Introduction:
We Love Like Jesus (John 15:12-17):
- When we care more about Others than Ourselves. (John 15:13)
Phil 2:3 - Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.
- When we let People in. (John 15:14-15)
- When we see our Ministry as "loving people". (John 15:16-17)
1 John 4:9-11 - In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. 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. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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00:53-00:53
Amen.
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Open up your Bibles to John chapter 15, and we are going to be picking up in verse 12.
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And while you're returning there, you know, when I was a kid, as I think back, I was about 10 or 11, and there was this kid in my class that said to me, "If you'll be my friend, I'll give you a four-wheeler.
01:26-01:28
And I said, do you mean like a real four-wheeler?
01:29-01:32
Or like a matchbox little toy car or something?
01:33-01:38
He said, no, I'll give you a real four-wheeler if you'll be my friend.
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I had to think about it.
01:44-01:45
And I thought, you know what?
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I'm gonna take that offer.
01:51-02:00
So I said, "Deal, I'll be your friend." Can you believe there was no quad?
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Can you believe that?
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I mean, you know, like I said, I was 10 or 11 and now I'm, you know, looking back, I'm pretty steamed about that.
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I would have liked that quad.
02:19-02:29
But what kind of guy just walks around willy-nilly offering quads for friendship and then not giving the quad when I said I'd be his friend?
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You're like, were you still friends with him today, Jeff?
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No, I'm not friends with him today.
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But you know, that's not the, that's not the most shocking statement about friendship I've ever heard, believe it or not.
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because that actually came from Jesus.
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Look at, are you in your Bibles now?
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You better be.
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John 15, look at verse 14.
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Jesus said, "You are my friends "if you do what I command you." Now there's a sales pitch for friendship.
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You can be my friend, but you have to do everything that I tell you to do.
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What?
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What?
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Who talks like that?
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I mean, that's just, that doesn't make any sense, because, come on, we think of friendship as equality, right?
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And friendship and commands don't seem like they go together, but this is what Jesus said.
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And when we get to John 15 here, understand this whole section that we're in, it's all about relationships.
03:43-03:53
Because last week, we saw the teaching of the branches and the vine where Jesus said, "I am the true vine." He was talking about our relationship with Him.
03:54-03:59
And in this passage we're looking at this week, He's talking about our relationships with each other.
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And next week, if we're still here, He's going to be talking about our relationship with the world.
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So we're talking about relationships.
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And when Jesus started this whole conversation that we've spent months going through, it all started chapter 13 verse 34, this whole dinner conversation through the vineyard on the way to the garden, it all started talking about love.
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And here's something that I found extremely interesting and a bit perplexing.
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12 in our passage today, Jesus said, "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you." You're like, "Well, what's so perplexing about that?" That's almost word for word what He said when this whole thing started, right?
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When this whole conversation started, it's almost word for word.
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So I had to sort of wrestle through, why did he bring it up again?
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Didn't we cover that ground like months ago when we went through this?
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So why did Jesus bring it up again?
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So I had to ask myself, what changed?
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What's different?
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And you see, what's different is the context.
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Like, what do you mean?
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Stay with me here.
05:37-05:39
This is like really critical part of the sermon.
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I know every single person I've talked to this morning has been like, "Oh, I'm so tired." Is there anybody here this morning by show of hands feeling super refreshed and energized this morning?
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Anybody?
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Oh, like, okay, like five of you?
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Awesome.
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And I know that of those five, three of you were so tired you didn't actually hear what I was saying.
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"Who's tired?
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That's me.
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I'm tired." Look, this is the Word of God.
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Let's tune in here because this is really important.
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See, the context is different.
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This is why Jesus brought this up again.
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Let me paint this picture for you.
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And chapter 13, verse 34, Jesus said, "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another just as I have loved you.
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You also are to love one another." That's how this conversation started, okay?
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Now we fast forward to chapter 15.
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We get to chapter 15, and Jesus says, "I am the true vine, and you are the branches, and You abide in me and you will bear fruit." And then, he repeats this command again.
