Jesus tells us not to trust the instincts of our past or any of our survival skills before Him – we are to trust the Spirit who has come to be our advantage; He is in us and He is trustworthy.
We are simply not going to fit in. We can’t accommodate or blend in. That’s not our calling. We are called to take Jesus’ love and Spirit into a hateful world.
Jesus asks us to remain in his love, and to love others because we have been loved by him. If the foundation of our lives rest on the unfathomable and glorious riches of Christ’s love for us, then we are equipped to fulfill the greatest commandment—to love God and others. The result of partaking in this loving, intimate relationship is that we will bear fruit that remains.
We are trusting in a real Person whose constant message is, “I love you and my plan is glorious and good – TRUST ME!” When we do abide in Him as our vine, His life actually flows into ours. We experience greater levels of brokenness, greater ability to wait, greater detachment from this world.
Do you ever feel like God has gotten your circumstances horribly wrong? This is exactly where the disciples find themselves in the Upper Room Discourse—fearful and overwhelmed, and in need of much encouragement. Jesus’ message to the disciples in the Upper Room, and to us today, is that He has come to bring peace to our troubled hearts.
The Christian journey is a slow and deliberate process, full of victories and failures, joy and defeat, confidence and doubt . . . in all of these paradoxes, we are Jesus’ spiritual masterpieces.
With the uncertainties, pain and confusion of life around every corner, it is a guarantee that fear will try to be our constant companion. In the Upper Room Discourse, Jesus talks about giving us peace. He leaves us with peace; He gives us His peace, a peace we can’t find in this world.
What is love? If you want to know why God is love, look no further than the life, ministry, actions, attitude and sacrifice of the Son of God. It’s Christ who opens up categories of love for us. It’s Christ who empowers us to love like we have never loved before.
The Apostle John’s declaration at the beginning of John 13 that Jesus “loved his own to the very end” is the perfect opening to this discussion. John describes what supreme love looks like in action.
This series unpacks the unbridled love of our Savior as He launches us into the high calling as disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ.
At the very onset of the Upper Room Discourse, Jesus introduces to us to our high calling. In a very intimate and tender way Jesus explains that our high calling is to “go low”. Jesus’ journey from the very beginning was to go low, to take the form of a slave, to show humility to the point of death—even death on a cross
