"If you love me..."

Intro/Context

We are continuing our study of John. Now this gospel is a biography of Jesus’ life from the point of view of John the apostle, not John the Baptist. This book was written to a mix of Jew and Gentile audience. We left off at chapter 14 which is part of a long dialogue that starts right outside the house where Jesus washed the disciples feet, and it is the middle of the night. This conversation seems to continue on at the end of chapter 14 to a traveling discussion as they were walking to the Garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus is betrayed. This seems to be the case from the way that John quotes Jesus calling the disciples to get up and move at the end of the chapter. You can observe when seeing how Jesus interacts with His disciples in not just preaching sermons to them, but also talking with them, teaching, and answering their questions that getting a sermon once a week was not enough for their spiritual development. They needed time to think through and be taught biblical teachings. This is something that, should be practiced in all of our walks with Christ.

Today’s Scripture we will be talking about what it means if you love Jesus, and the things that God does for us because of and in response to our relationship. Which will be built on more so as we continue into John 15 next week, but for we will reread the scripture John14:15-31.

Body

Read John 14:15–31

John 14:15–31 ESV

“If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. Yet a little while and the world will see me no more, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him.” Judas (not Iscariot) said to him, “Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us, and not to the world?” Jesus answered him, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. And the word that you hear is not mine but the Father’s who sent me. “These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. You heard me say to you, ‘I am going away, and I will come to you.’ If you loved me, you would have rejoiced, because I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. And now I have told you before it takes place, so that when it does take place you may believe. I will no longer talk much with you, for the ruler of this world is coming. He has no claim on me, but I do as the Father has commanded me, so that the world may know that I love the Father. Rise, let us go from here.

Looking at the passage, verses 15-17 really set the foundation on what this passage is about. In verse 15 we should notice the order of the statement being made. “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” It does not say keep my commandments so that you may prove that you love Me. Why? Are not our works evidence of our faith? Of course! But our works don’t make us right with God. Some versions of this text make it more commanding by not putting in the “you will” into verse 15, but I think that can make things messy. As someone whose flesh tends to lean toward legalism and rules, if I read that, my mind goes toward, “I need to do more, so that God will be happy with me.” That’s me mixing up the order. We need to love God, so that He will work in us and through us to build His Kingdom. We can get so focused on doing deeds for God, that we forget to actually worship Him for who He is, which is the reason we are doing these things in the first place.

Verse 16 shows us how God will help us to not mess these things up, like we have a tendency to. Immediately after a verse talking about obedience we are given a verse about a helper, advocate, counselor, or comforter depending on the version you are using. If you notice in some of your translations, this word may also be capitalized and we see why in the beginning of verse 17. We are talking about the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth, one member of the divine triune God who comes along side us to show us how to walk and guides us in the teachings of Christ. The Greek word for the Spirit here is Parakletos, which uses all the terms advocate, counselor, helper, or comforter interchangeably. All of these terms are true about the Spirit, and can all make sense here, but the two words that seem to make the most sense are Helper and Counselor. We see the Spirit not necessarily advocating for us in the text here, but we do see teaching and reminding in verse 26. Why does it matter that the Spirit is sent to dwell in us? This was the prayer and hope of Moses in the Old Testament, Numbers 11:29 “But Moses said to him, “Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, that the Lord would put his Spirit on them!”” The Spirit came upon all the priests that were to help Moses lead God’s people. The Spirit would come upon the disciples, just as Jesus says in verse 17, but after Jesus death they then receive the Holy Spirit and he dwells within them. This promise is also true to all believers after the death of Christ. This was one of the reasons for His death that a member of the Divine trinity lives within all believers of Christ.

This shows two radical truths clearly through this work. To illustrate these truths I will give an example to help explain them better. In sci-fi movies people who get very physically hurt sometimes use cybernetics or robotics to help people fix their physical needs like a robotic limb or a robotic exoskeleton so that they can regain the movement they have lost, and sometimes gain more abilities. These pieces of technology are usually technically advanced and really quite marvelous for the characters, but there’s also a reality that these people need such a wonderful and complicated piece of machinery to do basic tasks and that they know if this tech didn’t exist there would be no way to do the things they can do now. This is the truth about our spiritual condition as well. We are blessed and gracious to have a wonderful God who gives His Son for us, to live the perfect life, and die a horrible death, to be raised on the third day, and ascend into heaven, and not only that, but allows the Spirit to live with us so that we might be able to be saved and continue being saved throughout our life. Praise God! But the fact is, that all those wonderful things had to happen for us to be saved. That’s how wretched we are without Christ. We need to be given a member of the Godhead, just for us to live sanctified lives. Jesus had to die horribly on a cross, so that our awful sins could be forgiven. The truth of God’s amazing grace and not withholding good things for those who love Him, and the wicked nature of all human beings is made evident through the cross and the Spirit’s work in our lives. The Spirit’s intercession builds on the fact that Jesus isn’t telling us to work harder, but to love Him more.

So, why is Jesus telling the disciples all these things that are going to happen? Why right before His death? There’s a few reasons. He does this to show that Jesus isn’t abandoning them. In verses 18-21 Jesus explains that He will be gone, but that He will live within them through the Spirit. That the sign that those who love Him are the ones who keeps His commandments. This is to show that the works are not the ends of the goal of our relationship with God, but an outpouring result of it. Jesus is actually showing this as He himself is showing love to the disciples. He has just washed their feet in the previous chapter, and is now explaining what will be happening in the short time in the future. That they shouldn’t be disheartened, even when failure eventually does come. This is where I think that these words were not necessarily meant for them for the events of the next couple of days, but long after His passing. When the troubles of the early church fall upon the disciples and they are being persecuted that during these times the Spirit would remind them of Jesus’s words in their tribulation, so that they would strive toward the prize that is Christ even toward their ending breath.

He also stated these things, so that they would believe in Christ by these words. He states this in verse 29. That they would remember the works of Christ, and hold fast to the promises that He made to them and all followers of Christ to come after.

Conclusion

If we love Christ, we will obey His commandments as evidence of Christ’s death and resurrection and the Spirit’s working on our lives. Church, as we go on this week, we should reflect in ourselves to see that Christ is using us for His works. That we are following the commandments in Christ. We should evaluate where we fall short, where we mess up, and where we are dangerously close to grievous and deadly sins. We also need to evaluate our works to see that we are in Christ. If we say that we are in Christ, but we see no growth of affection, no works of His grace, and we see growing apathy toward sin and disobedience, then maybe we need to evaluate if we truly are in Christ. If we see growth toward Christ in day to day life, but see a few stumbling blocks, then brothers and sisters remove those blocks so that we may do greater and greater works for God. That our neighbors might believe our testimonies about God by His reflection in our works,. That He might use us to provide for those around us or for those who are within the church. Martin Luther once said, “God doesn’t need our good works, but your neighbor does.” We are the hands and feet of Christ. We are to do His work on this earth, but not us but Christ in us. Seek God first, love Him, and let Him make you clean, so that you may work and work abundantly for the Kingdom. May your works be seen by your neighbors and let the Spirit working in your evangelism and spiritual conversations, all so that we may be part of the great commission Jesus commands us. Let us pray.