The Sacrificial Love of Jesus - John 15:12-17

We live in a world that is obsessed with love. Everyone everywhere talks about love. There are so many cliches about love, like ‘love is love’ or ‘who you love is who you love.’ Perhaps you remember a few years ago there was a series of commercials that ran that were specifically about love.

I remember it because it ran during football season. The ad series was, “love has no labels.” One of those commercials sticks out in my mind because it had John Cena in it. On the “Love has no labels” website they describe their goal. They say, “Love Has No Labels is a movement to promote acceptance and inclusion of all people across race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, age and ability.”

Regardless of how you feel about their goal, I think they nailed one of our world’s definitions of love. Love simply means acceptance or tolerance. Isn’t that precisely what people mean when they say things like, “we should all just love each other?”

But I think if you scratch slightly below the surface, what love and acceptance is really about is liberating them from any objective moral standards. Everyone needs to let me live however I want without even the chance of you telling me that I’m doing anything wrong. Because according to their worldview there is no right or wrong - just tolerance and acceptance or love.

The other common worldly definition of love is an emotional response. It’s just the butterflies in your stomach when someone walks into the room. Romantic love is just a feeling. The moment your spouse no longer gives you that “feeling” anymore means it’s time to move on. Go ahead and get a divorce. Stop wasting your time on someone that doesn’t give you butterflies in your stomach.

But Jesus doesn’t define love according to acceptance or an emotional response, rather he defines love by sacrifice.

And we see a few things from this passage: first, Jesus commands us to love (vv. 12-13), second, Jesus is our friend (vv. 14-15), and lastly, friendship with Christ bears fruit (vv. 16-17).

Last week, Doug preached from John 15:1-11, which is where Jesus said, “I AM the vine and you are the branches” then he said, “apart from me you can do nothing.” What we read in verses 12-17 is really an extension to what Jesus said in those first eleven verses. His words obviously build upon each other. Because if you read verses 1-11 in complete isolation you might be led to believe Jesus is implying a cold, rigid, forced connection to himself, but he quickly tells us what our connection to him is centered upon love. However, the Christian’s relationship with Jesus Christ isn’t built upon our love for him but rather, it’s built upon his love for us.

Jesus commands us to love (vv. 12-13)

Beginning in verse 12 we read one of the greatest feel good verses in the whole Bible, because it’s all about love! “Love one another as I have loved you.” As I’ve already mentioned, everyone embraces the idea of loving one another, but the question that’s always left lingering is “who’s love?” What kind of love are we talking about? Jesus tells us, we’re supposed to mirror his love. We like the “love one another” part, but not so much the “as I have loved you” part.

Previously Jesus said, “as the Father loved me so I love you.” That’s a verse that we can all get behind because it requires nothing from you and me. But in John 15:12 there is! Quite literally Jesus says, “This is my commandment that you love one another as I have loved you.”

Love isn’t optional. Jesus commands us to do it. The reality is, we can’t do it can we? We can’t love one another as Jesus loved us. Jesus’ love is pure, but our love is all mixed up. It’s complicated isn’t it?

And we see that most clearly in our marriages, don’t we? The person you profess to love more than anyone else in the world is the very same person that consistently sees you at your worst. The person you love the most in the world is the same person that catches the majority of your frustration.

Jesus tells his disciples that they needed to love as he had loved them. They and by extension we, need to love as Jesus has loved us. We must reflect the love of Christ. It’s no wonder that Jesus emphasizes the work of the Holy Spirit. We can’t do it on your own! You need help! I need help! Amen?

So how do we adequately reflect the love of Christ to those around us? How do we do it? Jesus gives us a specific component to love that the Christian must embrace: sacrifice.

Our love is and should be sacrificial. Verse 13, “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.”

Jesus’ example of sacrificial love isn’t doing the dishes even though you despise that chore. No, Jesus’ example of sacrificial love is laying down your life for your friends. That is, sacrificing your life for others! The ultimate sacrifice.

We intuitively know that sacrificial love is honorable. The vast majority of service men who have received the medal of honor paid the ultimate sacrifice, haven’t they?

We just know that this sacrifice is something to be honored. To lift up.

But in order to sacrifice, you have to do something. It requires an intentional action. Sacrifice doesn’t happen by accident.

What Jesus says is literally the opposite of the love advice you might hear on the internet. The idea that love is simply a feeling is often presupposed. It’s just assumed. Love is something that just sort of happens to you.

Because love is simply a feeling then you have every right to move on once that feeling is gone! Love has been reduced to another product we consume and then discard when it’s all gone.

Which makes what Jesus says in verse 13 all the more interesting: he doesn’t define love in terms of passive feelings, but rather, action, and not just any action, sacrificial action.

That is, Christians are willing, at a moment's notice, to lay down their rights and privileges. Because love in its purest form is selfless. And this is something that we’re commanded to do, but of course, Jesus would never ask something of you and me that he wasn’t willing to take on himself.

Jesus laid down his rights, his privileges, humbled himself even to the point of death - death on a cross, so that he could make his enemies his friends.

Jesus is our friend (vv. 14-15)

Jesus is our friend too. Look at verses 14-15 with me:

“You are my friends if you do what I command you. 15 No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you.”

Sometimes people are, in my personal opinion, too cavalier in the way they describe their relationship with Jesus Christ. The whole Jesus is my homeboy mentality. I’m not super comfortable with that, because if you look closely at verses 14-15, Jesus isn’t your fraternity brother. A friendship with Jesus Christ has stipulations.

You are Jesus’ friend if you do what he has commanded you. D.A. Carson makes the point that, “...this ‘friendship’ is not strictly reciprocal: these friends of Jesus cannot turn around and say that Jesus will be their friend if he does what they say (pg. 522).”

The Christian isn’t in a position to make demands of Jesus Christ in the same manner that he has commanded us. He makes demands of us, but we cannot make demands of him. Afterall, Jesus literally says in verse 14, “You are my friends if you do what I command you.”

Now obviously, Jesus isn’t saying that your obedience or works is what ultimately saves you in verse 14. You’re not perpetually trying out to be Jesus’ friend.

Rather, he’s saying that if you love him, trust him, and have your faith in him, then you will desire to do what he has commanded. It’s what James said, “faith without works is dead.” Or as I’ve heard it put more recently, “we’re saved by grace through faith alone, but that faith is never alone.”

It’s worth noting that the Westminster Confession of Faith devotes an entire chapter, chapter 16 specifically to the role of good works in the Christian life. It says in chapter 16 paragraph 2: “[that] good works done in obedience to God’s commandments, are the fruits and evidences of a true and lively faith.” To put it simply, your desire to live as a Christian is evidence or demonstrates that your faith in Jesus Christ is genuine.

Which is why Jesus uses that servant illustration in verse 15. A servant doesn’t do what his master has told him simply out of love for him. He does what his master told him out of rigid obedience and compliance. The servant doesn’t know or understand what the master is doing nor does it really matter. A servant doesn’t have any right to understand what’s going on, or why he needs to do what he’s been asked to do. The servant simply does as he’s been told.

Jesus compares the privileges of friendship to the oppression of servanthood. He tells his disciples that they’re not servants, rather they’re his friends. Friends of Jesus want to follow him and do what he has commanded because they understand and are grateful for what he’s done for them.

You know, I’ve had multiple conversations with people that profess faith in Jesus Christ but are hesitant to follow through on what he has commanded. And it really baffles me, because if your faith in Christ is genuine then you should want to please him and do what he has commanded. For the Christian it’s not a duty to do what the Lord Jesus has instructed. Rather, it’s a delight. It’s not something that we have to do, it’s something that we get to do!

The gospel message and living the Christian life isn’t something that Jesus just made up one day. What he revealed to us has come directly from heaven. Look at the end of verse 15: “...all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you.”

Jesus is sharing and fulfilling the gospel, the good news which came directly from the Father’s good will. Even though it was dark (they were literally in the upper room on Thursday night), and would get darker everything that he told them about was for their good.

But the gospel message, the message that Jesus is relaying to his disciples in the upper room, that he must go away in order to die for them and that plan was set before the foundations of the world.

Jesus by his sacrificial atoning death on the cross, purchased our reconciliation. We have peace with God through Jesus Christ. But have you ever stopped and simply asked, ‘why?’ Why would Jesus do all of this? Why would he suffer and die and go experience the torment of the cross? Why would he subject himself to all of this? Because he loves his friends.

Friendship with Christ bears fruit (vv. 16-17)

It’s somewhat stereotypical, but in high school there’s an “in crowd.” There’s the “cool kids” that everyone wants to be friends with. And if you’re an outsider, it can be a tough crowd to break into. You have to try really hard to fit in and get them to notice you in order to be friends with you. You have to dress like them and act like them in order to fit in. You have to go out of your way to make yourself appealing to them. You have to earn favor with them.

But friendship with Jesus doesn’t work that way. You don’t earn friendship with Jesus Christ. Instead, he brings you in, loves you, makes you his friend, based not on anything that you have done!

It’s exactly what he says in verse 16. “​​You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you.”

Again notice his words, “You did not choose me, but I chose you…” He chose you. You don’t make Jesus your friend. Jesus makes you his friend. Because friendship with Christ isn’t balanced. It’s one-sided. As one commentator put it, “[Friendship with Christ] was not brought about by gradual approach from both sides, as is often the case among men, but by Jesus alone!”

And of course, when Jesus said, ““You did not choose me, but I chose you…” he’s not being capricious or arbitrary, rather, he’s highlighting his free and independent love. It’s his loving, elective, saving grace. Love is at the core of God’s character. He’s not capricious or arbitrary in nature, He’s love.

John tells us in 1 John that God is love.

And if you’ve been chosen by Christ, and you are his friend, then you should bear fruit regularly or abidingly.

“[He] appointed you to go bear fruit and that your fruit should abide.”

There’s the word “abide” again. Last week, Doug preached on Jesus being the true vine and he repeated the word abide over and over again. I’m sure Doug mentioned this last week, but Jesus said it ten times.

But notice Jesus tells his disciples “to go bear fruit.”

There’s two different types of “fruit.” There’s the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. But it would seem that Jesus has another type of fruit in mind: it’s what our baptist brothers and sisters call, “soul-winning.”

That is, the disciples were going to go out and see people come to faith in Jesus Christ through the preaching of the gospel. And in many ways, we’re the fruit of their apostolic ministry aren’t we?

But the disciples weren’t the only ones called to bear fruit, it’s something that every Christian is called to. We’re all called out of the world of darkness in order to be vessels of light. We should all look for opportunities to share our faith when given the opportunity!

There’s a bit of a stereotype out there that the Presbyterians don’t care about evangelism and sharing their faith because we’d rather be holed up somewhere reading a dense book on theology. Not that there’s anything wrong with that!

I’ve often wondered why are we so intimidated to share our faith in Christ? I know it’s a common struggle, but I don’t really have a great answer as to why that’s the case. I think all of us who are Christians would say that our faith in Christ is the most important part of our lives - and yet, for whatever reason, we have so much difficulty talking about it with others. We’re afraid of making someone uncomfortable or fear what they’ll think of us.

There’s nothing quite like, seeing the Holy Spirit turn the light bulb on in someone’s head. It’s thrilling, isn’t it? Which is why Jesus characterizes it as a reward. It’s a reward and privilege for us to see someone put their faith in Christ.

So why does sharing our faith cripple us? Is it that we no longer see the beauty in our own salvation, or have we simply grown cold and apathetic towards others? I don’t know. It’s tough to say, isn't it? One thing is for sure, we must stop looking at sharing our faith as an unfortunate task and rather view it as a privilege that the Lord allows us to participate in. We don’t save anyone, but certainly the Lord works through ordinary people like you and me to draw people to himself.

But there’s another privilege that Christ mentions there in verse 16: prayer. We get to pray. And again, what we read here is interconnected. We pray for fruit bearing. We pray for others salvation in and through the name of Jesus Christ. Because it all comes in and through him. He must draw people to himself. He has to do it.

And all of this is an expression of love. Living the Christian life, sharing the gospel, and praying dependently is not only how you and I express love to God but it’s how we express love to one another.

What Jesus teaches in this passage is so different from the way our world talks about love. According to the world, love is a euphemism for your lifestyle toleration or someone giving you butterflies in your stomach. But if love is simply how you’re being received or how you feel towards someone else then love is all about you. Isn’t that the common denominator? You are? But what makes Christian love so different is that it’s not defined in terms of self-gratification but in terms of self-denial and sacrifice.

And this is something that Jesus doesn’t politely ask of Christians, rather he commands it!

It probably will come as no surprise to you that I’ve preached this text at weddings.

And the reason is to emphasize the sacrificial nature of Christian love. It’s what we mean when we recite those beautiful vows: better or for worse, in sickness and in health…

The Christian willingly walks through hard times with his wife or her husband out of love. In other words, you’re willing to sacrifice everything because you love your spouse.

This text is just a glorious microcosm of the gospel! Because the ultimate display of sacrificial love was Jesus’ sin atoning death on the cross. And he died not for people who have straightened themselves out and gotten everything squared away, no he died for sinners. The very people that have mocked him, ignored him, and are indifferent toward him are the very people that he’s made friends with.

It’s what Paul says in Romans 5: “but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

Just as Christ pursued you and me with his saving love so you and I must pursue one another in love.

He gave everything up for people that were hostile towards him, so that he could turn sinners into friends.

And that great sacrificial love that he displayed on the cross he now commands all of us to reflect it to one another in much smaller ways.

Jesus laid down his life for sinners like you and me because he loved us. May we sacrificially love one another as Jesus has loved us.