TRUTH BOMB:  Loving is knowing, knowing is showing. 

“If you really loved me, you wouldn’t have done this!” How many times did our parents pull this out their repertory of reprimands when we did something that was not acceptable?  Unfortunately, they were only thinking how the unacceptable act was a reflection on them and of their parenting skills so as a quick response they went for the juggler with these words to us as children.

When Jesus says, “If you love me, it’s all about His love in us, guiding us, filling us with all of Him!  Jesus is different with his “if you love me” because instead of condemnation, He is teaching us all about God’s love with His best life plan for us.  Jesus says to know love is to know God who is love.  God is always thinking of His created who He knows by name.  We have a hard time truly understanding the depth of this kind of love God has for us.  God’s love builds and shapes us to be all He created us to be.  God’s love forgives quickly.  God is limitless and unconditional in His love.  God’s love is pure, perfect and simple—and He wants us to unreservedly love Him back.

God is a jealous God, not because of His power, not because He wants to control us like puppets, and not for sport of playing games with our lives for the fun of it.  God is jealous of the evil one who tries to distract us from all HE knows is good and right from Him. His jealous is about what we miss when we miss Him!  God really loves you.  God truly and forever loves me.  He loves the world He created. 

God wants us to love Him back because we decide to, not because we are forced.  When we love Him back, God opens up the heavens with a bounty of blessings He pours over us.  These blessings include teaching us to show His kind of love to the world by developing the fruits of His Holy Spirit so that we will live the abundant life with Him and with others.  One of the first fruits mentioned in the list is love—followed by joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.  (See Galatians 5).

Yes, if we unreservedly love God, says Jesus, our lives show it. 

Loving is knowing, knowing is showing. 

John, who was there listening and learning, narrates the Master Teacher’s last in-class session with his students before being arrested and taken away from them.  Because of the love of God in Jesus, Jesus unconditionally loves his disciples who have dedicated their lives to following him.  Read and understand the love that oozes with every word…

John—God’s Love

John 14:15-31, The Message

The Spirit of Truth

^15-17 “If you love me, show it by doing what I’ve told you. I will talk to the Father, and he’ll provide you another Friend so that you will always have someone with you. This Friend is the Spirit of Truth. The godless world can’t take him in because it doesn’t have eyes to see him, doesn’t know what to look for. But you know him already because he has been staying with you, and will even be in you!

^18-20 “I will not leave you orphaned. I’m coming back. In just a little while the world will no longer see me, but you’re going to see me because I am alive and you’re about to come alive. At that moment you will know absolutely that I’m in my Father, and you’re in me, and I’m in you.

²¹ “The person who knows my commandments and keeps them, that’s who loves me. And the person who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and make myself plain to him.”

²² Judas (not Iscariot) said, “Master, why is it that you are about to make yourself plain to us but not to the world?”

^23-24 “Because a loveless world,” said Jesus, “is a sightless world. If anyone loves me, he will carefully keep my word and my Father will love him—we’ll move right into the neighborhood! Not loving me means not keeping my words. The message you are hearing isn’t mine. It’s the message of the Father who sent me.

^25-27 “I’m telling you these things while I’m still living with you. The Friend, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send at my request, will make everything plain to you. He will remind you of all the things I have told you. I’m leaving you well and whole. That’s my parting gift to you. Peace. I don’t leave you the way you’re used to being left—feeling abandoned, bereft. So don’t be upset. Don’t be distraught.

²⁸ “You’ve heard me tell you, ‘I’m going away, and I’m coming back.’ If you loved me, you would be glad that I’m on my way to the Father because the Father is the goal and purpose of my life.

^29-31 “I’ve told you this ahead of time, before it happens, so that when it does happen, the confirmation will deepen your belief in me. I’ll not be talking with you much more like this because the chief of this godless world is about to attack. But don’t worry—he has nothing on me, no claim on me. But so the world might know how thoroughly I love the Father, I am carrying out my Father’s instructions right down to the last detail.

“Get up. Let’s go. It’s time to leave here.”

REFLECT ON THE JESUS’ PROMISES…

“I will talk to the Father, and he’ll provide you another Friend so that you will always have someone with you. This Friend is the Spirit of Truth.”

“You know him already because he has been staying with you, and will even be in you!”

“I will not leave you orphaned.”

“I’m coming back.”

“The person who knows my commandments and keeps them, that’s who loves me. And the person who loves me will be loved by my Father…”

“The Friend, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send at my request, will make everything plain to you. He will remind you of all the things I have told you.”

“I’m leaving you well and whole. That’s my parting gift to you. Peace. I don’t leave you the way you’re used to being left—feeling abandoned, bereft. So don’t be upset. Don’t be distraught.”

“If you loved me, you would be glad that I’m on my way to the Father because the Father is the goal and purpose of my life.”

“…the chief of this godless world is about to attack. But don’t worry—he has nothing on me, no claim on me.”  (And not on us who believe!)

“If you love me, show it by doing what I’ve told you.”

The last words of the love lesson are awesome and tells us that Jesus is ready to fulfill his mission.  “Get up, let’s go”.  I love that!  After prayer each morning I can hear Him say to me, “Let’s do this”, can you?  Can I get an amen?

Lord,

I love You.  I love how Your word speaks to us, builds us up, readies us for another day with knowing we are loved so well.  May your love in us be shown to others in ways you have preordained for this day.  Thank you, Lord.  Continue to transform my life with your love in me.

In Jesus Name, For Your Glory, Amen.  I believe.  It’s settled.