One Anothers #2: Love One Another Series

Love One Another

Series: The One Anothers: The Church’s “Body Builders”

Chuck Sligh

May 1, 2022

NOTE: A PowerPoint presentation is available for this sermon by request at chucksligh@hotmail.com. Please mention the title of the sermon and the Bible text to help me find the sermon in my archives.

TEXT: Please turn in your Bibles to John 13:34.

INTRODUCTION

I want to begin by sharing with you a very special letter I found taped to my office door after a week away when I pastored in Wiesbaden. Though it was only 13 short lines with 38 words, most of which were misspelled, and missing all punctuation marks, it’s one of the most precious letters I’ve ever received. It read:

Dear Pastor I Love You

Verey verey verey

verey verey

verey verey verey

verey verey verey

verey verey verey

verey verey verey

verey verey verey

verey verey much much

much much much

much much

Love Jenny

very much

Oh, it’s nice to be loved, isn’t it? Love is the most precious commodity any of us has. it’s the greatest gift we can receive or give. It’s the most intimate feeling we can share. After all, as the song accurately says, “love makes the world go ’round.”

Why is love such an awesome thing? Because it’s rooted in the very nature of God, and we are His image-bearers. John tells us twice in his first letter that “God is love.” And love is a subject Jesus taught and demonstrated every day He walked on this earth.

Last Sunday we began a series on some of the “One Another” statements and commands of the New Testament, starting last week with Paul’s reminder that we are members of one another and therefore we should see both the importance of our ourselves and of many other people of various backgrounds and points of view in the local church.

Today’s “one another” command comes from the mouth of Jesus in our text this morning: “A new commandment I give to you, That you love one another: as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.”

I suppose there aren’t many more important teachings in the New Testament than this one. Jesus Himself said that love was part of the weightier matters of the Law. He also said love for God and love for our neighbor are the two greatest commandments.

The Apostle Paul reiterated the importance of love when he said in 1 Corinthians 13:1-3 – “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not love, I am only as noisy gong, or a clanging cymbal. 2 And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not love, I am nothing. 3 And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not love, it profits me nothing.”

With all this in mind, it’s not surprising that 17 of the 58 “one another” commands—about one-third of the total—are for God’s people to love one another. So, nothing more worthy of our time and study this morning than this text.

In a sense, you can say that all the “One Another” statements and commands hinge on this one command for us to love one another.

What I’d like to do is just break this verse down into its two parts and apply it to our lives.

I. NOTICE FIRST A PRECEPT TO OBEY – Jesus said, “A new commandment I give to you, That you love one another.…”

Up to this point in His ministry, Jesus had taught his disciples to love GOD with all their being, to love their NEIGHBORS as themselves, and to love their ENEMIES. But this is the first time Jesus had given them this command to love ONE ANOTHER, so it truly was a new commandment.

Why is this new commandment needed when God’s people already had the commands to love their neighbors as themselves? Well, if you take a look at Jewish religious, social and political life in the first century, you’ll find there wasn’t a whole lot of love goin’ around.

• Politically, they weren’t loving their enemies: most deeply hated the ROMANS.

• Socially, they didn’t love their neighbors as themselves: most Jews despised their neighbors to the north—the SAMARITANS.

• Religiously, the people were divided between Pharisees and Sadducees; and even between the students of Rabbi Hillel and Rabbi Shammai.

• And they were greatly divided over issues of practice: dumb stuff like…How much effort you could expend to get your ox out of the ditch on the Sabbath? and How many paces you could walk on the Sabbath without it being considered work.