Dennis Tuuri

# Sermon Transcript – Reformation Covenant Church
## Pastor Dennis Tuuri | John 15:1-17

Please stand for the reading of God’s word. John 15:1-17.

“I am the true vine, and my father is the vine dresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, he takes away, and every branch that bears fruit, he prunes that it may bear more fruit. You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. Abide in me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me.

I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me and I in him bears much fruit. But without me, you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered. And they gather them and throw them into the fire and they are burned. If you abide in me and my words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you. By this my father is glorified that you bear much fruit. So you will be my disciples.

As the Father loved me, I also have loved you. Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my father’s commandments and abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you that my joy may remain in you and that your joy may be full. This is my commandment that you love one another, as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.

You are my friends if you do whatever I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing. But I have called you friends. For all things that I heard from my father, I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the father in my name he may give you. These things I command you that you love one another.”

Let’s pray. Father, we are cognizant of our sins. We know how infrequently we truly focus on abiding in you. You know, Lord God, that many times this last week when each and every one of us strayed from the path of abiding in our savior, in his word and in his love. We know, Lord God, that this is particularly evident as we manifest unkindness and impatience with one another.

Lord God, we thank you for the centrality of this command that our savior gives us today to love one another. And we pray that you would enable us day by day, week by week, month by month, and year by year. And as we move into this new year, enable us, Lord God, to more fervently love one another, abiding in our savior. In his name we ask it. Amen.

Please be seated. We have before us this central section of the upper room discourse once more—this abiding in the savior, the vine and the branches. And we have come to that part of the abiding which speaks directly to that abiding being manifested and demonstrated in our love for one another.

As we close off one year and open another, we focus upon this central command of our savior who says in essence that all the law is summed up in this: that we love one another. And we come to this command hopeful.

We come believing what we read in Psalm 138, that God will indeed perfect that which concerns us. That he has begun a good work in us, will complete it, will perfect it and keep us till the day of our union with him. And so we come to this verse hopeful that the Holy Spirit will take these verses, write them upon our hearts, change us, transform us, and make us more the image-bearers of the Lord Jesus Christ.

We come to this new year, casting away of the old, entering into the new. And as we do that, in whatever phase of life we go through these kinds of movements away from one thing into the future, we do so hopefully with a little bit of contemplation about shedding the sins of the past and walking in the newness of life that God has given to us.

There are various songs written for the new year, some of which we most of which we don’t know. I wanted to read from one as we begin today. The year is gone beyond recall with all its hopes and fears, with all its bright and gladdening smiles, with all its mourners’ tears. My thankful people praise thee, Lord, for countless gifts received and pray for grace to keep the faith which saints of old believed.

We pray as we enter into this year that God would empower us by his spirit to keep the faith. And our savior says the centrality of the faith is abiding in him, bearing fruit for him, loving one another.

To thee we come, oh gracious Lord, the newborn year to bless, defend our land from pestilence, give peace and plenteousness. Peace is God’s order in the midst of his people. And it’s really summarized in this abiding love we have for one another. Forgive this nation’s many sins, the growth of vice restrain, and help us all with sin to strive, crowns of life to gain.

May God through the preaching of the word today cause us to wish to strive against the failure of love that we have so often one for another. And may he empower us by his grace to live this year in the love of the brothers.

From evil deeds that stain the past, we now desire to flee and pray that future years may all be spent good, Lord, for thee. Oh Father, let thy watchful eyes look on us in love, that we may praise thee by year with angel hosts above.

May God grant us as we begin this year to focus upon his word today and then be transformed by his spirit to the end that we might indeed put off the death-like words and actions we have all so often for one another and put on deeds of love and kindness, words of life-giving power and love to one another. We pray that God might cause us this year to abide in the vine as his branches.

We said that this is the central portion of the upper room discourse. We’ve taken two Sundays to talk about it. Today we’ll focus primarily on verses 12 to 17. Last week we talked about verses 1 to 11, but they are a unit. And so please allow me to review what we talked about last week as indicated on your outlines.

We said last week that this text begins with an identification of the one in whom we are to abide. Very importantly, he identifies himself as the true vine—as opposed to the false vine. He is the Israel of God. The Old Testament over and over portrayed Israel as a fruitless vine, as a vine that was giving fruit for itself or for idols, turned toward idols opposed to him. And so Israel is the false vine.

And very importantly to understand: the historical context here is that he is preparing his church, the leaders of his church, with strength to combat the persecution of the world which, as we’ll see in a couple of weeks, is primarily identified as the Jewish church, the false vine and the false church. They’ll be cut off from that. And he is the true church in whom we are to abide.

Our calling is to abide in this true vine. And let me just say here that I think that if we think of this as a homily as it were upon the fruit of the vine, the wine that was taken at the last supper, picturing the wine that we’re to take every Lord’s day at the Lord’s supper, and if this is a picture of that, our abiding in the Lord Jesus Christ—certainly it’s much broader and deeper than this, but it must be seen, I think, as abiding in the true vine, the true church, the true source of life-giving communion with the Lord Jesus Christ.

And I’d like to say that I think this text calls us to kind of shed this idea that abiding in Christ is something we can do apart from the church of Jesus Christ. They’re going to be tempted to scatter. They’re going to be tempted to walk away from the church of Christ and go back to the synagogues from which they’ve been expelled. And Jesus is exhorting them to abide in the true vine, to abide in him, to love one another in the context of Christian community.

My point is: how do we distinguish who is a Christian and who is not a Christian? I think that our savior would cause us to distinguish those things objectively by those who are given the covenant signs, who remain in participation in the church, and who abide in the vine by receiving the fruit of the vine in communion in the services of the church.

