Love One Another

I would like you to imagine for a moment that a reporter from the New York Times has secretly entered into the ranks of the members of Life Pointe Church. This reporter’s sole intention is to write an exposé on the relationships of Christians within a local church. What would they write? More specifically—and perhaps a more challenging thought—what would they write about you? This thought experiment is a unique way to open us up to consider how we have been treating our brothers and sisters in Christ. Which is exactly what this next series of blog posts will be about.

Over the next ten weeks we will be seeking to answer a simple question: “how are we called as Christians to love our brothers and sisters in Christ?” Which is a very important question to answer at this particular moment. Ten weeks from now, when these blog posts end, an election will be held that will determine who is to be the next president of the United States. Whether we like it or not, over the next ten weeks the world around us will become increasingly divided, and unfortunately, there is a potential for some of this divisiveness to seep into the church. 

Like a slow gas leak—which can go unnoticed for quite a while—this divisiveness slowly works its way in until “BOOM!” it explodes with a force that can cause an entire structure to collapse. So how do we avoid this? The key is early detection and repair. We must recognize early our failures in this area, repent, and then seek to live in a more Christlike way through obedience to the Scriptures. Let us, therefore, take this time to reflect upon some of the great Scripture passages that teach us what it means to love our brothers and sisters in Christ. 

To accomplish this task we will be looking at ten of the great “one another” passages in the New Testament. By doing this, it is my hope that we as a church can see that our primary call towards each other is one of love. Moreover, it is my hope that we will see how this love is cultivated. If love is the final product, then what are the means of production? That is what these blog posts will focus on. 

Our first Scripture passage comes from John 13:34–35. The reason that I chose this text as our starting point is because it is clearly the foundational “one another” text. Apart from this text, the other “one another” texts are groundless. Let us turn now to John and make note of a few things that we learn there: 

“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.” (John 13:34–35) 

1) We Are Commanded to Love

The first thing we notice about this text is that love of one another is not optional. It is not a nice addendum to our personal salvation, but it is explicitly commanded by Jesus Christ that we love one another. But what is love? 

Love is a much-confused concept even amongst those who claim to be Christians. Many people tend to slide more into the cultural understanding of love. For these people love is synonymous with tolerance, acceptance, and being non-judgmental. It is often reduced to a feeling of affection and care. However, on the opposite side of the spectrum love is equally as confused. Those who represent this camp tend to view love as “tough love”. For them love is less about acceptance and more about a judging of sin. It’s a defiant speaking of “truth”—often with no filter—against the “lies” of the world. Yet, both of these understandings of love are wrong.

A truly Christian concept of love is defined primarily by the nature of God who is love (1 John 4:8). Furthermore, since Jesus Christ is God incarnate, then we learn what love is primarily by looking at Christ. Unsurprisingly, when we look at Christ, we see both mercy and wrath, both justice and judgment, both acceptance and holiness. Therefore, I am hesitant to offer a definition of love. While it is easy to tell you what love is not. It is not so easy to define it as a concept. Why? Because the only true definition of love is found in the character of God which is most clearly revealed to us in Jesus. We learn what love is as we look at and meditate upon the God of the Bible who is revealed to us as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. If we want to know what love is then we must reflect upon the character of God revealed to us on the pages of Holy Scripture. It is this kind of love that we are commanded to do.

2) We Love Like Jesus

The second thing we notice about this text is that we are told to love one another “just as” Jesus loved us. So how did Jesus love us? We learn the answer to this question from another Bible verse a few chapters later in the Gospel of John. In John 15 we read, “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends” (15:13). Jesus loved us by self-sacrificially dying for us, laying down his own life for us. 

This means that we are called to love one another in such a way that we are willing to disadvantage ourselves for the advantage of another. Loving like Jesus means a constant dying to one’s own needs and a propping up of the needs of the other. Practically this means a whole host of things. Perhaps it means we give (even though it hurts our wallet a bit) to help a brother or sister in need. Perhaps it means we hold our tongue when someone says something we disagree with—or something bad about us—instead of lashing out in response, a selfish way of meeting our need for vengeance. Simply put, we are to love “just as” Jesus loved which means a consistent habit of prioritizing our brothers and sisters in Christ above ourselves. It is a daily dying to one’s own selfish needs for the sake of the other. 

3) We Witness to Jesus with Love

The final thing we notice from this passage about love for one another is that it is evangelistic. Listen to the words of Jesus here, “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35). Don’t be confused by what Jesus is saying here. This is not one of those difficult passages of Scripture which require a careful study to see what is going on. Jesus is communicating that our love for one another as brothers and sisters in Christ is the very thing that people should be able to point to as a distinguishing mark of what it means to be a Christian. Jesus is saying that outsiders to the church should be able to look in at your life, see your love for other members of the church, and know from this that you indeed are Christians.

Let that sink in for a moment. Really stop for a brief moment and ponder what Jesus is saying here. Ask yourself, “If someone were to witness my behavior at small group would they know without a doubt that I’m a Christian?” Ask, “If someone were to read my Facebook or Instagram comments towards other Christians would they be attracted to Jesus or repulsed?” Let us return in our minds to the illustration I used to open this blog post. If a New York Times journalist were to secretly join into church life with the sole purpose of writing about what our relationships with other Christians communicated what would they conclude? Our love for one another communicates something to the watching world and we need to consider what it is that is being communicated. 

While the above is obviously a warning to us as a church to watch our love for one another I also believe an encouragement is in order. One of the things I have heard consistently about Life Pointe from new people is how welcoming as a church we are. People will say things like, “I don’t feel judged here” or “someone introduced themselves to me right away” or “I was invited by someone at the . . .” All of this is a testament to how we already are fulfilling the command to love one another. People are seeing it and experiencing it at Life Pointe and that is beautiful. Let us be encouraged by this and let us seek to do everything we can to protect what is clearly so good amongst us.