Love will keep us together
It's the thing we gotta do
What is one of the most important things we can do as disciples of Jesus Christ?
Well, how about the one thing that the Lord said would identify us as belonging to Him?
Yep, I’m talking about – love one another.
That’s it. Sounds easy. But it isn’t, is it? Because we’re… well, saints who are still sinners. And we fail to please Him when we focus on ourselves to the detriment of loving one another. So let’s unpack this a little.
Love your neighbor
First, how does “love one another” differ from “love your neighbor”?
Well, who is your neighbor? We think of it as someone who lives near us. But Jesus was asked this exact question and clarified it differently, in the parable of the good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37). Based on His beautiful answer to that question, we know that loving a neighbor means loving anyone in need who comes into your sphere of influence. This could be a fellow believer, but most often we use “love your neighbor” to talk about how we are to treat those who are not yet in God’s family. A good topic for another time.
So how is “love one another” different from that? The phrase “one another” virtually always refers to our brothers and sisters in Christ. The New Testament provides about 50 things we should be doing for, to, or with “one another,” and those instructions are referring to our fellow Jesus followers. Practically speaking, it’s your church family, for the most part.
I love that someone put together a list of all the “one another” commands in one place – check it out here. Note that the specific “one another” command that is repeated the most often in the Bible is – no surprise – love one another.
What does loving one another look like?
A good starting point to figure that out would be those other 50 or so things the Bible tells us regarding one another. Because all of them demonstrate how we love one another. For example:
serve one another
forgive one another
encourage one another
pray for one another
…and all the rest. The resource I linked above provides a wealth of wisdom and instruction. I encourage you to read through it carefully and let the Holy Spirit bring some “one anothers” to mind. (I’ll be doing that too!)
Another excellent teaching on how to love one another comes from Romans 12:
Let love be without hypocrisy—by abhorring what is evil, clinging to what is good, being devoted to one another in brotherly love, giving preference to one another in honor, not lagging behind in diligence, being fervent in spirit, serving the Lord, rejoicing in hope, persevering in affliction, being devoted to prayer, contributing to the needs of the saints, pursuing hospitality. — Romans 12:9-13
Giving preference and honor to each other, contributing to each other’s needs, pursuing hospitality – that’s a lot of practical instruction packed into just a few verses, isn’t it? Again, let’s prayerfully review these verses and see if the Holy Spirit has something (or someone) in mind for us. The topic of hospitality, in particular, is one where most of us fall woefully short.
A new commandment
In John 13, Jesus said “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another…” This used to confuse me a little, because I knew that godly people of the Old Testament were also expected to love one another. That was the point of the Law – to love God and one another, even though it wasn’t stated in the “one another” words explicitly.
But I wasn’t really paying attention to the rest of Jesus’ statement in that verse, which explains the “new” part in black and white. Here’s the whole verse:
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another.
John 13:34
Even as I have loved you. That was the new part!
God’s people had already been told to love their neighbor (Leviticus 19:18), which certainly included their fellow Jews. So the disciples who first heard this teaching from Jesus knew that they were to love their own people. But what Jesus had made real to them was the nature of that love. He had walked out that love with them for three years, day by day, showing them exactly what it looked like, sounded like, acted like. And now, He offers this new commandment.
And the context for this revolutionary statement is stunning. Our Lord gave the disciples this instruction immediately after humbling Himself to wash their feet (including the feet of Judas) – just before He was betrayed and died an excruciating death.
Love like I do.
This is an exceedingly tall order. What enables us to love like that?
I believe we can love like that only to the extent that we understand how we are loved. I wrote about that here. When we – each day – enter His presence, absorb His Word, humbly receive what He has for us, and literally bask in His love – that is the only way we can love each other in that uniquely Christlike way that shows the world we are different.
And we are definitely supposed to be showing the world that we are different. What’s the very next thing Jesus said after telling the disciples in John 13:34 to love one another?
By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.
John 13:35
Imagine a world in which we lived this out far more obediently than we do today.
The hard reality
But… those other disciples we encounter regularly can be kind of hard to love, right? Annoying, irritating, just rub-you-the-wrong-way. Just think of that one person (or ten people) at church who you kind of hope won’t sit next to you because they kind of drive you nuts.
And now remember – sometimes, you and I are those people.
None of Christ’s people on earth are always easy to love. None of us. And so we lean on the Holy Spirit to give us that good fruit that will help us not only love each other but be more loveable! This is a lifelong exercise and as writer Hannah Williamson has noted, this exercise provides a “gritty training ground for loving the wider world.”
In other words, loving one another helps train us to love our neighbors (the lost among us). But first – the lost must see our love for one another.
So in obedience to the Lord, let’s draw closer to Him for the purpose of fulfilling this beautiful task He’s given us – to love one another better.