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"This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you." Why did he repeat the command?
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It's simply this, church, because now the disciples can truly understand this command in light of his further teaching.
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Do you see that?
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In other words, after Jesus was teaching on abiding, which was the message last week, we can understand this command that He already covered, but we can understand it in a much deeper way.
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Jesus says, "Okay, you get the picture.
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I'm the vine, you're the branches.
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My life goes through you.
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I produce fruitfulness through you.
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My life comes through you." Do you get it?
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Do you get it?
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Do you get it?
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"Love one another as I have loved you, with my love flowing through you." And that's what we call abiding.
08:08-08:47
You see, when Jesus said, "Love others as I have loved you," yes, we do for others what has done for us. But church, listen, that's not the full impact of the statement. Because for some people it's like, okay, let's just make a list of the things that Jesus did, and if we're to love others the way He loved us, we'll just replicate that list. And do you know what that's called? That's called religion. Give me the list, and I will do the list, and my heart doesn't have to be in it at all because I'm going through the motions.
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Listen, I can train a dog to go through the motions.
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I can train a dog to do things without any heart or conscience behind the act.
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And Jesus here is saying, "Hey, I expect more from you because when you love others as I have loved you, it's not just going through the motions, it's coming from here.
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It's a genuine love.
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It's loving others as Jesus loved us.
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That is not just the works, but with the same concern and compassion and heart that drove him to love that way.
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Do you see that?
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It's not heartless love.
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It's I have it in here.
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I feel it.
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And you're like, "Man, that's, that's, that's, Jeff, have you been around some of these people?
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Like loving them like Jesus isn't easy." not.
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Fulfilling this in the flesh is not possible.
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That's why this teaching comes flowing from His teaching about abiding.
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This kind of love has to come when we are first being filled up by the love that He's pouring into us.
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Are you with me?
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Are you with me?
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Because I can start over.
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Did I tell you about the kid who offered me a four-wheeler?
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I can start a...
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All right, you're with me, you're with me.
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So Jesus teaches on abiding.
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Do you get it, do you get it, do you get it?
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My life flows through you, my life flows through you.
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Now love people the way that I love you.
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Verse 12, "This is my commandment, "that you love one another as I have loved you." You're like, man, how is that fulfilled?
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What does that look like?
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Great question because Jesus explains that on your outline.
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We love like Jesus when we do three things here that he points out.
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Number one, we love like Jesus when we care more about others than ourselves.
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Genuinely care more about others than ourselves.
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Look at verse 13, Jesus says, "Greater love has no one than this, that someone laid out his life for his friends.
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Stop there, because our minds immediately and rightly jump to the cross, right?
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Because that's where this love was ultimately demonstrated.
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But in this context, see, Jesus is also applying this principle to the way that we love one another.
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Do you get that?
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Yes, this is the love that Jesus had for us, but he's saying here, "Listen, "this is how you're gonna love one another." Jesus said, "You have to be willing "to lay down your life for each other." You get that?
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You know, in our car, Owen's in charge of the radio.
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I don't always love his choice of stations, especially when they play this song.
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Maybe some of you have heard it.
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And if you haven't heard this song, I envy you.
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But you ever hear the song, ♪ I would catch a grenade for ya ♪ Who sings that?
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Is that Bruno Mars?
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Throw my hand on a blade for ya ♪ Jump in front of a train for ya You've heard that song?
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How many people heard that song?
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(sighs)
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You know, right now, right now there's, I imagine some lady sitting here going, that is so sweet.
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Let me tell you something, it is not.
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That song is horrible.
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And you're like, well, yeah, Jeff, I get the principle though from Jesus, and if there's ever a grenade, I'm your man.
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But I gotta tell you, Jesus' teaching here is much more than that.
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It's not just like dying for you because you can, yeah, you can do that, but you can only do that once.
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It's constantly laying down your life for others.
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Constantly.
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And that genuinely happens when we love others and care about others' needs more than our own.