There’s a sense in which, you know, professions of faith in Jesus Christ apart from commitment to the body of Christ—that’s clearly indicated in this text that we’ve read today—is really not to be seen as abiding in Jesus. It is, I think, a false faith that refuses to join itself to the church of Jesus Christ and abides in isolation from the vine and the other branches on the vine. And I think we can see that from this text.

Our calling is to abide in the true vine. Our calling is to abide in the church of Jesus Christ where the fruit of the vine is administered to us by way of covenant signs and seals. The result of our abiding in the true vine is fruitfulness.

Now, we said that one other thing I wanted to make in terms of this abiding in the vine: you know, it’s not enough just to come to church to take communion. Jesus says that we’re to abide specifically in the love of the father. We’re to remind ourselves every day in the midst of difficulties of the love of the father being mediated to us, no matter what means happens to us. No matter what things happen, the father’s love—we’re to abide in the love of the father as Jesus did.

And Jesus says we’re to abide in his word. This would make a wonderful time of year, a time of resolutions, to resolve to abide in the word of the Savior—not just by attending Lord’s Day services and hearing the Savior’s words preached. That’s important, as we’ll see in a moment here, but to read your scriptures.

You know, I think it’s so significant that we enter into decisions as a result of the word of God. And when Jesus commanded us last week to abide in his word, and does again this week, when he commands us to do that, may we respond with a commitment and dedication to abide in his word, in his scriptures, to read them every day.

Now, if that’s a commitment you want to make today, I would encourage you to make it in your heart now and to think of that as you come forward and offer yourselves to God in the tithes and offerings portion of the service. It would be a wonderful way to start the new year. Don’t, you know, make a commitment you can’t keep. You’re going to read ten pages a day or whatever it is, but commit every day to read some portion of the scriptures—just a verse. Abide in the commandment of the Lord Jesus Christ. Abide in his word.

The result of such abiding is fruitfulness. And we’ll talk about that again today. The purpose for our abiding in Christ is not simply good communion with Christ. That’s certainly there, but it’s that we might be fruitful for the kingdom.

And we said last week, based upon the Old Testament text of the failure of fruit in the Old Testament as well as the New Testament texts about the use of the term “fruit,” that while we can certainly see evangelism in the context of what our savior is saying here, we see much more than that. This is comprehensive fruit bearing.

We bear fruit when we enter into sound, righteous, just business practices. We bear fruit as we raise our children in the instruction of the scriptures and to be responsible citizens of the context in which they’ve been placed here by God. We bear fruit for God when we bear fruits of repentance from our sins and speak words to one another and engage in deeds of true repentance instead of a simple apology or “I’m sorry.” That’s fruits of repentance.

The fruit of the spirit—singular—result of Jesus Christ abiding in us and the work of the spirit is listed for us and we’ll go back to that list today as we proceed into the next portion of this text. So it’s a comprehensive fruitfulness that’s being described here. We’re all to bear fruit for the Lord Jesus Christ.

And we were given a very explicit and real warning about failing to fruitfully abide. The warning is not given to cause you to doubt whether you’re a Christian or not. You are to assume that you are. You are to hear the word of Jesus Christ confirming that you are his disciples. You’ve been gathered to receive his love and abide in it.

But Jesus warns you that if you fail to abide in him, or if you fail to demonstrate that by fruit in your life, you will be subject to the disciplines of the church and you’ll be excommunicated. Now, it may not happen in many churches today—probably doesn’t happen, you know, as often as it should in any church—because the country, the culture in which we live has no stomach for church discipline anymore. But our savior makes it quite clear: if we’re to look at these in terms of objective covenant realities, that if we have people in the context of the church who do not bear fruit of repentance for sins, righteousness, justice, love for one another, then they’re to be subject to the formal disciplines of the church.

Our savior cuts these branches off by excommunication, removing from a perceived abiding that is no true abiding in the Lord Jesus Christ. And we all have that real warning given to us as an exhortation, as Calvin said, to investigate, to think about our lives, to think about fruit or not in our lives, and to commit ourselves afresh to abiding in Christ fruitfully.

And then finally, we said that there was this promise attached to the abiding: much fruit—not just some fruit, but much fruit. Jesus says that this much fruit comes as a result of pruning, and he says you’re—and the word “pruning” is related to the word for “clean” in the next verse where he says that you’re all clean because of the word that I spoke to you. So it’s not an error in the text. Those things are linked.

The pruning is a cleansing away of sin in the life of the believer, and it is accomplished, Jesus says, by his words that are spoken to this original audience. But I think by way of application we can say that when we come together on the Lord’s day and the word is preached, and you hear the word spoken of Jesus to you through the pulpit, through the reading of the scriptures, through the prayers of the church, that you’re being pruned by that word. The word is a sharp two-edged sword. It prunes and it heals. It prepares you for more fruitfulness.

And I don’t know how you can go through what we’re going to talk about today in terms of the requirement to love the brothers and not be pruned somewhat, not hurt a little bit, not be brought to some degree of conviction for your failure of love for your brothers and sisters in the Lord. And may God cause us to be pruned today by his words spoken to us.

Again, the necessity of abiding under the context of the preaching of Christ’s word is absolutely crucial for proper fruit bearing and for the wonderful fruit that God intends to bring forth in his people.

