Family & Friends: JESUS and His Friends
SCRIPTURE: “This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. 14 You are My friends if you do whatever I command you. 15 No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you. 16 You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you. 17 These things I command you, that you love one another.” John 15:12-17
Those who are true friends of the Lord Jesus are to also be friends with one another, and that friendship is to be based on the spiritual capacity to love that we have received from Christ Himself. He speaks to his 12 disciples about his commitment to those who are His friends, but he also teaches them, as well as us, that to be Jesus's friend carries with it a great responsibility, because of who He is and what He has made those that He chose to be his friends. For Jesus to have us as His friends He had to show the greatest act of love toward us by sacrificing His life for us, by dying on the cross for our sins.
He did it not only to save us so that we who believe can be forgiven for our sins, but He revealed the example that is expected from us, who are His friends, toward one another when required. This is also the teaching that is given to us in 1 John 3:16, “By this we know love because He laid down his life for us. And we also Ought to lay down our lives” for our brothers and sisters in Christ. The active experience of our friendship with Jesus and one another is called fellowship and it is characterized by our sharing of His life and receiving His love as we walk together with Jesus and one another. 1 John 1:3.
The first expectation He reveals to his friends is that we are to obey what He commands (14). It reminds us that though Jesus calls us into this friendship, and does not call us his servants, does not mean that He relinquishes His position of authority in our lives. In sacrificing His life so that we could be His friends, He assumes personal possession of all those whom the Father has given Him (John 10:29 and 17: 24). and personal ownership of all who believe on Him (Acts 20: 28 and Ephesians 1:14). True friends of Jesus are mindful that He expects obedience from us. Being our friend does not mean Jesus is less “Lord.”
PRAYER: Father in Heaven, thank you for saving us through faith in Your Son the Lord Jesus Christ, and giving us to Him to have to hold and share His life with Him. Grant us greater revelation. That we may know you and him so much better. As we live for you in this world In Jesus name, Amen.
By Pastor Wayne Cockrell
Taken from “The Pastor’s Heart” Family and Friends Day Newsletter No. 22- Vol 8, October 2018
He did it not only to save us so that we who believe can be forgiven for our sins, but He revealed the example that is expected from us, who are His friends, toward one another when required. This is also the teaching that is given to us in 1 John 3:16, “By this we know love because He laid down his life for us. And we also Ought to lay down our lives” for our brothers and sisters in Christ. The active experience of our friendship with Jesus and one another is called fellowship and it is characterized by our sharing of His life and receiving His love as we walk together with Jesus and one another. 1 John 1:3.
The first expectation He reveals to his friends is that we are to obey what He commands (14). It reminds us that though Jesus calls us into this friendship, and does not call us his servants, does not mean that He relinquishes His position of authority in our lives. In sacrificing His life so that we could be His friends, He assumes personal possession of all those whom the Father has given Him (John 10:29 and 17: 24). and personal ownership of all who believe on Him (Acts 20: 28 and Ephesians 1:14). True friends of Jesus are mindful that He expects obedience from us. Being our friend does not mean Jesus is less “Lord.”
PRAYER: Father in Heaven, thank you for saving us through faith in Your Son the Lord Jesus Christ, and giving us to Him to have to hold and share His life with Him. Grant us greater revelation. That we may know you and him so much better. As we live for you in this world In Jesus name, Amen.
By Pastor Wayne Cockrell
Taken from “The Pastor’s Heart” Family and Friends Day Newsletter No. 22- Vol 8, October 2018
Archive
2026
January
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