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This is what Paul was talking about in Philippians 2.3.
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Paul was saying, "Church, listen, "do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit," which is how most of us operate all the time because of our flesh.
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But look at this, he says, "But in humility, "count others more significant than yourselves." That certainly changes the focus when you come to church, doesn't it?
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Instead of kicking in the doors saying, "Here I am, what does this church offer me?" That's how a lot of people go to church, by the way.
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"What can you offer me?
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"What's here for me?
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"What programs are here for me?
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"How's this church going to meet my needs?" That, look, that is an unbiblical attitude towards church.
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It just is.
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Biblically, the attitude is, "Hey, here I am.
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"Hey, look, see these people?
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"Their needs are more important than my needs.
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"What are some ways that I can help meet those needs?
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"What do I need to give up?
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"What do I need to lay down to meet their needs?" That's a biblical approach to church, by the way.
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I mean, yeah, maybe you would catch that grenade.
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But would you sacrifice money that you had set aside?
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That if you saw a need right here, like man, I was saving this money for, you know, that new motor I wanted for my boat, but you know what, I'm gonna, that's laying down your life.
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I'm gonna give that up to meet this need.
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You're laying down your life.
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You might catch that grenade for you, but would you give up that time that you had carved out?
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You know, this is my favorite hobby and I had this day set aside and I was gonna do that, but I just found out, you know, there's somebody at the church that needs my help and I'm gonna give up that time and I'm gonna go help them.
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That's laying down your life.
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It's constantly making those decisions to put others ahead of yourself.
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That's exactly what Jesus is saying.
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Look, love people the way I loved you.
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How did you love us, Jesus?
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He's about to show like hours after he says this when he's nailed to the cross.
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He goes, "I'm willing to lay down my life for you.
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Are you willing to lay down your life for each other?" Jesus said, "There's no greater love." And Jesus didn't just model that through his death, he modeled that through his entire life, all the way up to and including the cross.
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So do you care about others more than yourself?
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Can you honestly take an inward evaluation and say, yeah, I can recognize areas of my life that I've given up, that I've laid down for the sake of others?
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That's the kind of love that Jesus calls us to, church.
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We love like Jesus when we care more about others than ourselves.
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Number two, write this down, we love like Jesus when we let people in.
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All right, now let's get to that controversial statement, verse 14, Jesus said, "You are my friends "if you do what I command you." If, that's the word that I struggled with here, if.
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I had to do some study on this, if.
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What does he mean?
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The question is, is Jesus saying that you can earn his friendship by obedience?
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Absolutely not.
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See, the word if can be conditional or it can be confirmation.
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It's just used that way.
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We use it that way all the time, don't we?
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If can be condition or confirmation.
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Like what do you mean?
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Here's condition.
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Here's how you use if as a condition.
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If I say to you, if you're a good ball player, you can be on my team.
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That's conditional.
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I want you on my team under one condition, you have to be a good ball player.
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See that's condition.
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But we also use if as confirmation.
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That if I say, "If your temperature is normal, you no longer have a fever." Do you see that?
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The normal temperature is the confirmation that you no longer have a fever.
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So Jesus' words here are not conditional because that would be works-based, that would imply that we can earn His love.
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And that, boys and girls, is what we call heresy.
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That is not true.
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You cannot earn His love.
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You see, it's confirmation.
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Jesus is saying, "If you show your love for me through obedience, that proves that you're my friend.
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That proves that you know me.
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That proves that you get it." But then that raises another question.
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You know, if He is God and I am not, if He's the master and I'm the slave, how can I be His friend at the same time?
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That's a really good question.
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And that's exactly what Jesus answers in verse 15.
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Look at it with me, please.
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Jesus said, "No longer do I call you servants, "for the servant does not know what his master is doing, "but I have called you friends.
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"For all that I have heard from my Father, "I have made known to you." See, disciples of Jesus, catch this, or you're gonna completely miss what he's saying here.
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And this is absolutely foundational to understanding your walk with Christ.
