John 14:15 is one of my favorite scriptures. It teaches us a little about the human heart and the life of a disciple.
Jesus makes one of the greatest claims in all of psychology. He links love to behavior.
As believers, we know love is much more than a feeling. In fact, feelings are a small aspect of true love (1 Corinthians 13). Love is action.
When we have the feeling of love (that I think is often infatuation), it can make us do CRAZY things! Things we never thought or imagined we would do.
I don’t think Jesus is talking so much about infatuation here (we can often ascribe infatuation to love), but rather true, deep, undying love. The type of love that is not only, patient, kind, does not envy, does not boast – but the love that is dedicated; singularly minded; devoted to Him.
The type of love that you’d give your life up for.
The type of love that would gladly die to self.
We can tell what we exalt as lord in our lives by what we obey. If we obey our phone notifications, the scale, bank accounts, sex drive, material possessions, our bodies, etc. that is what we love.
The things that consume our thoughts, our time, our money, and our actions are what we love.
But Jesus invites us to make the only thing that can truly give us identity, hope, comfort, joy, and peace to be Lord over our lives – He invites us to Himself.
What we obey is what we truly love.
We know we are true disciples of Jesus by how we keep His commandments. His commandments are the BEST thing for us. He gives us instructions on how to flourish in this life! His commandments may not always “feel” easy or good, but they are the greatest gift to us.
His commandments tell us how to be close with God!! I hear girls say all the time how they feel distant from God. And then we take an inventory of their life and usually it leads to “Yea, I can see why you’re feeling distant, you’re not doing anything He said.”
If we call ourselves followers of Him, and I mean REAL followers, not the wishy-washy “Christian” that is pervasive in our culture right now. But I mean true, narrow-path followers of Christ – we will learn His commands and follow them no matter what.
BUT we cannot follow Him on our own, and luckily He doesn’t expect us to. That is why He has given us the Holy Spirit which gives us a desire for God and enables us to follow His commands. And we get the Holy Spirit when we are born again (i.e. spiritually alive).
I lived the first 24 years of my life dead. I know that sounds like an oxymoron. But I did not have the spirit of God and anything without God is dead. But once I realized my need for God, I believed in what Christ did for me and was born again into a new life. This new life has transformed every part of me (including my allegiance). I wanted to obey God and the more I obeyed His commands, the closer I’ve gotten with Him and the more I love Him.
“When many of his disciples heard it, they said, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?” But Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, said to them, “Do you take offense at this?…. It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all… After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. So Jesus said to the twelve, “Do you want to go away as well?” Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.” John 6:60-71
Ashlyn Lanni 