Leviticus 19:23-24 says that when you come into the land and have planted all kinds of trees for food, then you shall count their fruit as uncircumcised. Three years it shall be as uncircumcised to you. It’s not clean, in other words, for three years, but it shall not be eaten. In the fourth year, all its fruit shall be holy, a praise to the Lord. God proves us that we might eventually bear fruit of holiness and praise to the Lord God. And we may go long periods of time seemingly dormant, not bearing much fruit. And yet God’s pruning work is on its way to produce fruitfulness in the life of his people.

The end result of this is the glory of God. Jesus says that in all this his Father will be glorified. Our Father in heaven will be glorified as a result of this whole process. And in Matthew 5:16 we read, “Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your father in heaven.” May we glorify God in heaven by men seeing our good works, by causing our light to shine.

January 6th is Epiphany, the celebration—the feast. The historical church has looked at January 6 as a celebration of the coming of the magi, the wise men, led by the light to come to worship Jesus Christ as king while yet an infant. And the text of scripture tells us that we are that light-bearing people. We are to have our light so shine before men that they see our good works.

John says in chapter 17 that the good works they see is our love for one another, and they then glorify our father in heaven. There is a direct connection between our bearing fruit, loving one another, shining forth as lights, and drawing the nations of the world to that light. And so God says that this text is a missionary text as well. The fruit bearing is really to the end that all the nations may glorify God.

Jeremiah 13:11 says that as the sash clings to the waist of a man, so I have caused the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah to cling to me as the sash clings to a man—the branch abiding in the vine. They he has caused them to cling to him that they may become my people for renown, for praise and for glory, for renown, for praise and glory. That’s why you’ve been grafted into the true vine, the Lord Jesus Christ. The end result of this is that we would fulfill that original created purpose we were given in Genesis 1:22.

That God’s blessing to man and woman created in his image begins with “be fruitful.” Be fruitful. That’s what they lost when they fell into sin. That’s what they’re restored to through the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. The central text in the middle of this upper room discourse, the central message to his disciples, is that they are to be fruitful once more, and they’ll be fruitful as they abide in him and love his people.

As we said last week, Isaiah 26:27, verse 6 says that Israel shall blossom and bud and fill the face of the world with fruit. What a wonderful image! We’re to fill the face of the world with fruit. We’re restored to fruitfulness and blessing from God through the work of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Now in today’s text, this goes one step further: this abiding in Jesus is linked to the love of the brothers. And so this is what we want to talk about today in verses 12 to 17. We are to abide in the Savior’s love by loving one another.

And so our savior goes on now in the verses before us to tell us that we are to abide in him by loving one another. “This is my commandment that you love one another, even as I have loved you.” To abide in the Savior’s word and commandment is to abide in the single commandment to love one another. And that’s what we’ll be talking about today.

And we’re going to look at the Savior’s love as pictured for us. Again, the only thing we have as Christians, as branches in the vine, is the sap that flows forth from him. We have none of this in and of ourselves. Our abilities are gone. We are helpless and hopeless and useless, as we saw last week, apart from abiding in Christ. So what we need is the Savior’s love. That’s the kind of love that we are to love one another with. And we’ll see today in the text what that love looks like.

**First of all, Jesus’s love is a self-sacrificial, nurturing sort of love.**

In verse 13: “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for the brothers, for his friends rather.” So Jesus begins by telling us that the particular love of Jesus is to lay down his life for those who are his disciples, for his friends. And indeed, we’re told in Romans that while we were yet sinners, he died for us. Sometimes Romans says, “You may die for a good man, but Jesus died for us while we were yet his enemies.” Now here he calls them as friends, which we’ll get to in a moment. But the point is that Jesus’s love is first and foremost, rather obviously, a self-sacrificial love.

But if you think about the implications of this, it—you know, I’m not exhorting you today to just think about each other a little bit and do acts of kindness occasionally and, you know, maybe put on, you know, maybe I can help somebody out in my spare time. No, Jesus calls us to lay down our lives if need be for the sake of the brothers. This is the love of Christ. That’s to characterize our love. This is what he tells us.

Here he tells us this is love. Ephesians 5:2 says the same thing: “Walk in love as Christ also has loved us and given himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling aroma.”

I love Psalm 138. We’ve used it for many years at the close, or beginning, of the year. We read it at our New Year’s Eve celebration at my house. It was the psalm that R.J. Rushdoony read at the beginning and end of every year for many years in his life. And it has a tremendous statement of encouragement to us. As I mentioned earlier, God will perfect that which concerns us. But it also has a tremendous statement of what God does for us in this verse.

It says that we’ll praise your name in verse two “for your lovingkindness and your truth. For you have magnified your word above all your name.” You have magnified your word above all your name. Let me read through it. Now, God’s name is the totality of who he is. It is the representation of who he is in his totality. And what this verse tells us is that his word, that is his word to us, his covenantal word to us that he faithfully performs, his promise to redeem us, to bring us to fruitfulness once more, to love us—he has magnified that promise, that word and that covenant above his very person. This is a statement that is awesome. Truly awesome, unlike the things that we call awesome today. This is truly awe-inspiring. This is a verse that, if you understand what it’s saying, causes you to gasp almost as you read it.

And yet we see it fulfilled on the cross, do we not? We see our savior, the second person of the trinity, the Son of God on the cross, God dying as it were for us, fulfilling his word, magnifying that word above his very name and personage. The Lord Jesus lays down his life for us, and he calls us to have that sense of commitment to him as demonstrated by that sense of commitment to his people.

People sometimes say they’re willing to die for their country, and they do. People will die for the Lord Jesus Christ as martyrs, and they do. But Jesus takes it a step deeper. He says that this commitment we’re to have to love one another is to go to the death for one another if need be.

