Love One Another
Easter • Sermon • Submitted
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Transcript
Welcome
Welcome
Welcome to the House of the Lord. Let us stand together and worship the Lord.
We continue this week as we have been for a couple of weeks, exploring the worship of the Lord from the Lectionary. Reform Baptists normally do not utilize a Lectionary - however, this was a normal function of the earliest church. Judaism was a lectionary religion, with standardized weekly reading s from the Old Testament - when the New Testament was being written by the Apostles, New Testament readings were added in. Eventually, some of the Old Testament readings had to be weeded down a little, as the Bible reading portions would have taken the better part of the day.
Let’s take a look at one of our first readings. This portion cycle is a little overwhelming, with a lot of readings. We have to narrow it a little or we too will be here all day. No Sunday cookout, and… we can’t have that.
John 13:31-35
John 13:31-35
31 Therefore when he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in Him; 32 if God is glorified in Him, God will also glorify Him in Himself, and will glorify Him immediately. 33 Little children, I am with you a little while longer. You will seek Me; and as I said to the Jews, now I also say to you, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come.’ 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. 35 By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
John 13 is of course to be found right after John 12. This is the beginning of the discourse in the Olive garden, or Gethsemane.
The arrest and trial of Jesus is about to happen in a few hours. Many of you have the passion of the Christ movie - let me just say it’s a wonderful film; however.
A lot of what you see there is so artistic license, we have to call it fan fiction.
What’s important is that this is one of the last discourses before His death, and that important messages are given here.
There’s a number of observations. Judas is gone. This means this discourse is not given indiscriminately to the church - it is given indiscriminately to the Elect. There were no tares among the apostles, the eleven remaining.
One of the first things I have to bring out from the text is verse 33. This is a reference to John 8:21
21 Then He said again to them, “I go away, and you will seek Me, and will die in your sin; where I am going, you cannot come.”
Notice what Christ does not say to the apostles: the words “die in your sins” is not present. These are the Elect. They are going to heaven, unlike those hearers in John 8. The Jews he said those words to were Reprobate. They were not elect. Christ is going into the underworld , which was split into two parts - the Bosom of Abraham, where the righteous awaited passage into Heaven - and Hades itself, the burning darkness.
Let me say this at the outset - one of the worst and most rebellious arguments I ever got into was in a Southern Baptist church, where the vast majority of the Sunday School class I was in believed Hell was some kind of time out. You sat in the corner in a dark room and cried, because you were separated from God.
These people apparently had never spoken to an argumentative atheist. No militant Atheist I’ve ever met would sit and a corner and grieve that they were separate from God in a dark room, nor would they just sit in a corner and cry.
Hell is not a time out. Hell is conscious, eternal torment. If you describe it as anything else, you’re arguing with Christ. In case you’re wondering how that argument turned out, they were so opposed to the concept of eternal torment I had to conclude that most of them would find out for themselves. Believers DO NOT reject the inerrancy and inspiration of Scripture. To make matters even worse, I discovered that some of the Sunday School class were showing outright evidence of reprobation - rebellion against a pastor is not a good sign. The Elect don’t do that continuously.
The third really bad sign was inability to read and comprehend Scripture - The natural man cannot understand Scripture. And I literally narrowed it down to the hair color of Jesus - I had them read the verses in Revelation 1:14
14 His head and His hair were white like white wool, like snow; and His eyes were like a flame of fire.
And I asked them - “What color is Jesus’ hair? What color are His eyes, post-Resurrection?”
I did this three times, and they kept saying. “I don’t know.”
That’s really a bad sign. In case you’re looking at that verse - I know you skipped ahead, no worries - His hair is white. His eyes the color of fire.
That’s what the Bible says. If you read that and still don’t see His hair is white - come see me Monday.
The second point I have to bring out from the text is the Glory of Christ. Now is Christ glorified.
Why?
Christ has always been glorified. His glory is from eternity to eternity. If Christ did not veil His glory, the apostles would have been burned away into ash simply from His power and glory. It’s no joke He told Moses, “you can’t see my full glory and live.”
Think of it being a trillion amps generated through a five amp fuse. Poof.
But Christ considers this His glory - His proceeding forth to suffer and die that we may live.
I can’t for the life of me reconcile that fully. I know He says it. I know He seriously means it. But I know who I am. Christ is seeing His own righteousness when He looks at us. That’s the only way I can reconcile this in my mind.
We are so unworthy.
He alone is worthy.
And that’s why He is glorified. He paid a debt He did not owe, we owed a debt we could not pay.
Christ is glorified.
My third point is this: The understanding of Agapete αγαπετε. Love.
In American culture, love has come to taken the meaning of a fuzzy emotion. As long as you feel a warm glow for other Christians, that’s how Americans interpret love.
