The New Commandment

The New Commandment
John 13:31-35
31 So, when he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now the Son of Man is glorified, and God is glorified in Him. 32 If God is glorified in Him, God will also glorify Him in Himself, and glorify Him immediately. 33 “Little children, I shall be with you a little while longer. You will seek Me; and as I said to the Jews, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come,’ so now I say to you. 34 “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. 35 “By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”

v31 “Now the Son of Man is glorified, Now with the works that He has done, in the Fathers name, and the Father’s approval of Him, Christ has been glorified. Luke 3: 21, 22. When all the people were baptized, it came to pass that Jesus also was baptized; and while He prayed, the heaven was opened. And the spirit descended in bodily form like a dove upon Him, and a voice came from heaven which said, “You are My beloved Son; in You I am well pleased.” And again on the Mount of Transfiguration, Luke 9:35, and a voice came out of the cloud saying “This is My beloved Son. Hear Him!” These are a few examples of Christ being glorified by God, and yet there is one that all mankind will see and hear. Romans 14:11 tells of a time when Christ will be glorified before all mankind. “For it is written: “As I live, says the Lord, Every knee shall bow to Me, And every tongue shall confess to God.” All mankind and Satan himself will bow at the judgment seat of Christ and confess that Christ is indeed the Son of God, and in this Christ will be glorified.
Christ also says in Verse 31 that, God is glorified in Him. God is glorified in Christ, and in us, when we do the will of the Father. John 6:38 “For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but of the will of Him who sent Me.” and again in John5:30 “I can of Myself do nothing. As I hear, I judge; and My judgment is righteous, because I do not seek My own will but the will of the Father who sent Me.” When we not only seek the will of the Father, but walk in the will of the Father, God is glorified as a just and true God. We are to glorify God by giving thanks for revealing His will for our lives and accomplishing His will through us. In this way we are to draw attention away from our accomplishments and give God all the glory. For if we seek our glory for God’s working in us, here on earth, than we have received all the glory we will receive, giving God the glory than releases God to glorify us before the host of heaven and during the final judgment at the throne of Christ. Where Christ will be glorified in full for the faithfulness that He had in walking in the will of the Father, and we will receive our glory for walking in His will as well. I used to say, “Lord it is enough to just sit in a corner of your kingdom, as long as I am there.” This is not the will of the Father, but I am to allow Him to work through me to bring others to the saving knowledge of Christ.
V. 32 “and glorify Him immediately.” as He did, not only in the miracles at His death, but also in John 18:6, when the crowd came to seize Him and they drew back and fell to the ground.
V. 33 Jesus addresses His disciples with great tenderness and affection, telling them that soon He will no longer be with them. Now that Judas had gone out to betray Him, He had but a few more hours to spend with his disciples, and they would be scattered.
“You will seek Me;” If the disciples had witnessed His death in the coming days how would they seek Him? They knew Him to be the Son of God, The Messiah; the One told of in the Word of God, so they would question themselves and God, as to if they had followed Him in vain. They would call out to Him but He would not answer. They would be left in the darkness of doubt and faith at the same time, wondering if it all had been in vain. We too are left with these times when the glory of God is revealed in the answer to prayer, or a great spiritual moment, only to have Satan rush in and cause us to doubt if God had been in work in our lives or not. We by faith and the experiences with God that we share, walk in the knowledge that God does indeed work in our lives and through the hearts of men, glory be to His name.
He goes on to say, “Where I am going, you cannot come.” This reminds me of a child with their nose pressed against the window, watching as their parent pulls out of the drive leaving them behind as they go to work. They long to go, just to see what takes them away from home. To enjoy in what seems like fun, if it would take their parent away from them for hours each day, little do they know. We long to be where Jesus is, to walk the streets of gold, by the crystal sea, but alas our time has not yet come. We shall die in the truth, but since the truth lives in us, we shall awaken in glory, where we shall indeed be where Christ is.