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Here it is, "Disciples of Jesus are slaves who are friends." Like, what?
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Now in Jesus' culture, slavery was normal.
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Now you understand the Bible never condemns slavery.
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The Bible condemns abuse of slaves, rightly, But the Bible just simply recognizes slavery as part of that culture.
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That's just the way it was.
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And actually what the Bible does is redeem the picture because slavery, hear this church, slavery is the picture of discipleship in the New Testament.
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He realized we are called slaves of Christ in the New Testament 130 times.
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All the way up to Revelation 22, in glory, in heaven, what are we referred to as?
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Slaves.
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You're like, "I don't remember reading that in my Bible like that though." Well, see that's part of the problem.
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You see, the word "slave" has a stigma, right?
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It's associated with cruelty.
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So over the years of translations, in order to sort of take the edge off of the word "slave," which is the word "doulos," translators have made the word "slave" into words like "servant" or "bondservant." But the actual, literal Greek word without any question from anybody who understands Greek is the word doulos literally means slave. And you're like, you know what, Jeff, you're kind of nerding out on me here now. What's the point? What's the, okay, okay, so it says some say servant, you're like, okay, literally slave. Does it make a difference? Does it really matter? Yes, it does. I'm gonna tell you why.
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Servant, that word servant describes what somebody does.
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They are a person who serves.
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But the word slave describes what somebody is.
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You see, a slave is owned.
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Slave doesn't have personal rights or autonomy.
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A slave is like, "Hey, you're a tool.
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Do what you're told." And biblically, that's what we are to Jesus.
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We are His servants.
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We are His slaves.
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My freedoms are defined by Him.
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My duties, my convictions, my words, my actions, my attitudes, my thoughts, my relationships, everything about my life, because I belong to Jesus, is to come under His absolute Lordship where I'm like, "It's not about what I want, "it's about what you want." That's why the Bible calls us slaves of Christ.
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Get the picture, church.
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We're owned by Jesus.
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You are not your own.
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You are bought with a price.
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We were on the slave market of sin.
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Like, I don't like to be called a slave.
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You're a slave to something.
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You're a slave to sin, you're a slave to righteousness.
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And by nature, we're on the slave market of sin, and Jesus comes along, and he says, I'm going to buy you off of the slave market, and I'm going to pay the price with my own blood and now you belong to me." Biblically, that's what happened.
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That's why the Bible says you need to deny yourself.
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Why?
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Because you're a slave.
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You don't have rights.
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And then we get to verse 15 here, where Jesus says, "No longer do I call you servants, for "does not know what his master is doing, "but I've called you friends.
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"For all that I have heard from my father, "I've made known to you." You're like, "Wait, wait, wait, is this a contradiction?
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"With everything you're saying about being a slave, "is this a contradiction?" No, no, you're saying this is the beautiful thing, you can't miss this.
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We're slaves who are friends.
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And you're like, "You still lost me on this, Jeff." Well, the disciples would have understood this because they were living in the culture.
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But in Jesus' day, it was estimated that there were, on the low end, 12 million slaves.
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You're like, "Where were they?" They were everywhere.
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They were in every part of culture, in every trade, every craft, every job, every vocation.
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They were people working, strewn throughout every level and place in society.
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The only thing unique about them was the fact that they were owned.
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And some slaves, some slaves actually would become personal attendants to the king.
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And those slaves were constantly in such close proximity to the king that when they fulfilled their duty so faithfully, they actually became trusted friends of the king.
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The last person the king would see before he went to bed, his slave, first person the king would see when he got up, his slave, traveling with them, attending to every need.
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There's the slave, part of his life in all things.
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And that slave would get the inside scoop on everything.
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The king's thoughts, his plans, his dreams, his intentions, his disappointments, the slave was constantly getting the inside scoop to the point that These slaves would know more about the king than the people that had a more formal relationship with the king.
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Because honestly, for the king, wives and children, there was a detachment there.
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And concubines were for concubining.
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But with the slave, that person became so trusted that there were no secrets.
