John 14 - Obedience is God's Love Language

Jesus Promises the Holy Spirit

15 “If you love me, keep my commands. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever—17 the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be[c] in you. 18 I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.19 Before long, the world will not see me anymore, but you will see me.Because I live, you also will live. 20 On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you. 21 Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them.”
Jesus says, "If you love me, keep my commands".  This sounds like something your parents might tell you when you were young. Or even now! LOL.  This is not the first or last time Jesus will say this.  Obviously he means it.  And some people confuse this with "works righteousness", which says we can only earn God's love if we do enough works. John isn't as interested in our justification in Christ as Paul was, but he is interested in our relationship with Christ.  In John, Jesus is the one who wants to know us.  Jesus wants us to be in him, and he in us.  
One of the ways we stay 'in Him" is to keep His commandments.  Why? As we keep his commandments we stay connected to Jesus and operate in His power. As a further reflection of the intimacy Jesus wanted with his disciples and will keep with them when leaves, he tells them about the coming Holy Spirit.  The Spirit will be Jesus' presence in them and will help them to carry out what He has commanded them to be and do. He will be the point of connection because He is the Spirit of Christ.
So while Jesus begins to prepare for his departure, he teaches them how they can continue to be reminded of what He has taught them through the Spirit.  In fact Jesus tells the disciples that they will do the things He had done and even greater things because the Father would send the Holy Spirit to them.  Wow!  What a promise!  
As Jesus wanted to have this intimate and organic relationship with his disciples he wants the same with us.  Jesus calls us to obey him not to earn his love but to continue in it.  Through our obedience we show ourselves to be his disciples and the world will know Jesus through our love.  This is the love that Jesus had for the world that now flows through us.  Are you living in this kind of intimate relationship with Jesus where your love for him is shown through obedience? If you feel far from God it quite possibly be because you are not living in obedience to him.  And we obey God not out guilt or legalism but because we enjoy the deep abiding relationship when we do.  We will see this even more tomorrow in John 15!  Until then, let's show God some love! 

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