Love as God Loves (Chantilly)

John 10:27 CSB – My sheep hear my voice, I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life….

Disciples love as Jesus loved

John 13:34 CSB – “I give you a new command: Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you are also to love one another.

Love is Confusing!

John 13:1 CSB – Before the Passover Festival, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.

The reigning cliché of the day is that in order to love others one must first learn to love oneself. This formulation–love thyself, then thy neighbor–is a license for unremitting self-indulgence, because the quest for self-love is endless.

By the time you have finally learned to love yourself, you’ll find yourself playing golf at Leisure World. – Charles Krauthammer

Jesus Clarifies the Confusion by Demonstrating Love

John 13:1 CSB – Before the Passover Festival, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.

John 13:2 CSB – Now when it was time for supper, the devil had already put it into the heart of Judas, Simon Iscariot’s son, to betray him.

Luke 22:24 CSB – Then a dispute also arose among them about who should be considered the greatest.

John 13:3 CSB – Jesus knew that the Father had given everything into his hands, that he had come from God, and that he was going back to God. ⁴ So he got up from supper, laid aside his outer clothing, took a towel, and tied it around himself.

John 13:4-5 CSB – So he got up from supper, laid aside his outer clothing, took a towel, and tied it around himself. ⁵ Next, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet and to dry them with the towel tied around him.

Jesus’ Motivation: The Father’s Love

“Jesus knew that He had come from the Father…”

1 John 4:19 CSB – We love because he first loved us.

1 John 4:7-8 CSB – Dear friends, let us love one another, because love is from God, and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. ⁸ The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love.

• Are You Confident in God’s Love for You?

1) Because God Made You In His Image

Genesis 1:27, So God created man
in his own image;
he created him in the image of God;
he created them male and female.

2) Because Jesus Died for You

1 John 4:19 CSB – We love because he first loved us.

1 John 4:7-8 CSB – Dear friends, let us love one another, because love is from God, and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. ⁸ The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love.

Romans 5:8 drive me: God proves his own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

John 13:3-4 CSB – Jesus knew that the Father had given everything into his hands, that he had come from God, and that he was going back to God. ⁴ So he got up from supper

Jesus’ Motivation: Confidence in His Calling

John 14:15 CSB – “If you love me, you will keep my commands.

John 13:2b, …the devil had already put it into the heart of Judas, Simon Iscariot’s son, to betray him

Loving as Jesus Loves Means Loving Judas

Jesus Washes Peter’s Feet

John 13:6-8 CSB –

He came to Simon Peter, who asked him, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?”

⁷ Jesus answered him, “What I’m doing you don’t realize now, but afterward you will understand.”

⁸ “You will never wash my feet,” Peter said.

John 13:10 CSB – “One who has bathed,” Jesus told him, “doesn’t need to wash anything except his feet, but he is completely clean.

John 13:12 CSB – “Do you know what I have done for you? ¹³ You call me Teacher and Lord—and you are speaking rightly, since that is what I am. ¹⁴ So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. ¹⁵ For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done for you.

John 13:34 CSB – “I give you a new command: Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you are also to love one another. ³⁵ By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

Love is a Choice to Wash Feet

1. Loving Others is First to Choose to Love God

John 13:3 CSB – Jesus knew that the Father had given everything into his hands, that he had come from God, and that he was going back to God.

Love is Defined by God’s Character & Motivated by God’s Presence

1 John 4:7 CSB – love is from God, and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.

1 John 4:19 CSB – We love because he first loved us.

John 14:15 CSB – If you love me, you will keep my commands.

• God is the Source of Love
• God is the Motivation to Love
• Obedience to God is the Ultimate Expression of Love

Matthew 22:36-40 CSB – Teacher, which command in the law is the greatest?”

³⁷ He said to him, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. ³⁸ This is the greatest and most important command. ³⁹ The second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. ⁴⁰ All the Law and the Prophets depend on these two commands.”

John 15:11-14 CSB – “This is my command: Love one another as I have loved you. ¹³ No one has greater love than this: to lay down his life for his friends. ¹⁴ You are my friends if you do what I command you.

Loving Others Means Choosing to Love Judas

Luke 6:27 CSB – “But I say to you who listen: Love your enemies, do what is good to those who hate you,

2. Loving Others Means Sacrificing for Other’s Best Interests

John 15:13 CSB – No one has greater love than this: to lay down his life for his friends.

Ephesians 5:25 CSB – Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her

3. Loving Others is Expressed Best in Small, Daily Acts of Service—not occasional, dramatic events

Love is not communicated in the big event but in the small acts of kindness.- Richard Foster

Proverbs 26:12 CSB – Do you see a person who is wise in his own eyes?
There is more hope for a fool than for him.