"Final Encouragement"

Preached by Rev. Ed Brouwer at The Gathering Place,
Pulpit Series Volume 17 Issue 47 12/30/2007


Consider if you would; Jesus coming into this room today, looked you straight in the eye and said, "Hello friend." And then He had you stand up and He put his arm around you and looking at the rest of us He said, "This is my friend."
On what basis would Jesus say that about anyone of us here?
Take a look at John 15:12-17.
We could call this portion of scripture "What friends of Jesus look like”. Of course we are talking about character not in their appearance.
My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father, I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit- fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. This is my command: Love each other."
Jesus equates friendship with Him on the basis of how we love each other, as well as Him.
This is a great note for us to go out on!
Loving one another is the first priority of life in the church community.
Love is the greatest gift of all time. The Bible says that love will never end.
The proof of our friendship with Christ is demonstrated by our loving one another in the family of faith.

When it comes to human relationships there is a single commandment; That is to love one another.
And not just to love, but to love one another as He (Jesus) has loved us. He wraps up all the commandments into one. This is it. This is the big one.
God is love. And to love each other as He has loved us is the priority that Jesus sets out.
I remind you that He does not end the sentence with just love each other. He ends it with love each other, as I have loved you.
We cannot love each other the way that Jesus loves us, unless He lives inside of us. I have to die to myself and ask Christ to come into my life and love others through me.
As goes my relationship with Jesus, so goes my relationship with others!
Sometimes what we call love may be activity designed not to lose somebody's affection or approval. Or maybe we feel guilt and so we try to do good things for people.
The love, which Jesus speaks of is so different from anything else.
How did Jesus demonstrate His love?
First, He freely gave. Jesus did what he did for us without coercion. That's a great question to ask ourselves ...am I doing what I am doing freely?
Love, if it is truly divine is given freely.
The divine love that Jesus talks about is active goodness.
Jesus freely laid down what?
He freely laid down his life.
Divine love is sacrificial. In other words, when we love it's going to cost us something. It's may be time, or money. We may be discomforted in some way. There may be blood sweat or tears shed.
Among the many descriptions of love, Paul said that love does not insist on its own way.
True love does not insist that everyone fits the same spiritual mold. We need to move each other towards Christ, but there may be differences of opinion, like in a good marriage.
So here's how it works: "A loving community is a place where there can be difference, but one can still belong. It becomes a healing place and a converting place when its members have learned to stop trying to heal and convert."
See, if you believe something differently than I do, and I spend all my energy trying to get you to be where I am, I get in the way of love. But if I accept you where you are and we just say, let the Lord work it out, then love flows freely and people can share their opinions and they can share themselves.
They can share who they are and what they think without worrying about being devalued or judged. Even a person who comes in who is not a believer and says, You know I don't believe this and I don't believe that. That's okay, we love you. It's all right, come on, have coffee with us.
See, it is not our job to convert. It's only God's job to convert. Our job is to be the vessel of love that God does that through.
We are here because God called us and chose us to be here. And who is going to say to the Lord, you chose poorly?
As we accept and love each other especially in our differences, God can draw others to Christ through us. So loving each other, how we are with each other is our first form of witnessing to a hurting world.
Drill that into your mind. Our first form of witnessing, is how we are with one another.
At the 100th anniversary of the arrival of missionaries in what was once called the Belgian Congo, Christians gathered to celebrate. The festivities lasted all day with music, preaching, food, conversations and many reminisced about all that God had done and the progress of the gospel in that part of Africa. Near the end of the program a very old man stood up and said that he had to say something, or else a secret would go to the grave with him. It is something that nobody else knew and he felt it important to tell. He explained that when the first missionaries came to the Belgian Congo that the people didn't know whether to believe the message of Jesus or not and so in sort of a diabolical way they devised a plan to slowly and secretly poison the missionaries who had come to their shores. One by one, children and adults became ill and died and were buried. And it was when his people saw how the missionaries died and how they loved each other even in the midst of distressed they finally believed and they became Christians. Think of it, those missionaries never had a clue as to what was happening. They didn't even know they were martyrs. They didn't know they were being poisoned and didn't know why they were dying, but in the midst of their distress and their stresses, they continued to love each other. They loved Christ and they trusted him and so in their dying they taught others how to live. You know, sometimes we are not aware of why we go through troubles, why we go through struggles, but if we will love through them, if we will love through them, then a watching world will notice and will believe.
So my final charge, my final call, my final encouragement to you and I am speaking to myself, is that we love one another as Jesus loved us.

Freely.
Sacrificially.
Graciously.

So that the world might know that He has been sent. This is my command, love each other.


Love never gives up.  Love cares more for others than for self.
   Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.
   Love doesn't strut, Doesn't have a swelled head,
   Doesn't force itself on others,
   Isn't always "me first,"
   Doesn't fly off the handle,
   Doesn't keep score of the sins of others,
   Doesn't revel when others grovel,
   Puts up with anything, Trusts God always,
   Always looks for the best, Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end.