary, what, here's what we should see.

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We should see other sinners forgiven by grace. But even more, we should see brothers and sisters adopted, brought into the same household by the same glorious and gracious Father who adopted us because we are in Christ Jesus.

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We love one another because God loved us first and gave us hearts with default settings of love for other

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Christians. You know, if you have a, if you have a program and you go in and you change the default settings, well, it changes the behavior of the program.

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Our default setting, when we get saved, is to love other Christians. I, I can't, you know, just as on a personal note, and I've kind of, may have mentioned this before, but when

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I went from unsaved to saved, I was working in the jail. And I'll never forget it because I used to do everything

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I could to obstruct the chaplains who would come in. I mean, I would just delay and obstruct.

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you know, I was, anyway, I, I, I, I was a roadblock to them and I didn't really,

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I thought it was all a big waste of time. I didn't care about what the inmates were doing or anything else. After I get saved,

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I, I remember working, because I was working 16 hours on a Sunday by schedule, not by desire or anything like that.

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And I wanted the, the chaplain to keep the, the, the inmates would go into this day room where they would hold church services and sing and stuff like that.

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And I'm like, could you just leave that open? Because I just want to hear the singing. You know, could you just leave it open?

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Because I want to hear these men testify of God's goodness to them. I didn't, I didn't hate them anymore.

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I, I wanted, you know, I wanted to share in their experiences. I didn't know if all of them were saved or not, but I knew some of them were.

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And I wanted to hear what they were saying. I wanted to be part of it. It, it was a complete change of attitude.

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And that's what God does. Our default setting then is on love. When we go, when we travel around the world, if you travel around the world, if you travel around the state, if you move to the other side of Worcester, and you go to another church, right?

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If you visit people who love the Lord Jesus Christ, your default setting is to love them.

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Because they love Jesus. You've all been redeemed by Jesus. We're all brothers and sisters.

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John has a message for those who don't. If you don't love your brother and sister in Christ, and you say you love

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God, John's message is what? He'd like to lean right over into your ear if he were here this morning and say, you say you love

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God, whom you cannot see, but you don't love your brother and sister in Christ.

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Whom you can't see. You're a liar. Love one another.

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Love your brother and sister in Christ. Now let's talk about what the love of Christ is not.

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Let's talk about what it is not. It's not a feeling. In John chapter 13, in the beginning of the chapter, where it says

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Jesus loved them to the end. He wasn't emoting to the cross. He was taking action.

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He was equipping them. He was loving them, it says. He was pouring out his life into them and for them.

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He served them. This is love. Love is not emotion. Love is action.

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If you say that you love your wife, if you say that you love your kids, and you do nothing for them, they don't believe you.

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If you say that you love your brothers and sisters in Christ, and you do nothing for them, I'll leave it to you.

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Is that love? I don't think it is. Sometimes, you know, people say, well, you know, this church, you and Mike, and the elders here are not very loving, because you talk about what you're against, you know, and not just what you're for.

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It's not loving to point out error. It's not loving to point out false teaching. All I can say about that is the

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Bible says that we're to do both. The Bible says that we're to exhort in sound doctrine, this is

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Titus 1 .9, and refute those who contradict it. Jesus himself, you know,

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I mean, you want to talk about not being loving, I guess Jesus wasn't loving in Matthew 23, when he said, woe to you scribes, hypocrites,

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Pharisees, you know, and he's just like, woe, woe, woe, woe, and he just slams them. You should read, go home and read

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Matthew 23. Jesus was very loving in what he was saying to them, because it was all true.

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Matthew 23, there's your homework for the week. Being known as tellers of truth does not make us unloving.

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In fact, the most unloving church is, think about this, what is the most unloving thing a church can do?

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To gather unbelievers together, right? Have them sit right there, tell them that they're good enough, they're wonderful, and they should stay just the way they are, or maybe make little tweaks in their life and make their life a little bit better.

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And then what happens one day? They face the judge, right?

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And they say, well, I went to church all the time, I heard how to be a better neighbor, I worked on my marriage,

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I worked on being a better parent. Where's the gospel in that? Being good is not a defense.

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Being good is not what we want to teach you, because being good won't get you anywhere.

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Being in Christ is what you need. Love also is not based on race.

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This just really bothers me, you know, this, I mean, it makes me sick when I think about how Scripture has been twisted for centuries to justify various racial theories.

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You know, when we read about Revelation, what do we see? We see, you know, people of every race and every, you know, every color, every nation, every tribe and kindred and tongue are going to be in heaven.

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God doesn't respect all that stuff. He doesn't inspect people on the basis of their race or their ethnicity or whatever.

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So why would we? Galatians 3 .28, it's clear that all are equal in Christ.

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We're all equally sinners, all equally in need of redemption and all equally brothers and sisters in Christ.

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To claim any kind of racial superiority for any race is a slap in the face of God, and it has no grounding in Scripture.

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It's also not based on wealth or health. And this is the home of much false teaching, but, you know,

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James tells us not to not to prefer people who have wealth. All these kind of things, all these conditions are just they are not loving and they're not things that we should consider when we're talking about loving one another.

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And may I just say quickly that love of Christ, love for one another is not exhibited by gossip, by backbiting, by doing all these things.

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You know, even saying, and I'll get to this in a minute, but saying things that are true, right?

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What's the purpose of saying them? And I'm going to get to that in a minute. Gossip is destructive and it is not loving.

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In fact, it is the very opposite of love. And there's almost nothing that gets me going more than people who just want to tear other people down.

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We ought not to be quick to jump to the worst possible conclusion about other people. We ought to be, you know,

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I could go into all the one another's, how we ought to be forbearing and patient and hoping and all the best of people.

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But suffice to say, that's what love is not, any of those things. Let's talk about what love, the love of Jesus is.

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First of all, it's humble. We think of the humility of Christ and how he willingly submitted to the plan of the

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Father. We could go to Philippians 2 and we would see that what Paul says, that we ought to consider others more highly than ourselves.

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It's pretty basic, but do we do it? If I were to sit down,

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I mean, I think we all fail in this, but if I were to ask you to sit down and just make a list of all the ways that you serve others at BBC or that you consider others more important than yourself, could you do it?

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And that's what love is. You know, if you sit down there and you go, I can't really think of any way that I serve anybody else or that I prefer anybody else.

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I can't tell you that you don't love believers. I could just tell you that maybe you, me,

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I think we could all do better. Do you consider others, other believers, more highly than you consider your own comfort, your leisure time, your desire to eat the best stuff at the

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Pot Providence? I couldn't resist that one. I love you, brother, but I have to get in front of you in the line.

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Sorry. Do you bear the burdens of others?

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Do you want to bear the burdens of others? Do you seek fellowship with other believers? These things are all indicators of loving the brothers and sisters in Christ.

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Love also speaks the truth. We must be honest with one another. We do no favors to our brothers and sisters by failing to be truthful, honest with them.

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But it's also important that we season that with love. Truth is great, but it must be delivered with the best interest of the person that we're talking to.

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Just a couple other notes that I wrote down here. It is forgiving. It is forgiving.

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I want to read just from, it was interesting that my brother Scott went to Ephesians 4 because I thought, you know what,

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I want to go to Ephesians 4 too, but I want to go to Ephesians 4 starting in verse 29. These are like some of the most, read

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Matthew 23, but then I wish everybody would just memorize verses 29 to 32 because this is, in essence, and Paul's instruction here is to a church body, but just listen to this and think about what our church body could be like if this is how we lived.

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Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, edifying, building up one another as fits the occasion that it may give grace to those who hear.

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And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God by whom you were seated or sealed for the day of redemption.

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Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you along with all malice.

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And then listen, be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you.

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And I've preached and I've preached and I've preached about forgiveness. We need to do this.

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This is where we need to live. This is church life right here. Let's be kind to one another.

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Let's say edifying things. Let's be forgiving. Why? Because we've been purchased with a price and part of that price not only was our sin, but also our conduct and how we ought to treat one another, how we ought to think about one another.

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God commands it. Our Savior commands it. You know, churches today are just so clever.

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I mean, they really are clever. They have all these really cool programs. I mean, I'm constantly seeing these conferences where they're going to tell us how to do things right and to really pack the place out and grow and experience, you know, things that we've never experienced before.

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Churches today have mastered the ways of attracting and retaining attenders.

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They want people to come and feel comfortable to enjoy the experience. We disagree.

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We want to exalt Christ by preaching His Word and to equip you for the work of ministry, which includes exhibiting the love of Christ for one another.

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Our calling card is not our musical style. It's not the way we dress up here in the pulpit. It's not the practiced or the practical nature of our sermons.

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Our calling card is, Lord willing, by the grace of God, our faithfulness to Christ and to His Word and our love for one another.

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And I have to say, the first part of that is on us, right? We're the only ones who can teach and preach the

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Bible because we're the ones up here week after week. But loving one another, being known as a church that loves one another, this is on you.

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Now, I think we do a pretty good job, but I think we could improve.

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I mean, have you failed to love others here at the church body? I know I have. So what's the good news?

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The good news is that Jesus never failed. He loved those who were His own to the end. And the good news is,

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Jesus Christ died for the sin of failing to love one another as we should.

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He was raised on the third day. That is our hope. We are forgiven because we are in Christ.

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So what do we do then? Well, if we're failing to do things rightly, we need to think rightly. We need to think about how we've been forgiven and everything else.

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Then we need to repent, keep on believing in the

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Lord Jesus Christ, and then say to myself, ourselves, collectively, I want to love better.

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I want to care more about my brothers and sisters in Christ. I want to help them.

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I want to come alongside them. I want to serve them. I want to prefer them over me. And in that way,

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I want to honor the Lord who bought and paid for me. Let's close in prayer. Father, the love of Christ, who can measure it?

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The truth is we can't. When we read it, who can even fathom it? Who can plumb its depths?

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And as we think about how You loved us and sent

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Your Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and how He loved us, gave Himself up for us, died on the cross, and how the

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Holy Spirit loves us and seals us and abides in us, that we might honor

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You with our lives and with our thoughts. Father, we confess that we often fall short.

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Father, we pray for the day when the reputation of Bethlehem Bible Church is such that we could just put a sign out front that says we love one another and have people say that is a place where they have an odd and peculiar love for one another.

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They prefer one another in ways that it's supernatural.

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We are by nature selfish.

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Lord, help us to overcome that, to go outside of ourselves, to by the grace of God and for His sake, for His glory, love one another as the