Now, these weren’t idle words to these men. They were all—or well, not all of them, but most of them—would become martyrs. They would be persecuted, hounded, sought down to try to be killed, you see. And they would be tempted to turn their backs on one another, to not lay down their lives for each other, to give up each other instead of going to the death for them, concealing where they may be, for instance.

These are not idle words, and they shouldn’t be idle words to us. They should call forth a commitment, the depth of our being, to fulfill this central command of our savior that we love one another. This is the fruitfulness. This is how we abide. And it is a result of abiding in Christ. This is his love. It is a self-sacrificial love.

Now men need to commit to such a thing. And I think properly they need to commit to it ahead of time. The early church fathers contemplated this. John of the ladder was an early church father, and he said that what this verse called us to was a contemplation of death—a contemplation of our own death. A need to commit ourselves right here, right now, to be willing to die for one another if need be, if the requirement comes up.

If we commit to each other in that way in the context of this church, then we’re going to be able to fulfill those small acts of self-sacrificial love—putting aside our own desires, our own glory, our own requirements, whatever we think we would like to see happen here or there. It doesn’t mean getting rid of our input. That’s not what I’m talking about. But you know what I’m saying. You know how often we’re selfish and we try to maintain our own life as opposed to ministering life to one another. You know how often with our words we strike out at one another, either directly or indirectly.

And every time we slander each other, every time we use our tongues to abuse one another, we’re really ministering death to each other. God says that we have this tremendous capability with our words to speak grace to one another. And grace is the source of life. Jesus calls us to live a life of consecration to him by living a life of consecration to love one another.

And I would tremendously encourage each of us today, oh, at the middle of who we are, at the center of our being, to say, “I am willing, Lord God, to die for this person next to me in the pew, or the one who’s at the other side of the church from me, the one who I may be estranged from today, the one I may not feel all that happy about today, or I may think is kind of a goofball. God says, ‘Be willing to die for one another.’” Jesus says, “This is the love that he calls us to exercise one to the other.” And he calls us to commit to that today.

Don’t walk this aisle offering yourselves to God in your tithes and offerings and who you are to him today at the end of the sermon if you’re not willing to commit to be able to die for one another if need be in the context of this fellowship. That’s what God calls us to.

**Secondly, our Savior’s love is a friendly love.**

He says that you are my friends. He says, “I’ll die for my friends.” He now begins to call them friends. And so our savior embraces the disciples not as mere servants now, but as friends.

Now, there’s still, you know, we don’t want to go too far this way. Paul and the other apostles, the other writers of the New Testament—the word “servant” is certainly a good and proper word for our relationship to Jesus Christ. He is our king. He is our Lord. We are his servants. But at the same time, Jesus says now they’ve become his friends.

And so Jesus’s love for them that he’s calling them to walk in and abide in is a love that is one of a friend for a friend. Jesus brings them into his confidence as we’ll see in a couple of minutes. And that’s related to this idea of friendship. But for now, I just want us to think a little bit about what the scriptures say about the love of a friend.

Proverbs 17:17 says that a friend loves at all times and a brother is born for adversity. There’s a parallelism. We’re to, as we’re the be the kind of friends for one another that is as close as a brother is. We’re to be friends in adversity. We’re to love and be friendly at all times. And so it’s not enough to make the commitment today and then to be unkind to one another, impatient with one another this coming week. No, we’re to be a friend at all times. And specifically, our friendship is tested in times of adversity.

Doesn’t mean we don’t encourage and exhort one another to proper actions, but we do it in a way to recover one another. We don’t do it in a way to tear each other down.

Proverbs 18:24 says that a man who has friends must himself be friendly, but there’s a friend who sticks closer than a brother. So friendship can even exceed the kind of brotherly commitment we have one to the other.

And those of us who have sons say, “Thank God for that.” And sometimes brothers don’t stick too well together. May God cause the bloodlines of the church, the bonds they have for brothers, to develop into a deeper sense of friendship and commitment to each other as brothers in Christ.

Ultimately, you’re not, you know, brothers in a physical sense primarily. You’re brothers in a spiritual sense. You know, these children are not our children. They’re the holy seed that God has given to us as a result of our marriage, is the purpose—one of the purposes for marriage. And we must recognize that our children, we tend to think of them as our children. They’re not our children. It’s what baptism is all about: saying they’re God’s children and we commit to raise them as holy seed. And if we understood who they are, we would be more careful. And if they understood who each other were—sons and daughters of the king—they’d be more careful, and they’d be moved to the kind of friendship that our savior exhorts us to here.

Proverbs 27:12 says “Faithful are the wounds of a friend.” Sometimes being a friend and loving one another is trying to recover each other from sin and saying strong words to one another. I’m not talking about the absence of strong words, but I’m saying strong words spoken with an intent to minister life, to bring recovery, and to exhibit love one to the other.

Even the marriage relationship in Song of Solomon 5:16—”his mouth is most sweet. Yes, he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved and this”—and kind of a climactic portion of this place in Song of Solomon—climactic statement here is that “this is my friend.” You see, our love for our spouses is to develop and mature into a friendship one to the other. Jesus says we’re to love as friends.

Now, I would like you to turn your outlines over and go. We’re going to go briefly through 1 Corinthians 13. You know, if we’re to have a friendly love for one another, we have a specific section of scripture that’s kind of a synopsis of how this love is to look one toward the other in the context of the body of Christ.

In 1 Corinthians 13, verses 4 to 7, we have what I think at least is kind of a synopsis of what love is. Love is described for us here, and it’s useful for us to kind of put it together.

