Counter-Cultural Love-Our Greatest Witness: John 13:34-35

 John 13:34-35: “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

There are many ideas of what true love is. You probably have a thought about what real love looks like.

Maybe you think of sitting on a quiet beach with your spouse overlooking God's enormous ocean? Or you imagine meeting that perfect person one day. Maybe true love for you is when others accept you for who you believe you are.   

Agape Love and the Nature of God

The Bible uses "agape" love to describe God's unconditional love for us. John uses this word in our key verse to describe how we are called to love one another. Romans 5:8 illustrates agape love when Paul writes, "But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us." Even though God knew we would betray Him with our continuing sin, He still loved us by sending Jesus to die in our place. That is unconditional love!

First John 4:16 says, "God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them." God's nature of love makes harmony with God and man possible. When justice is deserved, love forgives. When we are betrayed, love puts controls on our anger. When someone does wrong, love leads us to advocate. When we see a mistake, we make it right. That is love that looks like the nature of God. 

Now take that description of love and overlay it on Jesus' words in John 13. I see several lessons we can learn about the importance of our love for one another. 

The Importance of Loving One Another

First, our greatest witness for God's love relates to how we love other followers of Jesus. You would think our greatest witness would be how we present the Gospel-maybe through presentations like Evangelism Explosion. But no! Our greatest witness is seen by how we love. You might think our greatest witness would be our deep devotion to God's Word. But it's not! Our greatest witness relates to how we love.

People will not know us as His disciples by our front lawn church signs. Not our political affiliations. Not even our doctrinal positions. But our love for one another will identify us as Christ-followers. 

Next, Jesus gave a new command. Jesus said, "A new command I give you. Love one another" (v. 34). Jesus may have been taking His disciples deeper with a new command by emphasizing how their love for one another reflected their love for Him. John later wrote, "Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates a brother or sister is still in the darkness" (1 John 2:9). Jesus had claimed to be the Light of the World (John 8:12) indicating by this new command that He embodied perfect love, which we are called to follow.   

Finally, Jesus' new command falls in the context of His prediction of Peter's denial (vv. 36-38). If you know the story, Jesus eventually restored Peter by questioning the disciple's love for him three times after he denied Jesus the same number of times. Both Jesus and Peter used agape and phileo love (i.e. brotherly love) in their dialogue pointing toward a lesson related to John 13.  

Typically, commentators differentiate between agape and phileo love as they analyze their usage. Truly they are different in their meanings, but I think inconsequential in this context for how we love God and others. The exchange between Peter and Jesus highlights a powerful theme that Jesus was teaching in John 13. Brotherly love for one another and God's perfect agape love for us are undeniably linked, meaning that we are called to love one another with the same perfect love that God has shown to us. 

Life Application

There are a couple of points of application that will guide our relationships in the church so we can demonstrate the love of God for the world.

• Prioritize loving relationships in the church. Love each other even when people don't deserve it. But more importantly, love those outside of the body until they become followers. There are so many people we keep outside of the church by the critical way we relate to them for superficial reasons like political expediency, Biblical teaching, or personal amenity. People can't experience God's love if we make it so hard for them to find Him. It's like we expect some people to flounder through a confusing maze of personal change before they can enter through our church doors. We put up with each other's faults and failures, but we put conditions on grace when it comes to people outside of the church. Whatever happened to the hopeful message: "God will meet you and love you right where you are!" Jesus broke all rules, violated all cultural norms, and usurped all religious doctrine to love those outside of His circle of followers. Should we not do the same?

• Take off our masks. One of the things I like about Peter was that he did not seem to hide behind a miraged image of himself. Peter is who he is; warts, wrinkles, and all. It's difficult to question the authenticity of his faith because of his transparency. We need to follow Peter's example by striving toward transparency in the church if our love for one another is going to be authentic. Without transparency, our love will look like just another masked Christian who is unwilling to let others into their mess. We will carry our greatest witness to the world when we take off our masks to love one another with transparency and vulnerability.  

Scriptures for further study

John 13:31-38

John 21:15-25