V.34 “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another;” If Jesus already said In Mark 12:31, that there was no greater commandment than to love God, and love your neighbor as your self, and that there was no greater commandment than these, how can He now say I give you a new commandment? He finishes the verse with; “as I have loved you.” Christ was looking to the cross, and that He had forgotten all earthly desire and was about to give His life for them. It is a self sacrificing love that He talks about. Not just a love that sacrifices for those who love us, but one that sacrifices for those who we don’t even know, or even for those who dislike us. Paul stresses this point in Romans 5:7,8 ‘For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.’ Christ wants us to imitate Him; to be ready to lay down one’s life for each other.
We pray that Christ will not ask us to die for another Human being, but this also means that we are to set our own wants and needs aside for the wants and needs of others. Whether it is a homeless man who needs a hand, or your wife who simply wants you to sit and talk with her. It is forgetting about ones self and remembering that others have needs as well. Contrary to popular believe it is not “All about me”, But it is all about Christ, which leads us to verse 35.
“By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” Like it or not man will look to the church as an example of Christ, for we are to be. I try and tell others to look not at man, but to look at Christ and what He did for you. Still man will judge Christianity by Christians. So what are we showing them? I received an email that I feel demonstrates what some are showing the world, and I would like to share it with you.
One day, a man went to visit a church.
He got there early, parked his car, and got out.
Another car pulled up near and the driver got
out and said,” I always park there!
You took my place!" The visitor went inside for
Sunday school, found an empty seat and sat down.
A young lady from the church
approached him and stated,
"That's my seat! You took my place!"
The visitor was somewhat distressed
by this rude welcome, but said nothing.
After Sunday School, the visitor went
into the sanctuary and sat down.
Another member walked up to him and said,
"That's where I always sit! You took my place!"
The visitor was even more troubled by this
treatment, but still He said nothing.
Later as the congregation was praying
for Christ to dwell among them,
the visitor stood up, and his appearance began to change.
Horrible scars became visible on
his hands and on his sandaled feet.
Someone from the congregation
noticed him and called out, "What happened to you?"
The visitor replied, as his hat
became a crown of thorns, and a tear fell from his eye,
"I took your place."
When we love one another with pure hearts, than it shall fully appear that we are indeed the Church that Christ desire us to be. We will become disciples of the one who laid down His life for us, and became a ransom for all. If one person looks at the life of a Christian and says I want the love that they have in their hearts, than the goal of Christ’s death is reached. They will know you by your love.

The Shepherd Knows His Sheep

The Shepherd Knows His Sheep
John 10:22-30
22 Now it was the Feast of Dedication in Jerusalem, and it was winter. 23 And Jesus walked in the temple, and Solomon’s porch. 24 Then the Jews surrounded Him and said to Him, “How long do you keep us in doubt? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.” 25 Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in My Father’s name, they bear witness of Me. 26 “But you do not believe, because you are not of My sheep, as I said to you. 27 “My sheep know My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. 28 “And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. 29 “My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand. 30”I and My Father are one.”
Taken from Spirit Filled Life Bible New King James Version
V24 “How long do you keep us in doubt? Tell us plainly” How many times the answer to a certain question has stared us directly in the face and we can’t see. Perhaps it seems too good to be true, or, too hard to do. People want the easy answer, the easy way out of things. To many times we would rather call information than to look it up in the phone book. We often look to short line with envy and wonder what ever processed us to get in this line anyway. In v. 25 Jesus is telling the Jews that the answer has been in front of your face all along. He wanted them to search the scriptures, see the prophecies and see that they all were fulfilled in Him. To see the miracles that He had performed and know that it came from God.
Jesus searches our hearts today as believer and unbeliever alike, and reaches us in a way that is unique to us. So that as unbelievers we can come to Him and as believers we can come to know God’s will for our lives. He tells that the miracles that He has done in the Father’s name are enough to convince us who He is.
V. 26. “you are not of my sheep.” This is not to say that these could not believe. It states that for whatever reason they chose not to. Be it that it went against everything that they were taught, or that they refused to admit that they needed Christ to change them. They, and we today, believe that we are good people, and to admit that we need saving would seem the gravest of sins in itself.