The context of 1 Corinthians 13 is chapter 10 where it talked about the cup of blessing and instructions about the Lord’s supper. Chapter 11 talked about the Eucharist and the agape. The words of institution that we normally read are from chapter 11, just before this. Chapter 12 talks about spiritual gifts to be used in the context of the body of Christ—this abiding in Christ and loving one another. And then chapter 13 tells us about this love that’s supposed to be demonstrated in the table, in the giftings we receive, etc.

And you know, one of the things that we read as we read in 1 Corinthians 13 is that these are everyday kinds of actions that are given to us. Now we go beyond a commitment to die for one another, and it’s a commitment to live in a particular way in relationship to one another.

Now these are actions. Love is action words here, given in the context of 1 Corinthians 13. And this helps us to get away from that sticky sentimental version of love that is just an emotional response to one another. These actions are motivated by emotional responses and covenantal commitments and that kind of thing. But that love that Jesus enjoins upon us is action-oriented.

Love is the fulfilling of the law. The scriptures tell us. So what we’re going to read about here in 1 Corinthians 13 is the sum of the law.

Paul said in Romans 13:9 that he quotes some of the commandments and then he says it’s all summed up in this saying: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Now that’s a verse from Leviticus 19. Leviticus 19 is the middle—it’s a commentary on the ten commandments. And right in the very heart of Leviticus 19 is this commandment to love your neighbor as yourself. And if you take a careful look at the structure of the entire book of Leviticus, it seems that the center of the book, some have affirmed, and from one perspective it is, this statement to love your neighbor as yourself.

The whole purpose of the sacrificial system given to us in Leviticus is to redeem us, to bring us back to that calling to be fruitful, to abide in Christ by loving one another. And so this is given to us here in 1 Corinthians 13.

It’s sort of the same sort of thing, you know. Okay, so the whole law can be summed up in loving one another. We’re used to saying it’s summed up in loving God. But how do you know you love God? If you say you love God and hate your brother, you’re lying. First John tells us, so the way we know if we’re loving God is whether we love our brothers in the context of the visible church or not.

And so that’s why our savior can say that his commandment is summed up in one word really: to love your neighbor. To love your neighbor. Well, the same thing here is in 1 Corinthians 13:4-7. What does it mean? Love your neighbor. And you know, to love God means to love God and to love your neighbor as yourself.

And 1 Corinthians 13 begins, I think, by giving us two statements. The two basic characteristics of what we mean in the scriptures by loving one another, I think, are summed up in the statement that love is patient and love is kind. Love is patient and love is kind.

Those are, I think, header statements, and the rest of the description in 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 are kind of a commentary and explanation of what those two things mean.

Now, there’s a single command—love God—broke it up into two commands: love God and love your neighbor as yourself, broke it up into ten commands that give us a description of what that love for God looks like and what love for your neighbor looks like. And then we could go into the case laws. Well, the same thing’s true here. Love is what the requirement is. What does it mean? Love is patient. Love is kind. And then it goes on to describe what patience and impatience looks like and what kindness and unkindness looks like.

I believe that this is kind of the central teaching. And what you want to nail in your head, put into your heart now as you come forward to offer yourselves in a few minutes, is to make it commitment to love one another in the context of your families, in the church, and the brothers that you have outside of this church or in other churches—to love them by two things: by being patient with them and by being kind to them.

I think I’m on good footing to say this is a summation. In Romans 2:4 we read, “Do you think lightly of the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience?” So God’s actions toward us are summed up in kindness, forbearance, and patience—the same two basic qualifications.

Galatians 5:22 says, “The fruit of the spirit—you know, the spirit brings Christ, he ministers the sap to us. It takes its bud and fruitfulness, loves one another. What is that fruit? Well, the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace”—these kind of summary statements. And now, very specifically, what does it say? The next two are “patience, kindness,” and then “goodness and faithfulness.”

So at the middle of this fruit bearing that we’re to have in Galatians 5:22, patience and kindness are tied together again.

In Ephesians 4, that text that my children are quite familiar with: “Be you kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other, just as God for Christ’s sake has forgiven you.” What are the two actions enjoined brother to brother in love? To be kind and to be forgiving. To be patient with each other’s sins and difficulties and to be kind to one another as well.

So I think that these two statements really link together God’s actions to us and what we’re to have toward one another.

In 2 Corinthians 6:6 says we’re supposed to have purity and knowledge and in patience and in kindness, in the Holy Spirit and in genuine love. This is how we’re to act: in purity, holiness to God; in knowledge, the word of God. And the resulting of that is in patience and in kindness. And then it says that if in his holy spirit in genuine love. So once more, in 2 Corinthians 6:6, it seems like the Holy Spirit’s fruit of love in us is manifested specifically in patience and in kindness.

So, you see, you see this pairing over and over again. And it’s kind of, you know, the thing we talked about several weeks ago: grace and peace, patience and graciousness toward one another, kindness, acts of peacefulness and God’s order one to the other. So I think these things are summed up in that way.

What does it mean? “Love is patient.” In other words, love suffers long. It doesn’t, you know, get quickly provoked. We’ll see this as we go through there. This particular word “patience” is almost always used in reference to people. So, right away here, we’re told that love is patient toward your brothers and sisters in the Lord. Love suffers long, even when wronged.

Chrysostom says this is a word used when a man is wronged and has it easily within his power to avenge, but will not do it. To the Greeks, this kind of patience was viewed as weakness. But this patience is victory over a just resentment. In other words, it may seem just to us to have a resentment about what somebody else has done to us or what their sin is to us, whatever it might be, but our patience is victory over those kind of just resentments. We’re to be patient, long-suffering with each other.

