(Do You Love Him Enough,
To Love Them Enough?)
The question Do you really love Him?
I would like to ask you a question, “How many of you really think you love the Lord?”
I want to suggest that many of you think you love him, but you really don’t love him the way he says you should.
If you do, what must you do?
Let us look at what Jesus said you would do if you really loved him.
Jn 14:15 (NKJV) — 15 “If you love Me, keep My commandments.
If you loved him, you would do what?
He repeats it here also:
Jn 14:21 (NKJV) — 21 He who has My commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me.
Let us make note that in the Old Testament, there were 10 major Commandments, but in the New Testament Jesus had this one unique commandment, and that commandment was
Jesus has one new commandment
Jn 13:34–35 (NKJV) — 34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another.
What was that commandment again?
How must we love one another?
And how is that love measured?…. According to the way Christ loved!
Who are we to love?….. one another!
This is a simple formula…loving your brother and sisters is loving God! Why? You are keeping his commandment.
Get this! To show that you truly love God, you have got to keep his commandments. And what commandment keeps all of the commandments?
That you love one another as Jesus Christ has loved you!
If you really love the Lord, you have got to really love your brothers and sisters just as Jesus loved them!
Because, if we love him, we keep his commandment. What is this commandment? Answer: that we love one another.
How are we to love them? …. As he has loved us.
The title of this message is:
Do You Love Him Enough,
To Love Them Enough?
And notice he repeats how we are to love one another as he has loved us.
This love isn’t just human kindness or a moral love. It’s sacrificial, unconditional, and self-emptying love—agape love as revealed by Jesus’ life and death.
How did Jesus love?
We have to look at the life of Jesus to see how he love so that we will know how to love!
Did he go around giving people the mean eye?
Did he return energy for energy?
Did he cuss people out?
Did he get people told?
What type of attitude that Jesus showed regarding those who were less than him?
Was Jesus a racist?
Did he go around condemning people?
The next verse says a very important thing to know. If you keep it, what does it prove?
John 13:35 By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
It is by our ability to love one another as he has loved us that we are truly proved to be his disciples.
We cannot be called his disciples if we do not love another as he has loved us! Get that in your head!
You are not known as a child of God…
Because you love God…
Because you attend church…
Because of your commitment to study the word…
Because of how much can quote the word of God
Because you serve well in the church…
Because you sing on the praise team…
Because you are a good Christian person…
No! Jesus says,
It will be known that you are His disciples by the love you reveal your for one another!
This is where most of us fail!
If you don’t practice trying to love your brothers and sisters, you risk hearing him say ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’
It does not end there, John tells us further in
1 Jn 4:20–21 (NKJV) — 20 If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? 21 And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.
He who loves God must love his brother also.
We need to be careful if we say we love God we must love our brother. How are we to love one another? As he has loved.
How did Jesus show His love?
Now let us look at the example he gives us to show us how to love one another.
Jn 13:1–5 (NKJV) — 1 Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that His hour had come that He should depart from this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end. 2 And supper being ended, the devil having already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son, to betray Him, 3 Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come from God and was going to God, 4 rose from supper and laid aside His garments, took a towel and girded Himself. 5 After that, He poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet, and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded.
He continues:
Jn 13:12–17 (NKJV) — 12 So when He had washed their feet, taken His garments, and sat down again, He said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you? 13 You call Me Teacher and Lord, and you say well, for so I am. 14 If I then, 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 should do as I have done to you. 16 Most assuredly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master; nor is he who is sent greater than he who sent him. 17 If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.
By this action he reveals how we are to love one another. What did he do? He served them!
If we love him, we are to keep his commandment. What is his commandment?
Jn 13:34–35 (NKJV) — 34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another.
If we love them, we must serve them!
Regardless to how people will treat us we are still to love them just as he has loved us!
Judas was going to betray him, and yet he loved him and served him.
Peter was going to deny him, and yet he loved him and served him.
Thomas was going to doubt him, and yet he loved him and served him.
All of them were going to forsake him, and yet he loved him and served them.
Look at this!
Jn 13:13 You call Me Teacher and Lord, and you say well, for so I am. 14 If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.
Washing their feet knowing what they were going to do shows his willingness to forgive them and spite of their wrongdoing!
He is saying if he is our Lord, and he is, which one of us is so prideful to think we are better than him that we won’t love our brothers and sisters and show it by serving them?
If the Lord of lords and King of Kings can love so much that he would bow down in front of those who were nothing but worms to him, how can we be so haughty and arrogant to not be willing to do what he was willing to do?
He was the superior and waited upon the inferiors.
He was the greatest and he waited upon the least.
He was the master and he waited upon those that should have been his servants.
Jn 13:14 …you also ought to wash one another’s feet.
Eph 4:29–32 (NKJV) — 29 Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers. 30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 31 Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice. 32 And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you.
