John 15:9-17

Sixth Sunday of Easter

May 17, 2009

John 15:9-17 (New International Version)

⁹"As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. ¹⁰If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father's commands and remain in his love. ¹¹I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. ¹²My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. ¹³Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. ¹⁴You are my friends if you do what I command. ¹⁵I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. ¹⁶You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit—fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. ¹⁷This is my command: Love each other.

TWO KEYS TO A JOY-FILLED LIFE

I. Remain in Jesus’ Love

II. Experience his Friendship

Dear Christian Friends,

You can find a book to cure about just any problem you may have. There is so much literature out there that claims to make your life easier. Scrolling through the library or bookstore you can find volumes upon volumes of material to guarantee you financial success. “How to make your investments count” or my favorite “Two easy steps to becoming a millionaire” Ironically you open the book to the first page and it says as step one of How to be a millionaire is you first have to get a million dollars before moving on to step two. Many books claim to be the answer to marriage problems or dating problems. All guarantee success. Trouble is not too many of them work. Not to sound like a salesman, but what if I was to tell you that I know of a book that guarantees happiness. It is free of cost no charge to you. No, I didn’t write it, but our God did. It’s the bible. Today in our text the Lord gives us two keys to a Joy-filled Life. The first step in his guidebook to a joy-filled life is to remain in his love and the second step is to experience his friendship.

Our text is taken from text is taken from John 15. It is preceded by the famous I am the vine you are the branches section. Jesus spoke these words on Maundy Thursday evening in the upper room. Chapter 15 and following, up until the time of his arrest serve as Jesus being a spiritual cheerleader. By that I mean he was getting them ready for the coming events of his arrest and soon death. He was giving them the comfort and assurance they would need for these coming days.

In the 60’s the rock group The Beatles put it best when they said in a song “All you need is love.” In their song they boasted that all you need for happiness is simply love. In essence they weren’t too far from the truth. For the Christian all we truly need to live a joy filled life is love. The first key in our guidebook to a joy-filled life is to Remain in Jesus’ Love.

Love is a very familiar word. We see it in movies and TV. We read about it in the books and magazines. Turn on the radio and you can hear love in songs or in poems. Love surrounds us today - Families with children, Husbands and wives, boyfriend and girlfriend. Yes there is even a love for the Packers that can be seen by the way we act and dress on given Sundays. Yes, love is around us. But do we really know what love means? Jesus gives us an answer. In our text our Savior encourages us to remain in his love He tells us in verse 9: “As my Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. When one pages through scripture, one will soon see that in addition to the names of God, the word love is used numerous times. Sometimes we even equate God with love.

When the Bible speaks of love, in the original language, it has three different definitions. All of these definitions are quite different. In order to under stand the beauty of what our Lord is telling us lets examine these three definitions. One way the bible describes love is with the word Philew, which simply means to have love or affection for someone or something based on association. In other words it’s like brotherly love that is why Philadelphia is called the City of Brotherly love. Now looking at our text is Jesus commanding us to be Philew, or affectionate to one another? Possibly, but lets look at the other two meanings.

A second meaning for love is Epws and this refers to a passionate love. Our English word erotic comes from here. This sensual love is reserved for the married couple. Looking at our context it wouldn’t seem that Jesus is encouraging us to be passionate to one another.

Finally we come to our third meaning and that is Agape. It means to have love for someone or something based on sincere appreciation and high regard. In other words it is the highest form of love. A love that is prompted by pure and unselfish motives, a love which wholly seeks the benefits , not of self but of others. Here in our text Christ is not talking about a brotherly love, but something deeper and with a higher regard.

Jesus tells his disciples that the Father Agaped him. We know Jesus wasn’t lying. The Father truly did show this perfect love to his Son. At Jesus Baptism and at his Transfiguration we hear these words: This is My Beloved son in whom I am well pleased.

Not only did the Heavenly Father show this agape love to his son but he showed it to his disciples and he shows it to us. He sacrificed his son. Verse 13 of our text Greater love has no one than thisthat he lay down his life for his friends.” What is the first passage all of us learned when we were younger? John 3:16 right? John three which simply states God so loved the World that he gave his one and only son. Now that is love. One person is sent to die for another. If you had to lay down your life for a member of the family or for a friend, that would be love. That is agape love.

All of us are sinful human beings, Isaiah put it best when he says “We’re nothing, but filthy rags.” We deserve death and hell. Yet instead of us being punished God says “Hey I love you and I am going to punish my Son in your place” God the Son looks at us and instead of resentment or sorrow He says “Hey I love you and I am willing to die for you that you may live an be with me in Heaven. That my friends is love, an unselfish love, far greater than any soap opera, country song, poem, or harlequin romance novel. Love-- an innocent man sent to die for us.