V. 27. “ My sheep hear My voice,…and they follow me.” It was funny moving to the country, where my neighbors are cows. We have learned to enjoy watching them in the field across the street as they eat, and I guess eat some more. This spring was especially enjoyable as we watched the calves play in the field and how the mothers called to their calves, and the calves had learned to know their mothers voices. While watching them one day, they all seemed to take off in one direction at the same time. This was indeed curious, until we heard the drone of a tractor engine and saw that the farmer had a round bale of hay on the back. The cows had heard something we could not hear right away, and they knew that sound meant food.
Unbelievers, for whatever reasons have refused to have ears to hear that Jesus is reaching out to them. It is God’s desire that none shall perish, but that all shall come to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. {Read 2Peter 3:9}
Don’t feel that believers are immune from the condemnation of this verse, for all at one point or another have turned a deaf ear to the will of the Father. How can we know the voice of Jesus? John 14:15-17 gives us a promise of a helper to guide us in the truth, and teaches us to listen to the will of the Father. “If you love Me, keep My commandments. “And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever- “The Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him, but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.
This all takes practice the cows did not automatically know the tractor meant food. I am sure they feared it at first. The calves had to learn their mother’s voice. We too must learn to hear the voice of the Spirit of God, as He guides us in truth and reveals to us the will of the Father. The sheep are those who hear, believe in, follow, and obey the Savior of the world knowing that it is Jesus that feeds us, with truth, love, patience, peace, and joy.
V. 28 “and they shall never perish.” Why? Since salvation is a gift from God, and not from man. It is an imperishable gift for those who walk in Christ. The world did not give you salvation and the world can not take it away. You can walk away from Christ, but He will never walk away from you. He will be there to walk with you and guide you back into the fold. {I John 5:11 and this is the testimony; that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. 12. He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.
“Neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.” In the seventies there was a show entitled Kung Foo. In it the goal of the student was to snatch the pebble from the master’s hand. Jesus says that nobody can snatch us from His hand. In verse 29 He backs that statement up that nobody can snatch us from the Father’s hand. Not this world, not the demons of hell, not even Satan himself. He who loves God must be happy, and he that fears God need fear nothing on this side of eternity.
V. 30 “I and My Father are one.” This flew in the face of the Jews, that Jesus would place Himself on an equal plane with God. We hear this and should rejoice. For Jesus and God are one in nature, one in all the attributes of Godhead, and one in the operations of those attributes. When we say that two people are of one mind, it is to say that they are in agreement with one another, we can count on them to speak and act accordingly. One has become a representative of the other and acts with the will of the other. Jesus acts with the will of the Father and that should bring joy to the believer and comfort to the unbeliever. For it is the will of the Father none shall perish, as it says in the most quoted verse in the Bible. John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”

Testimony

Testimony
Several years ago, a young lad sat in a tent watching grown men of incredible size, break blocks and boards with their hands, and listening to them preach the Word of God. Let me tell you if you place an impressionable teenager in that kind of situation you will get results. So I went forward and accepted Jesus as my personal savior.
I went back to my home church and wasn’t encouraged and soon fell away and quit attending church altogether. By the time I was nineteen fast cars, girls, and alcohol had more of an influence on my life than the Sprit of God. It continued this way even after I’d started my on family. It was then that God beginning showing me my relationship with my children as an example as the relationship that He and I had. I began to hear the things that I said come out of the mouths of my little ones and I didn’t like it.
It was at this point in my life that God chose to
call me back into the fold. On a cold January day I got a call from my dispatcher, asking if I would help fix her son’s car. Now you have to know that the dispatch office was connected to the garage where the mechanics fixed the trucks that I drove. To keep the trucks we drove running, these fellows were good mechanics. She had just as good a relationship with the mechanics as she did with me. I don’t know why she called me instead of a mechanic, I suppose that she saw the kind of junk I drove, and figured that if I could keep them running than surely I could fix her son’s car.