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And you see, when Jesus made this statement, the disciples would have got the picture.
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"Oh, okay.
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We're not just servants to you.
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We're not just slaves to you.
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We're friends.
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We're both." And that speaks to the loving relationship.
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So it's both.
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It's sort of like this.
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You know, imagine if, you know, my buddy Brian calls me up and he's like, "Hey, you want to go shooting?" So we go out to the range and we're shooting, you know, pew, pew, pew, and that's the sound my gun makes.
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I think it needs tuned or something.
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But this other guy that knows Brian comes up, I don't know this guy, but this other guy comes up that knows Brian, and Brian introduces that person to me.
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And Brian says, "This is Pastor Jeff.
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I attend his church." And I would quickly interject, "No, no, no, no.
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You're not just a church member.
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I consider you a friend." Does that mean he's not a church member?
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Is Brian going to walk away from that conversation?
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"Oh man, I thought I was a member of the church.
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I guess I just got like, you know, excommunicated." No, he gets the point.
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And that's exactly what the disciples would have got here.
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"Oh, you're a slave.
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Oh, but not just like that kind of slave.
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Do what you're told, get out of my business, but the kind that is brought in." And you're like, "Okay, this is all very fascinating, Jeff.
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But what does this have to do with anything?
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Because Jesus said, "Love others the way that I have loved you." And right here, Jesus is showing how He loves us.
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That we're no longer treated at arm's length, distant and detached.
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But he says, "No, no, no.
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I consider you friends.
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I brought you in." He says, "I've told you everything.
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Everything that my father has told, I've let you in." And Jesus is saying here, church, that's how we're to love one another, because that's how he loved us.
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If I, your master, deal with you as a friend, what does that say about the way that you should deal with each other?
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Here's the point, love is about being real.
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Love is about being real.
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And if you come to church on Sunday and warm a seat, and you're like, "Okay, see you next Sunday," and you have no interaction, no involvement.
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I've been doing this a long time, and even worse than hearing people say, "I'll pray for you," I'm like, "No, you won't, liar." But even worse than that, I've heard over the years is, "I just didn't feel connected.
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I just don't feel connected." Like, okay, let's talk about that.
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What level of involvement do you have?
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Well, I don't really have.
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I come in late and I kind of leave early, and I don't really talk to anybody from the church.
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I haven't joined any Bible studies or small groups.
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I haven't been to a fellowship event.
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I don't feel connected though.
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Well, let's connect the dots and see if we can figure that out.
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You're not going to feel connected.
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And if your church involvement is just simply that, I like coming here, but I don't really want to get personally invested with anyone, then you're not loving like Jesus, right?
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Is that what I'm reading here? Because we're called to be a body. The Bible says that we're members that belong to one another, and part of that church is we have to let each other in.
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And this church does so much to give you opportunity to do that.
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You know, the fishermen group kicked off yesterday.
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An opportunity for men to let others in.
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Ladies Bible study is starting up again soon.
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Another opportunity to let people in.
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We're relaunching small groups in two weeks.
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And we're not going to be asking you if you wanna join a small group.
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We're going to be asking you which small group you would like to join.
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Why?
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Because we wanna love each other the way Jesus loved us.
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That's why.
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It's not a program.
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It's an opportunity to emulate the kind of love that Jesus calls us to.
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And finally, we love like Jesus when we see our ministry as loving people.
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We're going to look at verses 16 and 17 for a second.
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We love like Jesus when we see our ministry as loving people.
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Look at verses 16 and 17.
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Jesus said, "You did not choose me, but I chose you." Stop right there.
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That's a slave market terminology.
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You're in the slave market of sin, Jesus said, "I saw you there and I chose you, and I bought you.
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You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide so that whatever you ask the Father in My name, He may give it to you.
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These things I command you so that you will love one another." You know, I read that this week and I'm like, you know, so we got bearing fruit, answered prayer, Jesus just talked about those things in reference to abiding.
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So what does this now?
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Why is He bringing it up again?