And then we’re to be kind. And this particular word is only used here in the New Testament. Similar words are used in other places—as I talked about—but this particular Greek word for kind means to show oneself kindly. Not to be kind in the way you think about somebody or, you know, your heart about them, but rather actions of kindness are implied here. To show oneself kind—to be kind in actions, not a mood or an attitude.

“Usefulness” is a good translation of this term. Our word means to be disposed to be useful one to the other. Hiebert says that it means “inclined to perform good deeds one for the other.” So we’re inclined to be apt to teach. He’s supposed to be, you know, kind of, it’s what he likes to do. He’s at the drop of a hat, he’ll start talking about the scriptures and teaching them. Well, this means we’re supposed to be apt to usefulness toward one another.

We’re to be at prone—given to looking for good deeds we can do one for the other. We’re to be animated by a constant desire to be useful to others. Not just desire another’s welfare, but actually work positively toward it. We’re to desire that kind of goodness toward each other. This is what love is: patience and kindness.

And then we’re given seven contrasts of what is not kind and what is not patient. The first five, I believe, are oppositions to kindness. When we’re not kind or when we’re these things, we’re not being kind. And these are motivators to unkindness.

We’re not supposed to be jealous. Jealousy or envy is what the Jews had for Jesus and killed him. Jealousy or envy of Joseph is what his brothers had toward him and delivered him into slavery in Egypt. And so this is a tremendous warning to us not to be jealous of another’s giftings, qualities or benefits that God has given to them. We’re to rejoice in the demonstration of giftings from God that one another has.

Jealousy is a dissatisfaction with the prosperities of others. This is part of the wisdom from below, James will tell us in his epistle. Jealousy is a horrible force. “Who can stand before jealousy?” the scriptures tell us. Nobody, really, apart from the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. Jealousy is opposed by being content at our particular state and a joy for others in with their particular giftings and estate. Kindness rejoices in what someone else has. Kindness is content with its own particular giftings.

And as a result of that, God says we love one another.

Love doesn’t brag. It doesn’t embellish rhetorically our own abilities, accomplishments, or who we are. That’s not kind or useful to others. Bragging is the opposite of kindness. Love is not arrogant or puffed up. What keeps us from usefulness to other people is an arrogance or being puffed up in pride, which eats away at our usefulness to one another.

Doesn’t act unbecomingly. In other words, doesn’t act gracelessly. Being puffed up in pride is usually related to words. Whereas acting unbecomingly is pride in actions or deeds, carriage or bearing. It says that tactlessness forgets its own place and fails, rather, to accord to others their proper due respect, honor, and consideration. So this doesn’t act unbecomingly—thinks too much of ourselves, and as a result our actual external actions take on this kind of pridefulness to them that is the opposite of kindness one to the other.

Doesn’t seek its own. You know, Jesus didn’t come to be served but to serve others. Lenski says that “cure selfishness and you have just planted the Garden of Eden.” Cure selfishness and you’ve planted the Garden of Eden. If God wants us to be fruitful, we do it by putting off self-seeking. So all these things get in the way of kindness toward us.

And then there are a list of things that are contrasted to patience. These are hostility. So self-interest is what keeps us from loving one another. Hostility toward others keeps us from being patient with each other.

Love is not provoked easily. This refers to lawsuits, dissensions, controversies. It means being having a reaction to other people in sudden outbursts of anger.

Love doesn’t take into account a wrong suffered. In other words, you don’t keep a list of what somebody’s done to you over the years. You rather let that stuff go. You can either overlook a matter or not. And if you cannot overlook a matter, you’re to resolve it biblically in peace. But at any event, you’re not supposed to keep a list of wrongs suffered.

Doesn’t entrust whatever happens to you into a notebook for later revenge. That’s the idea. Isn’t in rage at the moment, isn’t provoked easily, and it also doesn’t hold a grudge in lasting remembrances of wrongs suffered afterwards. So it’s not provoked, it’s patient—not being immediately provoked to anger—and it’s patient. It doesn’t take into account a wrong suffered. It doesn’t keep a list of things.

Now, this patience and kindness results from a proper motivation. It rejoices in the right joy. When we rejoice in unrighteousness, then we’re going to engage in acts of impatience and unkindness. But when we rejoice with the truth of God’s word, this is what motivates us to loving deeds for one another.

And then there’s a final set of four commandments that I think can also be related to patience and kindness.

In patience, we believe all things and endure all things. We don’t jump to an improper conclusion. We’re patient with each other. We don’t put the worst motivation. In fact, we put the best motivation upon one another’s actions. We endure things even if it is a true wrong that we’ve suffered from someone else. Our attempt is to endure it in the grace of the Holy Spirit, patiently with one another, being kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other, just as God for Christ’s sake has forgiven you.

And then kindness means to believe all things and to hope all things. We’re not impatient. We don’t, you know, we bear up with one another in their actions and deeds. We endure what they may end up doing to us.

And on the positive side, we believe things about them. We believe the best motivation to their actions. We put on a proper motivation when it’s not sure in our minds why they’re doing what they’re doing. A proper motivation. Believe all things. I failed at this just last night. My daughter was off babysitting with her fiancé. Couldn’t get a hold of him by phone, and I began to believe not right things, believe the wrong things. Now, they were being perfectly proper, but we’re tempted to go to wrong surmisings about each other’s actions.

And God says that kindness, usefulness to one another, is to believe all things, meaning to put on a positive spin on other people’s actions when you can. To believe the best about their motivations, not to jump to believing the worst about them, but to believe the best. And even when we find out that they are sinning, love hopes all things.

