This is part of an ongoing series during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic. To engage further in the #QuarantineSoulCare series, click here.
Jesus longed for his disciples to know from personal experience the joy of sharing in his Father’s love. It was this love that sustained Jesus in life and death; it would be this very same love that would sustain his friends in life and death as well.
But surprisingly, the mystery of the disciples’ union with Christ turns out not to be for them alone! For the mystery hidden within God from all eternity has been to bring everyone who believes in Christ into a perfect union (or “oneness”) with him! In this way, God would not be the God of only one nation or race of people, but Father to a brand-new humanity in Christ who would reveal his love to the world. …
How would this happen? By the disciples abiding in their union with Christ and extending the natural fruit of the Father’s love for the Son to one another (see John 15). “By this,” Jesus said in John 13:35, “all people will know that you are my disciples. …
How would the world know that Jesus was sent of God and that God loves the world as much as he loved his own Son? It would not come through believers being united in doctrine or on social issues, but through loving one another just as the Father loved the Son. United to Christ by the Holy Spirit, believers would make known the love of the Father to the world! …
As creatures created in the image of God, we are able, by grace, to share in the natural communion of love that has forever existed between the Father and the Son. This is afforded to you and to me as we are united to Christ through the eternal breath, who is the Holy Spirit.
As we love one another with this type of love, the world will see (and experience) God’s presence on earth as it is (and always has been) in heaven.
I will talk to the Father, and he’ll provide you another Friend so that you will always have someone with you. This Friend is the Spirit of Truth. The godless world can’t take him in because it doesn’t have eyes to see him, doesn’t know what to look for. But you know him already because he has been staying with you, and will even be in you!
–John 14:15-17, The Message
May today you share in the natural communion of love that has forever existed between the Father and the Son. #quarantinesoulcare Click To Tweet
Today’s reading was taken from Closer Than Close by Dave Hickman.
