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“The Defining Mark of the Church”
John 13:31-35
IPC, July 12, 2009

I have always loved this prayer: “Dear Lord, I am grateful for this new day.  So far, I haven’t said a cross word to anyone nor had an ill thought toward anyone.  I haven’t been selfish or argumentative in any way.  However, in a moment I will be getting out of bed and I think I’m really going to need you then.  Amen.”  Several years ago, I saw the Tom Hanks movie Castaway, where Hanks’ character spends months and years on a deserted island with no one to talk to but Wilson… who happened to be a volley ball.  At times, I would like that type of solitude, but I’m sure it would be short-lived, because I am simply too social a being. 

Last Tuesday, I went did a short 3-mile run, since it was the first time running since the Peachtree.  A couple of young guys in a pickup truck started “cat-calling” at me as they drove past, saying encouraging things like, “Hoof it, Grandpa!”  My initial thought was…well, I won’t share my initial thought…  I had spent Monday going over today’s passage and attempting to let the Word infiltrate my “being,” so I simply waved.  After all, I was outside trying to be healthy and they looked like beer-swilling, backward-baseball cap-wearing losers, so who am I to judge?  No offense to any of our backward-baseball cap- wearing folks around here, including deacons and associate pastors.   

Jesus had a lot to say about relationships.  His coming to earth was primarily to restore our vertical relationship with our Heavenly Father, but Jesus talked a lot about dealing with folks on the horizontal plane.   

John 13:31-35 “When he had gone out, Jesus said, ‘Now is the Son of Man glorified, & God is glorified in him.  If God is glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself, & glorify him at once.  Little children, yet a little while I am with you.  You will seek me, & just as I said to the Jews, so now I also say to you, “Where I am going you cannot come.”  A new commandment I give you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.  By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.’”   

Let me give the setting of this important teaching of our Lord Jesus.  He gives this to His disciples in the Upper Room on the night before He executed on the cross.  We know that Jesus often taught in parables, which were often acted teachings.  The most famous one is earlier in this chapter 13 when Jesus removed His outer garments and tied a towel around his waist, poured water into a basin and began to wash the feet of His disciples and wiped them with the towel that was wrapped around Him.  Just after this “living parable,” Judas rejects this grace of a humble God and then Jesus shares what is at the heart of His foot washing sermon.  He gives the defining mark of a true Christian. 

Now, “love” may not be what we would expect as the defining mark of a true follower of God.  Honestly, don’t we sometime act as if Jesus said:

• By this all people will know you are my disciples by your profession of faith?  On the fact that you hold to a Trinitarian theology or a Christ-centered redemption—in other words, salvation by faith alone?

• Or perhaps all people will know that you are Jesus’ disciples by your Sunday behavior—that you get up for church and you never mow your lawn on Sunday afternoon?

• Or do people know that you are His disciples by your ethical positions—your pro-life bumper stickers or your support for prayer in schools?

• Or maybe they know by the company you keep, such as, the church that you attend?

However, none of those are His test.  “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”  I wonder if folks in our neighborhoods know that the people at Ingleside Church are Jesus’ disciples?  People must be able to see and sense that we truly love one another.  Merely saying that we do is not enough.  The verse doesn’t say, “People will know we are Jesus’ disciples because we CLAIM to love one another.”  They must be able to see it. 

John Calvin, who is seen as the Father of our Reformed faith wrote this about our John 13 passage: “How necessary this admonition was (“a new commandment I give you”), we learn by daily experience; for, since it is difficult to maintain brotherly love, men lay it aside and contrive for themselves new methods of worshipping God.”  Calvin is saying it’s tough to love others, so we try to substitute other marks of orthodoxy instead of love.  Jesus is telling His followers that LOVE is the defining mark of the church.  How does our congregation stack up? 

We are to Love One Another:

1. Because of Jesus’ love for Us.  (Vs. 33-34)

Verse 33 begins with a comforting title of “little children.”  One scholar suggests that “My dear children” is a more accurate translation. Jesus is communicating care and compassion and concern.  He reminds His followers that their love is based on His model of love.  They were to love one another how?  “Just as I have loved you.”  When you put “My dear children” with “just as I have loved you,” we are reminded of God’s deep and abiding care.  When Jesus asks us to love one another, it is not out of ignorance to its difficulty.  He is not telling us to do something that He wouldn’t do.  This is not the command of the boss who forces his employees to do work that is beneath him.  We are to love because of Jesus’ love for us. 

2. Because it is a New Command. (Vs. 34)

“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.”  It may sound strange that Jesus calls this a “new” commandment.  It is not new in terms of never having been stated.  Lev. 19:18 “You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.”  Loving each other has always been the standard for God’s people, so why does Jesus call it new? 

It could be that His love has set a new and higher level for our love.  Before Christ, we were to love as we loved ourselves—now we must love as Jesus loved us.  Or maybe He called it new because the people of His day had ignored and neglected their duty to love each other.  In that case, it would be a newly discovered love.  Or maybe He is referring to something that is rare and unique.   

The late Rev. James Boice believed that the newness referred to a change in the objects of our love.  Under the Old Covenant, God’s people were to love especially fellow Jews (those sharing a common physical descent).  Now we are to love fellow Christians (those sharing a common spiritual life). 

One part of the newness may be the new power available to fulfill the law—that is, the Holy Spirit.  I’m not sure what the right answer is.  I would think that all of the above are true.  We must love one another because this is the new commandment from the Lord. 