It’s useful to the other person because we hope that the disciplines that might have to be applied to their sin will result in their correction. So we put on a proper attitude of patience, overlooking whatever offenses can be overlooked; kindness, we believe all things; and we hope, even when they’re in sin, that they can be brought to repentance.

And God says this is the kind of friendly love that our savior enjoins to us. This is the love of the Lord Jesus Christ that we’re to have for each other.

**Third, our savior’s love is a revealing love.**

He says that he calls them friends because now he is going to tell them what the master is doing. “I have called you friends for all things that I heard my father, I have made known to you.”

Abraham has the mind of God revealed to him and he’s called God’s friend. Moses has the mind of God revealed to him and he’s called God’s friend. God calls us friends by revealing himself to us.

The Savior says that now they’re not no longer servants. In the Greek, this word “servant” was looked upon in households as a tool, a useful tool. But the servant would not know anything of what the master of the house thought about things. He would just be issued commands: Do this, do this, do this. “You don’t got to know why you do this. I want me to think about this.” As little kids? Kids are slaves. When they’re little, you don’t reveal your mind to them. It’s pointless. You just tell them, “Don’t play in the traffic. Don’t do this. Don’t do that.” Or, “Do this and do that.”

But as our children mature, they properly want to be let in on what’s going on. They want us to reveal our minds to them. It’s funny, you know, how God works this stuff out. You get to my age and you’re real tired of the whole thing from one perspective. It’s been a lot of work, and the last thing you want to do is start explaining yourself to your children. But that’s precisely what God calls us to do in love for them.

When they become teens, now’s the time to reveal our minds to them because now they’re moving away from servantthood to becoming friends with us. You see, there’s a sense in which they’ll always be our children, but there’s a sense in which now they’re becoming full adults and now they’re our friends.

And Jesus says the kind of love we should have to one another is a revelation of our mind, a revealing of who we are. Jesus says that his love for his friends leads him to reveal things to them. You know, we’re closed off from people when we don’t trust them. God says in the context of the church, we should reveal ourselves to one another. We should talk, tell what our minds, what’s on our minds toward each other. Reveal something of our lives to one another. God says this is the kind of love that Jesus shows to us, and this is the kind of love we’re to show to one another.

**Fourth, Jesus’s love is a choosing love.**

“You did not choose me,” Jesus says, “but I chose you.”

Now, the immediate application of this is he chooses them as his apostles. They’re going to go out and build the church. But still, the application of this is true for all of us.

In Deuteronomy 7, we see that “the Lord does not set his love on you or choose you because you were more in number than any other people. You are the least of all peoples, but because the Lord loves you, because he would keep the oath which he swore to your fathers.”

Now, Jesus chose us because of the foreknowledge, the fore-love of the Father. He chooses us sovereignly. And our love, I think, should be a choosing sort of love. But it doesn’t, based on our choice, just like our salvation isn’t—it’s based upon the choice of Jesus. We didn’t decide what friends to have in this church. He has chosen each of us, planted us together. He has chosen, at least at one level, of friends for you in the context of your life. We have friends outside the church obviously, but here in the body of Jesus Christ in this particular part of the vineyard, Jesus has chosen particular people for you to be friends with. And they’re all around you in this room.

Our love is a choosing love. And if you haven’t understood that before, now, again, I would encourage you when you come forward offering yourselves to choose to love the people that Christ has chosen to put in relationship to you in this church. Choose.

Jesus’s love is a choosing love, choosing love based upon the Father’s foreknowledge and love. Our love is to be a choosing love—to choose to reveal ourselves to one another, to choose to love each other through patience and kindness and friendship, to choose to love each other if need be by giving our very lives, and certainly giving away portions of our lives for each other. That’s the kind of choice that we are to make today, I think, in response to the Savior’s words.

**Fifth, our Savior’s love is a purposeful love.**

The end result of this is not just that we can all have a good time. That happens. Joy is part of it. But there’s a purpose.

“You didn’t choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit.”

Now, as I said, this can refer to evangelism. Paul refers to those coming to the faith as fruit for him in Romans 1:13. He wants to come to have fruit amongst them—in other words, to bring some to the faith. But we have a purpose to our lives. We abide in the context of the Savior. We love one another, but it doesn’t stop there. The end result of this is fruit bearing in the context of the discipling of the nations.

As we saw at the beginning of the service when we talked about Epiphany, we’re to shine as lights before men. They see our good works, our love. The end result is the fruitfulness of all the nations being discipled for the Lord Jesus Christ.

Next week, I’ve changed my mind on the sermon for next week. On Friday, after the orders of service were printed, I will postpone the next sermon on John till the week after next. And next week I’ll be talking from Matthew 28:19-20 about our church’s vision statement and the strategy map that we came up with this past year.

And I think it’s very important to see that Jesus, in this centrality of this upper room discourse of abiding in him, the end result is purpose or mission. The Christian life is not a life that is just one that calls you into relationship with Christ simply to enjoy the relationship. Jesus chose us, appointed us. He chose you and he appointed you for a purpose: that you might bear fruit for him. We have mission.

You know what we’re going to talk about next week? Matthew 28: “Go make disciples and I am with you always.” “Go” means mission. Jesus called the disciples together on the mountaintop in Matthew 28. He calls us together today to equip us to be sent out with mission for him. Your mission this week is to bear fruit for the Lord Jesus Christ.

We’re not saved just to get together or beat our arms or sing good songs together. The purpose for this—being chosen, gathered together, abiding in Jesus Christ, loving one another—is to go forth and to bear fruit for the Savior. And so love is purposeful. It has a particular purpose to it.

