Love Like Jesus

Transcript

Hello, my friend… so glad you're with me today. This is By God's Call — day 36, Love Like Jesus.

"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. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." John 13, verses 34 and 35.

Let that settle for a moment.

Jesus wasn't addressing a crowd in an open field. He was in a small room with twelve men. The heaviest night in all of history was closing in. Judas had already slipped out into the dark. And it was in that moment — that exact moment — that He said: "A new commandment I give to you."

But wait. Loving your neighbor wasn't a new idea. It was already in the law. What was new was the measure. "Just as I have loved you." Not as much as feels fair to you. Not in proportion to what you receive back. As He loved. And He loved all the way to the cross.

And here's the detail you can't miss: He said it with the towel still damp. Minutes earlier He had knelt down and washed the feet of every man in that room. Judas's feet. Peter's feet — the man who would deny Him three times before sunrise. Jesus didn't wait for them to deserve it. He went first. Love always goes first.

That's the standard. It isn't a feeling you wait to feel — it's a decision you make before you feel like it. In the upper room, love looked like a basin of water and knees on the floor. Real love stoops. It serves. It gets its hands dirty.

And then Jesus says something that ought to stop us cold: "By this all people will know that you are my disciples."

Not by our arguments. Not by the size of our buildings. Not by our platforms, our reach, or our online presence. The world will recognize the children of God by the love they have for one another. That is the credential. That is the mark the world can see and cannot explain away.

And here's where it gets hard — because this commandment isn't about loving humanity in the abstract, from a safe distance, without any risk. It's about loving the believers right beside you. The ones who share your life. The ones who know you well enough to wound you. Discipleship is proven at close range, with the people who are easiest to overlook and easiest to hurt.

You don't have to fix every strained relationship today. But you can take one step.

Before breakfast, before you open your work, before the day carries you off — send a message to one believer. Make it specific. Not a generic "thinking of you." Name what you see God doing in their life. Tell them: "This is what I see in you, and it's from God."

That is the love Jesus commanded. Not vague, not passive. Concrete, deliberate, costly enough to ask you to stop and fix your eyes on someone other than yourself.

The world is watching. And it will recognize Christ in you when it sees that love.

Stay close to God. Pray — then act. I'll see you tomorrow, my friend.