Sermon Tone Analysis

A New Command

Our Passover Lamb tells us in John 12 why He has come into the world, why He has done all to accomplish the work He was given by the Father, and how soon He will be lifted up for the forgiveness of the world’s sins.

Jesus Came to Save the World

And Jesus cried out and said, “Whoever believes in me, believes not in me but in him who sent me.

And whoever sees me sees him who sent me.

I have come into the world as light, so that whoever believes in me may not remain in darkness.

If anyone hears my words and does not keep them, I do not judge him; for I did not come to judge the world but to save the world.

The one who rejects me and does not receive my words has a judge; the word that I have spoken will judge him on the last day.

For I have not spoken on my own authority, but the Father who sent me has himself given me a commandment—what to say and what to speak.

And I know that his commandment is eternal life.

What I say, therefore, I say as the Father has told me.” - JOHN 12:44-50

And then Jesus gives us His commandment, from which we take the name Maundy for tonight’s remembrance of Him and the call with which He left His people - 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.

The Psalmists tell us of God’s abounding, steadfast love that is rich in mercy, full of grace, and enduring forever.

We learn in God’s word that He is Himself love and He has been working throughout time in such powerful, unstoppable love to work the redemption of His lost people, to work the loving forgiveness of dead sinners, and and to work the loving transformation of God-haters and people-haters into lovers of God who go and love brothers and sisters like God has loved them.

And now Jesus speaks of this love, the love He has for His people and the love He wants His disciples to have for one another.

John 13:31-35 When he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him.

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

Little children, yet a little while I am with you.

You will seek me, and just as I said to the Jews, so now I also say to you, ‘Where I am going you cannot come.’

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.

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

“I have given you an example” Christ demonstrated what love we are Called to.

The Humblest of acts was to wash the feet of another person.

The disciples would of never of thought to was the feet of their peers, but yet Jesus being their teacher “knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going back to God” humbly shows what love they are called to.

It was an act that was deemed to lowly for a servant and was reserved for slaves, Yet Jesus bing from God humbled Himself to this lowly position.

His act of Humility is as unnecessary as it is stunning, and is simultaneously a display of love, a symbol of saving cleansing, and a model of Christian conduct.

John Piper “Let us not trifle with God or trivialize his love.

We will never stand in awe of being loved by God until we reckon with the seriousness of our sin and the justice wrath against us.

But when, by grace, we waken to our unworthiness, then we may look at the suffering and death of Christ and say (1 John4:10) “In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”

The question we face today is Have we been obedient to this new commandment?

Have loved as Christ has loved us? have we humbled ourselves in such a way as to follow in the footsteps of Christ?

How often have we zealously said “God I will do anything for you, I will go anywhere!”

and look back and see all the places God has gone and we never followed.

All the feet were called to wash but never humbled ourselves like the savior.

We fail even in this!

This humility that Christ showed by washing feet Came in light of the cross “Christ knew his hour had come,” and foreshadowed the humility Jesus would face on the cross- And also shows the cleansing we would have because of this humble act.

To truly understand the love of the cross we need to understand the depth of sin- We deserved Divine punishment, not divine sacrifice!

“I have heard it said, “God didn’t die for frogs.

So he was responding to our value as humans.”

This turns grace on its head.

We are worse off than frogs.

They have not sinned.

They have not rebelled and treated God with contempt of being inconsequential in their lives.

God did not have to die for frogs.

They aren’t bad enough.

We are.

Our debt is so great, only a divine sacrifice could pay it.

There is only one explantation for God’s sacrifice for us.

It is the as Eph 1:7, “for the riches of his grace.”

It’s all free.

It is not a response to our worth.

It is an overflow of his infinite worth.

In fact, that is what divine love is in the end: a passion to enthrall underserving sinners, at great cost, with what will make us supremely happy forever, namely His infinite beauty.”

This is the Love on display here as Christ (God) showed humbly washing the disgusting feet of men who were unworthy to even untie His sandals, and the same humble love that was showed as Christ hung on the cross washing the disgusting sin of men who didn’t deserve divine sacrifice, and finally it is the love which we are called to.

“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.

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