We are to be willing to show our love by serving others just as he loved and served them!
We are to serve one another
Just as Jesus came to serve
Why did Jesus come into the world? He came to serve, and we are to conform to his image.
We are to be servants to one another!
Jesus says He came to serve in Mark 10:45 and a parallel passage in Matthew 20:28. Here’s the most direct quote:
Mk 10:45 (NKJV) — 45 For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”
Mt 20:28 (NKJV) — 28 just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”
Do You Love Him Enough, To Love Them Enough?
Who is Them?
Think about this! Who are the them we are to serve?
Them are the difficult people you experience in your life!
Them are your enemies! For he said,
Mt 5:44–45 (NKJV) — 44 But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, 45 that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.
Them are those who will betray you! Just as Judas would betray Jesus!
Them are those who disappoint us! Just as his disciples would disappoint him!
Them are those who are different from us! Jn 10:16 (NKJV) — 16 And other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd.
Them of those who hurt you! Them of those who frustrate you!
Think of all of the disappointments that we present to our Lord and still he loves us! We are to love like him!
Do You Love Him Enough to Love Them Enough?
This is what we must do! He didn’t ask us, he said we ought to wash one another’s feet!
This simply means we are not to go around pointing out faults about one another. We are to cover one another.
Ga 6:1–2 (NKJV) — 1 Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted. 2 Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.
How are we to love them? He doesn’t just say it, he takes an action by washing their feet and then tells us: Jn 13:15 (NKJV) — 15 For I have given you an example, that you should do as I have done to you.
There is nowhere around this! We have no excuse, we must overwhelm our personal thoughts and submit to our Lord and learn to love even when we are not loved!
Now look at this,
Jn 13:4 (NKJV) — 4 rose from supper and laid aside His garments, took a towel and girded Himself.
When it says he girded himself with a towel, this means he took on the attitude of a servant.
This was an attitude of humility. He humbly served them and expects us to do the same for one another!
Jn 13:16 (NKJV) — 16 Most assuredly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master; nor is he who is sent greater than he who sent him.
Here, he clearly explains what he did. You are not greater than me! If I can do this for you, you must do this for one another! You must learn to serve one another!
Ro 12:3 (NKJV) — 3 For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith.
Php 2:3–8 (NKJV) — 3 Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. 4 Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others. 5 Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, 6 who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, 7 but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.
Jn 13:17 (NKJV) — 17 If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.
It is important now that we notice the difference of what he says!
Jn 13:17 (NKJV) — 17 If you know these things,
Many of us know the word, but knowing the word is not enough!
It is useless to know the Bible! We must live the Bible!
The Bible tells us, we are to love one another as Christ has loved us. We know this, but we must know this!
John 13:17 ….blessed are you if you do them.
He does not say you are blessed if people serve you. No! He says you are blessed if you serve others!
The blessings of God are reserved for those who love God to do the will of God and love his brother as he has loved us!
A lot of times we complain that people don’t treat us right, but have you considered, are you treating other people right?
To experience a thing you must sow a thing. We will all reap what we sow.
If we sow the love of God to our brothers and sisters, we will reap the love of God from God!
If we love the Lord, then we must love like the Lord!
When we love like the Lord and love and serve our brother, even when they are wrong, we will be blessed by the Lord!
Then the Bible tells us:
John 13: 35 By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
The true mark of a disciple is when we have love for one another! If we don’t have love for one another…
We may be in the church!
We may sing in the choir!
We may serve in the church!
We may shout and dance!
But if we cannot love like Christ says the love the Bible tells us in first Corinthians 13:2… We are nothing!
When we are able to love him enough to love them enough to serve them and forgive them,… then we prove we are his disciples!
Our eternity is based upon how we treat one another. It is based upon how we love one another. I conclude with this:
The result of not loving like Christ
Mt 7:21–23 (NKJV) — 21 “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. 22 Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ 23 And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’
The mark of a true child of God is that we love one another!
The ability to love like him comes from being submitted to him and practicing loving like him.
The result of loving like Christ
Mt 25:37–40 (NKJV) — 37 “Then the righteous will answer Him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry and feed You, or thirsty and give You drink? 38 When did we see You a stranger and take You in, or naked and clothe You? 39 Or when did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?’ 40 And the King will answer and say to them, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me.’
Do You Love Him Enough, to Love Them Enough?
Final Summary
1. If you really love him you will keep his commandments. John 14:15,21
2. Jesus gave us a new commandment – to love one another as he has loved us John 13:34
3. We are known to be his disciples if we keep his Commandment love one another as he has loved us John 13:35
4. We love one another like Christ when we serve one another John 13:13-14
5. We will be blessed if we love one another enough to serve them like Jesus does John 13:17 who is the greatest? The greatest servant!
6. The result of not loving like Christ is banishment Matt 25:41-46
7. The result of loving like Christ is being with Christ Matt 25:37-40