I told her that I would and I went out to fix the car, which just happened to be parked in the parking lot of a church. We worked on the car for an hour, while I questioned him what he had done recently to the car. He told me that he had replaced the fuel filter on the car. I removed the filter from the carburetor body and realized that he had placed it in backwards. I turned it around and low and behold the car started. How he ever got it that far with that filter backward I do not know.
While we were working on the car the pastor of the church was watching us from the window of the parsonage. After the car was running he came and asked if we would like a cup of hot chocolate. We took him up on his offer and warmed ourselves with his hospitality. He then asked if we would like to see his church and I agreed to go, after all, he had offered us a cup of coca it seemed only right.
He took us into the church and showed us around and told us of the plans that the church had for the building and the ministry they hoped to accomplish. Our journey ended at the alter, as it always does. Little did I know that my journey was about to be renewed. Behind the alter of this church was a full wall mural depicting Christ, you know the one, of Him knocking on the door with no knob. At that moment that was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. I know that I could go back there now and it would be just a picture. It was at that moment that God reached down into my life and reminded me of the promise I had made to him in that tent so many years ago. It was then that He had left the Ninety and nine and went and sought this one lost sheep to bring me back into the fold. The pastor continued talking and after awhile realized that I was no longer listening to him, but that I was staring at that mural. He came around in front of me to gain my attention. He asked do you go to a church? I told him no. He said, you may not come here but you will be in church somewhere, I see it in your eyes.
After that moment God installed in me a hunger for His Word. I could not put it down. It went to work with me and I read the Word of God every opportunity I got. As I read the words of Jesus I had never heard anyone speak with such authority and wisdom. The more I read I was so sure that Christ would return before I had a chance to finish His Word that I would pray, “Lord don’t come back yet, I have so much more to learn.” Soon I found myself in a small country church with my family. I began to open my mouth and someone thought it a good idea if I spoke from the pulpit. Soon I was a lay speaker than a district lay speaker. I felt led to a bigger church and soon was teaching a Sunday school class, working with the youth, as well as preaching whenever called to do so. All the while I felt God wanted more of me.
It all came to a head one night at work, when my dispatcher told me, “I don’t know what’s bothering you. But you need to make a decision.” He did not know what was going on in my heart or my head he only knew that I was troubled. I left work that night and turned on the radio to hear a preacher tell me I needed to decide who I was going to serve. I surrendered saying, “Lord. What good would it do to win souls for your Kingdom, and lose my own family?” For I had seen pastor’s families destroyed. God brought back the words that I had given to my daughter just a few weeks before. She asked me what it was like to invite Jesus into your heart? I told her that it was like inviting someone into your house and giving them access to every room. She wondered what if you kept jewels and money in one room. I told her that if you trust Him you will trust Him with your precious things. It was that words that he brought to me. “If you trust me you will trust me with your precious things.” So I give up, and asked Him to care for my family while I was doing His work, and declared as a candidate for ministry in the United Methodist Church.
Work took me out of town for a week at a time, so I put a lot of things on hold for awhile. I would come home on the weekend and still would teach at church and led the youth group. Until my wife told me that she no longer wanted to be married. I was hurt, confused, and angry. I was embarrassed to go back to doing the things I had been doing. I mean here I was a man trying to serve God and a leader in the church and I couldn’t keep my own family together. I ran from the church, from God and from the town I grew up in. I told myself and anyone that would listen that I wasn’t mad at God, when in fact I was. I didn’t feel that I could trust Him anymore. It wasn’t until four years later that I admitted to God that I was mad at Him. I told Him I felt that He had let me down, we had a deal. I trusted Him to keep my family together. It was then He began to heal me and show me that it wasn’t His fault that my marriage failed. I can look back and see several factors, that I was blind to at the time, that contributed to divorce.
Since then the desire to go back church has returned, and I find myself once again in a small country church. God has given me a new wife, who has showed me what marriage is really like. For the first time in six years I stood in the pulpit and preached the Word of God recently. What does the future hold? I don’t know, but I know who holds the future.