Now some of you may be sitting there and saying to yourself “hey do I remain in this love”? Jesus simply tells us in verse 10 If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love. Being motivated by the love we have been shown. Being told outright that all of our sins are gone, washed cleaned never to be seen again and that we have a place in heaven gives us joy. We can see how we can’t help but want to keep God’s commands out of thanks to him for all He has done for us. Obedience to Jesus’ commands is the product of faith. In other words people can tell if your a Christian or not by the way you act. This is what is referred to as fruits of faith

Do not get me wrong Jesus is not saying that obeying his commands is the way to heaven. Nor am I preaching salvation by works here. To put Jesus words of verse 10 in more practically terms, would be like the time our parents gave us rules or guidelines to follow while we were growing up. These rules were not to make our life miserable, but they were there to guide us in life and to keep us our of harms way. As children we’d soon realize that if we didn’t follow these guide lines, our parents weren’t very happy and problems would occur. Yet if we followed them we showed that we respected them and their rules and we had no problems. We did this out of thanks for all that our parents had done for us. On a larger sense our heavenly Father has given us some guide lines, His 10 commandments. He hasn’t given these to us to make our life miserable. He has given them to us because he loves us and he wants us to be safe and to remain that way. We as Christians can remain in his love by obeying these commands. John in his epistle puts it best that when we follow God’s law it is not as a punishment, but it is our thanks to God. 1John 5:3 This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome, We as Christians are motivated to love our God and serve him and our fellow man, because of the awesome love he has shown to us as sinners. 1 John 4:19 sums our remaining in God’s love best when it says We love because he first loved us. Love for God and his commands, rooted in the awesome love that God showed for sinners by sending Jesus to die for us, is one key to a joy-filled life.

The joy doesn’t end here with love, it goes one. We can have a joy-filled life by also experiencing our Lords friendship. Verse 14

As a child growing up it was good to have friends. The highlight was always being able to go over to a friend’s house for the weekend. We always found ourselves going over the friend’s house who had the best toys or the latest tree fort or if he had a pool forget about it we there in no time. We’d have the time of our life playing in the pool or chasing away bad guys from our secret hideout fort. What fun we had with our friends! My friends, Jesus is our friend and he has much more to offer than a tree fort or a swimming pool.

But weren’t always Jesus’ friend. No we servants as Jesus tells us in Verse 15. We were servants or in other words, slaves. Paul tells us in Roman’s 6:20 When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. We have been slaves to sin from the moment we were conceived as David reminds us in Ps. 51:5, Surely, I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me. We know that sin is all around us. Try going a day with out sinning. Ok, try going a hour, minute, a second. None of us can escape this slavery to sin. As a result we deserve death as Romans 6:23 tells us “The wages of sin is death”

But going back to our text, verse 15, Jesus says no longer are you servants, but you are my friends. In order for this to happen, a change had to take place. A change that rescued us from this slavery to sin. A change that Paul speaks of in Rom. 6:22 But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. No longer are we servants because our great Friend took our place and God punished him instead.

We truly are Jesus’ friends. Just like when you would go over to a friends house you were treated like a guest. You were given the best first. You were able to take the first piece of pizza. You were able to play with the best toy first. As Jesus friend he has given you and me many gifts. By his death on the cross we receive forgiveness of sins and the assurance of eternal life. Every time we come to his house we are given the best. We are given the news of how much he loves us and how much he has done for us. Truly we have been given the best from our friend.

I think the hymn writer put it best when he said “What a friend we have in Jesus” Hymn number 411 in Christian worship. Let’s take a look at what a friend we truly have. Please open up your hymnals and follow along. Here we see that we have trials, whether it be at work or at home, we have temptations whether it be at school, we have sorrows, but you know what? We don’t need to despair because we have a friend, who know all our problems. A friend who cares and a friend who can and will help us. There is no doubt about it, God has some pretty big shoulders to cry on. He even invites us to talk to him in prayer. Now that should make you happy. You can have a joy-filled life knowing that Jesus is your friend. We are confident that when problems arise we can go to him for help and experience his friendship.

Certainly we can be happy and have our joy-filled life by remaining in his love and experiencing his friendship. My friends this joy can go even further. You can double or triple it, by sharing it with others. Share Christ with your unchurched friends, co-workers and even relatives. Let them know who it is that lives inside of you. Let them see in your actions, your words what it is that makes you so joyful. Sometimes this may be frightening and you may say “Oh I can’t do that, isn’t that the Pastor’s job?” God gives all of us, pastor, teacher, business men, farmer, mom, dad, the strength to share this joy with others. He gives us this promise in Isa. 55:11 so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it. That is the promise we can count on.

Are you happy? Is your life going the way you want it to? You can find many books that give you suggestions on how to be happy or how to get your life on track. But that is all they do - give suggestions. Right here in front of us we have answers and solutions to problems. Right here in God’s word. This my friends is the only thing that guarantees a joy-filled life, not only for this life, but also for the one to come. AMEN