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Why is he talking about this in the context of loving others the way he loved us?" Then I'm like, "Duh, the prayers are for the people." That's what he's talking about.
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He's talking about answered prayer.
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He's talking about the way we pray for people because ministry is about loving people.
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It drives me nuts when these knucklehead preachers on TV try to hijack these verses to justify They're luxury cars.
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You know, "I asked God for this BMW and He gave it to me." Yeah, that's what Jesus was talking about here.
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He's like, "Love one another and in your loving one another, make sure you ask God for that new Beamer and He's going to give it to you." Like, what?
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Do you even Bible?
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See, the prayers are for the people, right?
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The fruit is about what?
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The people!
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Everything Jesus wants to do through us is about people because ministry is about anyone?
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Anyone?
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People!
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That's what He's talking about here.
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And that's why Jesus pointed out what He, again, in the first part of verse 16, "You me, I chose you. God in the flesh, here he is walking among us. And you're like, "Jesus, what is your ministry about?" And he says, "My ministry is about loving people." So that's what your ministry is about too. The abiding fruit, the prayers, everything that we do should be driven by loving people.
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And that's how we evaluate fruitfulness.
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And that also directs how we pray.
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And this is where it's so easy for the church to get off track, honestly.
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Because we can start evaluating the church in terms of, hey, that was a great VBS that we had.
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Did you see how awesome the set was?
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Oh, that was so awesome.
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And the set was great and the costumes were great.
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And are we evaluating VBS based on how awesome the props were?
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They were awesome, but...
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We can evaluate ministry by how good the band sounds.
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"Didn't the band sound great?
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Didn't the band sound great this morning?" They did.
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Or how many people fill the seats, or how much money's in the bank account?
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And we start to use all these things as little criteria on how we're going to evaluate our ministry.
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And yeah, those things are part of ministry, but they cannot be the target.
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The target, according to Jesus, is that as a result of our relationship with Him, we're loving one another the way that He loved us.
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And you're like, "Well, hang on, because I thought the mission had something to do with evangelism." he gave this command then, he said, "By this, all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." The best thing we can do for evangelism is to love each other the way Jesus loved us.
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ahead of ourselves, letting people in, seeing ministry as loving people.
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As our worship team comes forward, I'm sure that sometime later after this event, I'm positive that John was thinking about this particular exchange.
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And when he wrote 1 John, I really believe that he was summing this portion of Jesus' teaching up under inspiration of the Holy Spirit in this way.
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When he said, "In this, the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent His only Son into the world so that we might live through Him." life coming as a result of being attached to Jesus. That's abiding. That's abiding right there. And then he goes on to say, "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." You're like, "What's propitiation?" That's a whole nother sermon. Do you want to hear it? You're like, "Yeah, some other time I do." But look at this. Application point driving home, John. He says, "Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
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Loving how Jesus loved us, not just in the things that he did, but in the heart that moved him to do the things that he did.
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Let's pray.
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in heaven, what an incredible passage in your Word that is perplexing and mind -blowing and awesome, all at the same time.
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That the God of the universe would think of us as his friends.
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And Father, so often in the church, we do go through the motions.
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We do the things that we need to do because they're on the list.
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Or we just know these are the things that we to do.
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And sometimes, Father, our hearts are very far from the heart of Christ.
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And I'm just asking, Father, in light of Jesus' words here, and a call back to what we talked about last week, that we would abide in Christ and are so close to His heart, so attached to the vine, that loving one another isn't some mechanical thing, but it flows from the same motivation, the same care and concern that Jesus Christ had for us.
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Let the world see that we belong to you by loving each other the way He loves us.
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We pray in Jesus' name, amen.
Small Group Discussion
Read John 15:12-17
What was your big “take-away” from this passage / message?
Why do you think many people are reluctant to “let people in”? How can we as a church encourage people to let people in? How does Jesus example motivate us?
How does John 15:16 fit into Jesus' teaching about loving one another as He loved us? How are abiding fruit and answered prayer tied into this command to love?
Breakout
Pray for one another.