So the end result of you loving one another is a recognition that this is the way that the light shines forth from this hill, according to John 17. The world sees the love of the church of Jesus Christ, and this is integral to fulfilling the mission of discipling all the nations.

**So what we do is to shine forth his lights when we abide in the savior and specifically as we bear the fruit and abide in love for one another. This is a victorious love.**

Jesus says that he has appointed us that we might go and bear fruit and that our fruit should remain. “That whatever you ask the father in my name, he may give you.” (Verse 16.)

So this fruit that is resulting from us, this abiding, this purposeful love of Christ, is a victorious love. When we love one another, we equip each other for the task of mission in the world. And we assure each other once more of the victorious mission that Jesus says that his purpose is: we bear fruit and that this fruit might abide for him.

You know, our young people and four of our adults went off to India. I’m sure there’s fruit in terms of evangelism, in terms of strengthening the brothers and sisters there. What a wonderful thing for them to contemplate: that no matter what part they played in the team, no matter what part they were doing in that trip, they were part of an effort that produced fruit in the lives of people in India, halfway around the world. Maybe brought some to the Savior, maybe matured others in their obedience to the Savior, and their hope and their love and in their joy and created a little more peace there for them.

And vice versa. We have this tremendous calling to be part of the way that God brings people to the faith of Jesus Christ, equips them in that faith, and builds them up in that faith victoriously. That fruit remains. It abides. The Savior keeps those who are his own. And so we’ve given this love of our savior that is a victorious love.

**And then finally, it is a joyous love.**

Going back now to verse 11, before we get to verse 12: “These things I’ve spoken to you that my joy may remain in you and that your joy may be full.”

Our savior says that the end result of this is true joy. There is merriment in the Christian life, and we know that in this church. We know the joy of existing together in the context of community. We know the fruits that come from abiding in the Savior and loving one another the way that he has told us we are to love one another.

Jesus says that this is the fruit that he calls for us from us in this coming year. This should be our commitment for this year: to bear fruit for him.

Next week we’ll talk about the mission of our church, the vision statement of our church, and I’ll exhort each and every one of you to find some place in that mission statement that you can plug in to the work and the community of the Lord Jesus Christ at Reformation Covenant Church. I know many of you are already plugged in, but this is a way of organizing our labors as we fulfill the mission that God has called us to do as a church.

We have entered into these labors self-sacrificially, laying aside our lives for one another and bearing the fruit that our savior has called us to. I pray that the beginning of this year may be one in which you have a renewed commitment to do this very thing: to love one another in the context of this particular fellowship.

First John 3:14 says, “This is how we know whether you are dead or alive.” 1 John 3:14 says, “We know that we have passed from death to life. How? Because we love the brethren.” It’s the very proof of whether we have abiding in death or whether we abide in life. “He who does not love his brother abides in death.” That’s what First John 3:14 says.

Because John understood the centrality of this message at the middle of the upper room discourse, the centrality of abiding in Christ and bearing the true fruit of life, which is the love of the brothers.

Hebrews 12:27-29 says there’s a great shaking going on. But anything that can be shaken will be shaken and removed. And only the things which cannot be shaken may remain. That’s the world in which we live. Jesus has changed history definitively. He has brought in the new creation. Everything that exists from the old is being shaken, removed, and judged. And only what will remain or abide is what is true and right and life from the Lord Jesus Christ. The only thing that abides are those things that are constant with the love of the brothers.

Revelation 3:2 says, “Strengthen the things that remain.” Brothers and sisters, we’re called as we move into this new year to renew our commitment to love the Lord Jesus Christ by loving each other.

Let me conclude by reading one more New Year’s song:

“Ring out the old, ring in the new. Ring happy bells across the snow. The year is going, let him go. Ring out the false, ring in the true.”

As we have failed to love each other in this past year—and we know we have in many ways in our families and in this church—may we ring out the old, let the old slough off from us, and commit ourselves to the new.

“Ring out wild bells to the wild sky, the flying cloud, the frosty light. The year is dying in the night. Ring out wild bells and let him die.”

Let the old man who is impatient and unkind die as we go past this last year and move into the new.

“Ring out the grief that sacks the mind. For those that here we see no more. Ring out the feud of rich and poor. Ring in redress to all mankind. Ring out false pride in place and blood, the civic slander and the spite. Ring in the love of truth and right. Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out a slowly dying cause and ancient forms of party strife. Ring in the nobler modes of life with sweet manners, purer laws.”

That’s what love of the brothers is. That’s what the life of the Lord Jesus Christ is—the nobler mode of life, that regular man that we talked about last week, the Lord Jesus Christ, and us in him.

“Ring out old shapes of foul disease. Ring out the narrowing lust of gold. Ring out the thousand wars of old. Ring in the thousand years of peace. Ring in the valiant man and free, the larger heart, the kinder hand. Ring out the darkness of the land. Ring in the Christ that is to be.”

Odd statement, I suppose. This is the Christ who is to be exhibited in his people, maturing in their fruitfulness for him by committing ourselves to abide in him, in his word, in the church, and as a result, abiding in the love of the brothers.

Let’s pray. Father, help us now to commit ourselves afresh to loving each other as this new year dawns. Make it a great one for us. Father, we thank you for the way you crown this past year with goodness—from those returned from India and the other things that happened at the end of the year—to bring healing and increasing love of the brothers. We thank you, Father, for the year that’s passed, and we thank you for the year that comes ahead.

And may we now consecrate ourselves anew to a love of the Lord Jesus Christ that is seen in a love for his people. In his name we ask it. Amen.