3. Because Such is Our Witness.  (Vs. 35)

Vs. 35 “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”  Joni Eareckson Tada says, “To see Jesus is to see what love looks like.”  When we see Jesus, we see love.  In John 13, Jesus first tells His men that He is leaving and then He commands that we “love one another.”  So, when LOVE leaves, how will people know what true, divine love looks like?  They will see it in the relationships Christians have with one another.  This is our most powerful witness. 

There was a popular preacher named Chrysostom around 400 A.D.  At that time, Christians wanted pastors to perform miracles like Jesus did, because they believed such demonstrations would lead to great numbers of conversions, but Chrysostom disagreed.  He wrote: “Even now, there is nothing else that causes the Greeks (non-Christians) to stumble, except that there is no love.  Miracles do not so much attract the Greeks as the mode of life and nothing so much causes a right life as love.  We are the cause of their remaining in their error.  Their own doctrines, they have long condemned, and in like manner they admire ours, but they are hindered by our mode of life.”   

Folks, we don’t witness effectively simply because we have great spiritual gifts or have memorized a presentation.  Even the least educated Christian can be filled with love and become a powerful witness to the reality of following Christ. 

4. As Jesus Loved.  (Vs. 34)

John 13:34b “Just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.”  I Corinthians 13 is dubbed “the Love Chapter.”  Try substituting Jesus’ name for the word love.  “Jesus is kind and patient; Jesus does not insist on His own way and is not rude.  Jesus is not irritable or resentful.  Jesus bears all things.”  Try that and then ask yourself: Am I patient with those who offend me? Do I insist on my own way or do I enable others to have their preferences met?  Am I easily irritated by sinful behaviors or do I quickly overlook those and continue to believe and hope for the best in every new situation? 

In order to love as Jesus loved, we have to put aside everything that hinders that from happening.  Let me give some examples.

• We cannot love those we cannot see.  Matt. 7: 1, 3, & 5 “Judge not, that you be not judged…Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?  You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, & then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.”  A judgmental spirit blinds us to the people we would love.  When we jump to conclusions about motives and imagine we understand another’s reasons, we are no longer to see past the log in our own eye.

• We cannot love those we consider worse sinners.  When a woman washed Jesus’ feet with her tears, Simon was unimpressed.  (Luke 7:39) “He said to himself, ‘If this man were a prophet, he would have known who & what sort of woman this is who is touching him, for she is a sinner.”  Jesus then told Simon a story: “A certain moneylender had two debtors. One owed 500 denarii, & the other 50. When they could not pay, he cancelled the debt of both.  Now which of them will love him more?”  (Vs. 41) “Simon answered, ‘The one, I suppose, for whom he cancelled the larger debt.’  And he said to him, ‘You have judged rightly.’”  Jesus tells Simon that this woman had wet His feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair.  She kissed Jesus’ feet and applied ointment on them.  In verse 47, Jesus said, “Therefore, I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven—for she loved much.  But he who is forgiven little, loves little.”  Folks, a condemning spirit hinders love because it pulls us away from people.

• We cannot love those who will not stay.  Jesus is teaching about love just after Judas has walked away.  One area I struggle with it the expectation that the pastor is be nice and tolerant all the time.  I’m not sure that is what God wants.  I am to live at peace with all people as much as it is in my power. 

But, at the same time, the Bible warns faithful pastors that the church will be constantly in danger from those who have “a healthy craving for controversy & quarrels, which produce envy, dissension, slander, evil suspicions, & constant friction among people.”  (I Tim. 6:4-5)  We must have nothing to do with “foolish, ignorant controversies; you know that they breed quarrels.”  (2 Tim. 2:23)  Titus 3:9-10 “Avoid foolish controversies, genealogies, dissensions, & quarrels about the law, for they are unprofitable & worthless. As for a person who stirs up division, after warning him once & then twice, have nothing more to do with him.” 

Since the church is a place where we try to love others, those who are divisive and bitter and argumentative sometimes use our compassion to demand attention.  But these verses I just read make it clear that we damage the church when we fail to set limits.  Now we may be accused of being unloving.   

Ingleside is a very friendly church.  I hear that time and again from our guests. That’s great.  Jesus welcomed people, but is that all He is asking us to do?  Is that the fullness of the implications of this new commandment? 

Scripture encourages us to “put off” a number of things.  Let’s list a few of them and see if there are areas where we can improve.

• Put off gossip.

• Put off slander.

• Put off letting the sun go down on your anger.  (Keep short accounts by quickly resolving conflict.)

• Put off bitterness because love knows that others will never treat us as we think we deserve.

• Put off clamoring because love is tenderhearted.

• Put off the pride which always demands a perfect response from others.

• Put off the malice toward those against whom you have a justifiable complaint.

• Put off a complaining spirit.

• Put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony and let the peace of Christ rule in your heart, & be thankful.  (Col. 3:14-15)

When you mess-up, do you appreciate it when others sort of “cut you some slack?”  I know I do.  The Apostle Peter gives us a great cover-up in I Peter 4:8. “Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins.”  Love is what a watching world needs to see and love IS the defining mark of a healthy church.  As pastor, I’ve had opportunity to see love in action around here lately.  And, as a result, I believe that Ingleside is a pretty healthy church.  Let’s continue that quest for good health.  Let’s pray. 

Please visit us at our next worship service.

We offer "An Unchanging Word To A Changing World"

In Christ,
Bill Bratley - Pastor