Love Biblically is expressed as an action - how we treat one another. Preferring others to ourselves, being in fellowship with, and serving one anther is three ways in which Christians show love for each other.
Not that I’m doing one of those “three amazing characteristics of brotherly love” sermons, where you pick a random number, a buzzworthy adjective and a Christian principle to get people to pay attention.
If we unite together, and treat each other as if we belong, that’s the first principle of love. It’s not the only way - every member of a Christ-denying cult does this well, probably better than Christians do. It’s because they have an “us vs. them” attitude, and it’s very easy to generate this when you’ve got a “thin red line” attitude. Jehovah’s Witnesses get this attitude very easy, because they perceive - incorrectly - that they are persecuted by Christians. In reality, we absolutely do not think about JW’s at all until they’re knocking at our door. This isn’t how we should go about it - we should serve (that’s attribute number two) JW’s by bringing them the truth that they’re denying God through advocating Arianism.
If we think of all of the Elect as family members, within the covenant of God, then we’re doing half of the first principle. The second half is the ACTION of treating them like they’re family members. This is not something 21st century Americans do well. We’re actually being trained by sociopaths in the Entertainment industry to self isolate and act like sociopaths. This kind of isolation should not be. We have to break the mindset of self isolation. Christians are a family of believers. And oh my goodness, cliques should not be present in any church of Jesus Christ. They are, but they should not be.
The second definition of Love is service to one another. I can remember old Christianity where Christians chose other Christians because we’re trying to keep the business in the family. We help one another. When someone in the church needs to move from one apartment to another, they should announce it at Church, and not have to hope they get enough help. There should be a group of ten willing to help. You wanted help when you moved - help when someone else needs to move.
The third definition of love is preferring one over yourself. Give of yourself. Put others first. To me, it was exciting when Wordsearch Bible software used to give away a book every week because after a while, they’d repeat free books and I already had them. That meant rejoicing that others could get the same free gift I’d gotten, instead of complaining they’d already given that away.
When we all give a few extra dollars to the benevolence fund, it means you’re putting this into practice. This means when those people call up who need help, we can help them, even if it just means buying them groceries or paying one bill. Sometimes people show up at churches because they’re about to be homeless and they just need help with the rent.
Christians should help one another. Serve one another. Prefer one another. We’re one family, as long as we all are the elect of God.
Finally, let’s look at the Psalm in today’s readings.
1 I will extol You, my God, O King,
And I will bless Your name forever and ever.
2 Every day I will bless You,
And I will praise Your name forever and ever.
3 Great is the Lord, and highly to be praised,
And His greatness is unsearchable.
4 One generation shall praise Your works to another,
And shall declare Your mighty acts.
Love the Lord your God will all your heart, mind, strength. This means recognizing He is sovereign. This means praising Him, reading His word, obeying His commandments, praying to Him, meditating upon His words and His works.
Because what is coming is as amazing as what He has already done.
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and there is no longer any sea. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, made ready as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is among men, and He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them, and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.”
And He who sits on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” And He said, “Write, for these words are faithful and true.” Then He said to me, “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give to the one who thirsts from the spring of the water of life without cost.
I make all things new. A new heavens and a new earth. No more tears. No more suffering. No more want or hunger or disease. There are Christians everywhere who reflect on these promises. We have a century or so of struggle with illness, infirmaty, aging, the weakness of the body. For every athlete is a hundred people who can’t do those things, and two or three with grave medical issues who will never have those abilities. And those athletes will have those abilities for only so many years.
It’s always humorous to me those athletes with the kind of stamina to do MMA and always knock traditional karate. Then after ten years, they can’t take that kind of physical abuse any more, and they have to turn to traditional karate, and finally grasp the point of it all along. Silly me. But I digress, as I’m prone to.
As good as today seems to most Christians, there are far, far better days coming - after the judgment, the resurrection of the dead and the millennium era, when all of us will have glorified bodies.
We will all know God. We will all see Christ with our own eyes. We will dwell in His presence, and He personally will wipe every tear away.
These words were read to Christians who suffered greatly, often at the hands of brutal men who tortured Christians to death in the arenas, or in the public square, or sometimes locked away in prisons or fortresses.
Everyone who heard them had lost family members, loved ones, spouses or children to persecution. Many who heard would follow themselves into persecution, and horrible fates. These words gave them the strength to endure. God will personally wipe away your tears. God will avenge your suffering.
For afflicting death and torture on God’s elect, many will endure untold suffering and torture themselves for all eternity.
And it is only because God set His love on us while we were still sinners, and because He chose us that we escape so terrible a fate.
Let us praise His name and mighty deeds forever.
In Jesus name we Pray, Amen.
24 The Lord bless you, and keep you;
25 The Lord make His face shine on you,
And be gracious to you;
26 The Lord lift up His countenance on you,
And give you peace.’