A New Command

John 13:31-34 – When he was gone, Jesus said, “Now the Son of Man is glorified and God is glorified in him. If God is glorified in him, God will glorify the Son in himself, and will glorify him at once. “My children, I will be with you only a little longer. You will look for me, and just as I told the Jews, so I tell you now: Where I am going, you cannot come. “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.

John 14:13 – And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.

Mark 8:31 – He then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and after three days rise again.

Leviticus 19:18 – “‘Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord.

1 Thessalonians 4:9 – Now about your love for one another we do not need to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love each other.

Mark 12:31 – The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”

Luke 10:27 – He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”

Application:

• ·         “In my name” is not simply prayer that mentions Jesus’ name but prayer in accordance with all that the person who bears the name is.
• ·         “Son of Man” was Jesus’ most common title for Himself, used 81 times in the Gospels and never used by anyone but Jesus there. The Son of Man is pictured as a heavenly figure who in the end times is entrusted by God with authority, glory and sovereign power. That Jesus considered “Son of Man” to be a Messianic title is evident by His use of it here in juxtaposition to Peter’s use of “Messiah”. The Son of Man must suffer, as predicted.
• ·         In a sense this new command was an old one, but for Christ’s disciples it was new, because it was the mark of their special bond, created by Christ’s great love for them. Our standard is Christ’s love for us.
• ·         Rabbi Nahmanides: “One should place no limitations upon the love for the neighbor, but instead a person should love to do an abundance of good for his fellow being as he does for Himself.
• ·         “Love for one another” translates philadelphia, a Greek word that outside the New Testament almost without exception denoted the mutual love of children of the same father.
• ·         According to Jesus, the second most important commandment states that love for neighbor is an essential component of love for God.
• ·         Whether a four-fold love or threefold, the significance is that total devotion is demanded.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV