Transcript

Grab your Bibles and let’s go to John 13 this morning. John 13. You know, when you’ve been in a church 37 years like I have here, some of you, a very very few of you about that long here, you wonder about things. You wonder, “Lord, are my children going to desire the things of God? Are they going to love the church? And now my grandchildren are going to love you and love the truth and love the church?” And the pressure is to keep doing new and different stuff to hopefully reach the next generation. Brothers and sisters, the thing that will reach the next generation is the same thing that reached the last generation and the generation before that and the generation before that because anything else you reach them with will not last. So we desperately throw ourselves in dependence on God’s ordained means to convert the heart. That’s the key, the true regeneration of the heart in man so that man then begins to love Christ, the things of God, the truths revealed in Scripture. Now, it may ebb and fall and rise and fall, but it’s going to be there if the heart has been changed.

I want to talk to you this morning about “A Great New Love.” A great new love. Notice what the Lord says in John 13, talking to his disciples, verses 34 and 35. He says,

34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. 35 By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.

Three things about this. This is a great new love. First of all, it’s a great new love because it comes from, I. A new source. A new source. Jesus says here this is a new commandment I’m giving you, to love one another. You say, “Now wait a minute, that’s really an old commandment. That was under the Mosaic law. We are to love our neighbor as ourselves.” Well, you’re right but Christ takes the old law and he makes it new. Revelation 21:5, he says, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Now, the things he’ll bring to completion at the new creation at the end of the age, it’ll all be new and – listen – he’s already started the seeds and the cultivation of all the new stuff that will come into fruition at the end of the age. He’s already doing some new stuff. Christ takes the Old Testament law, you see, and he fulfills it. He brings it to its full intent or potential. You might view it this way: he brings it to full bloom. We’re seeing little sprigs and sprouts and grass and flower stems come up and not many of them, perhaps, have flowers yet but wait until, you know, later in May, the first of June, and then the flower comes on and then you say, “Ah, that’s what it really is.” That’s what Jesus did to the old commandment to love one another, he brought it into full bloom. He enabled us to see and experience what it really is. Christ takes the law of loving one another and produces, if you will, a new edition of it.

My first automobile was a 65 Ford Mustang. You couldn’t have had a simpler automobile. It was a straight 6. There was nothing under the hood but the motor and a carburetor on top of it. It was a 3 speed manual and it wasn’t much different than a lawnmower. I mean, you put it in gear, you pressed the gas or pressed the clutch or pressed the brake. I mean, it was just a simple automobile. I could have never envisioned the 2017 edition of the Ford Mustang. Have you seen some of those lately? Nothing like what I started out with. Man, it was used when I bought it.

Well, that’s what Jesus does to love. It’s the same love from God but he takes it and he’s bringing a new edition of it out and he’s the source of that new edition. So through Christ, the love of the brethren explodes into a greater, more glorious form. Now, how is this? Well, a subpoint here: it’s because the Spirit is now within us. The Spirit is within us. I can’t explain to you all the different dimensions of the Spirit’s work from the Old Testament through to the New Testament, but I do know something unique happened at Pentecost, the giving of the Spirit to anoint the church age, and I do know there seems to be a difference in the teaching about how the Spirit is indwelt in men on this side of Calvary when we believe on Jesus Christ. The Bible says the Spirit now lives in us and, in fact, Christ lives in us in the person of the Spirit – now listen – to live out this new love. He’s the source of it. We have a great new love God