¹² “This is My commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you.

Christians often seem to squabble a lot within churches, among churches, between denominations and doctrinal persuasions. A common criticism today is that individual Christians raise themselves up against “Christians” in general. To be sure there is a caricature of Christianity that the world has defined, and sometimes Christians join in the world’s criticism, as though we agree with the world’s condemnation of hypocrisy and hyper-conservatism. Strange bedfellows, though, for by doing that Christians inevitably place themselves on the pedestal of judgment over all so-called Christianity, as though speaking from a higher moral ground.

Yes, there should be self-judgment, but not on the world’s terms. The world is no more able to judge hypocrisy than the Pharisees of old. Likewise, we ourselves need to be careful of that, for such criticism lands not far from home. We judge other Christians for narrow-mindedness, having an unloving spirit, imbalance of focus, lack of evangelistic effort and unsound doctrine. We judge church leaders, church leaders judge parishioners, church leaders judge one another, etc. We compare ourselves and our ministries with others. Yet Jesus commands us to love one another!

One church is a mile wide in their outreach, but an inch deep in their theology. Another is a mile deep in their theology but an inch wide in the evangelistic efforts. But is there love?

Jesus commanded many things, but few did He emphasize in this way, “This is my commandment ….” The apostle John remembered this well: “Whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected … Beloved, I am not writing a new commandment to you, but an old commandment which you have had from the beginning; the old commandment is the word which you have heard” (1 John 2:5, 7).

This command to love does not negate having right doctrine, as though having love is all that matters, and everything else is unimportant. But, without right doctrine there cannot be a genuine basis for loving with an agape love. It is all interconnected. The love between the Father and Son is a doctrinal truth about the Trinity. The love of God as expressed in Jesus’ love for the world, flows in grace from the Trinity to undeserving humans. That is doctrinal truth. So we can love each other and the lost world from the perspective and security we have in a perfect, sacrificial love from which we will never be separated.

Lord, help me love others with a truth-based, gracious and sacrificial love.