The following audio is from Shiloh Presbyterian Church in Raleigh, North Carolina. More information about Shiloh Presbyterian Church is available at shilopc.org. Please remain standing for the reading of God's Word. John chapter 15, beginning at verse 12, reading through to verse 17. It's page 902 in your pew Bible. John 15 verse 12, let us hear the word of God. This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. 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. 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. These things I command you so that you will love one another. Let's pray. Our God and our Father, we do now ask in Jesus' name that you will open this text to us, that you'll guide the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts, so much so that they might be acceptable in your sight, to the edification of these, your saints, and to the great glory of your name, and blessing and praise unto Christ our Lord, for we pray in his name. Amen. Please be seated. Well, as we read these words, I think you can see that John, or at least our Lord, as he speaks to his disciples in these final hours, is covering a lot of old ground. There are a lot of familiar themes within this passage. He speaks about fruit-bearing. He speaks about love. matters he has already addressed with them. And yet I think this passage is a pivotal passage in understanding the difference between not only the Old Covenant and the New Covenant, but also understanding what it means to truly be a Christian. Our Lord says something remarkable to the disciples here, no longer are they servants but they are friends. You are my friends, says our Lord Jesus Christ. The Christian is allowed into the most intimate friendship, the companionship of Jesus Christ himself. That's a remarkable thing for us to say. And our Lord says it, and entitles us to say it also. And he tells us something special about that friendship. A servant does not know what the master is planning. He simply carries out the orders of the master. But Jesus said, I've allowed you to know. What I have heard from my Father, I have told now to you, and I entrust it to you, because, dear Christian disciples, he says, you are my friends. What a friend we have in Jesus. And what a privilege it is to be called a friend of Jesus Christ. And that's what our Lord speaks of in verses 12 to 15. He speaks of friendship with Jesus, friendship with the Lord. And then in verse 16, And 17, he speaks of assurance and love. Verses 16 and 17 function in a way to assure the disciples that what he says about friendship will actually remain in place. That the friendship, no matter what will happen, will remain intact. And so he tells them something, your friends, and then he assures them, verse 16 and 17, that what he has told them will come to pass and that friendship will never fail. And so friendship with Jesus, an indeed most precious thing for the Christian. And he starts this section in verse 12 with what I suppose is one of the central commands of New Covenant Christianity. Verse 12. This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Now, you'll remember that this is the second time our Lord has explicitly given this command in the same way. Chapter 13, verse 34 was the previous command. Why is our Lord repeating something? He repeats it because we need it repeated. It is such an important command, such an important principle in New Covenant church life that it needs repeating so that it will be imprinted upon each of our hearts. We are to love each other in the way that Christ has loved us. That is to say, we are to have a Christ-like, a self-sacrificial love for each other. That surely must be the theme of the Christian in the New Covenant. Self-sacrificial love. Now, a quick reminder about what our Lord has said about love, because he's spoken a lot about love in these few chapters. Remember, our Lord is leaving them. That very night, it seems, he will go to the cross. But he says, I'm leaving you, both at the cross and in ascension, but I'm giving to you my spirit. And so I will dwell with you. The Spirit will dwell in you and with you, he has said, working in the disciples and in the Christians both spiritual and kingdom graces, the chief of which I would suggest is love. That's probably, at least Paul thought so, the greatest of the Christian graces was love. And what has our Lord said about love? Well, he's already told us, as he does in this text, that love is patterned after Christ's love. Remember what the crowd said of our Lord when they saw his response to Lazarus's death. See how he loved him. Jesus wept, they said, see how he loved him. That's to be the kind of love that we exhibit one for another. Moreover, our Lord has taught us that love brings us into a communion of love. Chapter 14, verse 21, whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me, that's the first love, he it is who loves me, and he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him." Love, Christian love, brings us, not effectually or causally, but brings us into this communion of love between Father and Son, and implicit in that text, Holy Spirit. Love, our Lord says, also produces fruit. 14 verse 15, if you love me, you will keep my commandments. And importantly, for the mission of the church, 1335, after Christ has just given them that new commandment, to love each other he says this by this love by this all people will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another in short brethren the Christian is to exhibit love as a central theme or character trait in his life. It's one of the great abiding aspects or character traits of the New Covenant Christian. And our Lord now expounds that love further, if you notice, in chapter 15, verse 13 following, he says, you are to love one another. We've already covered that in some detail before, so I won't focus upon it. But he then goes on to exegete the kind of love of which he is speaking. What is Christ-like love? Verse 13, Christ-like love is this, greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. Now here is a very important development in the biblical theme of love. In the old covenant, what was the command? You shall love your neighbor as yourself. In the new covenant, we are commanded to love our neighbor as Christ. has loved us. That's to say, there is a development in this concept of love from Old Covenant into New Covenant. There is, if you like, a qualitative difference. There is a higher standard of love, not just as you love yourself, but as Christ has loved you. That is to be the character of that love. And our Lord explains the character of that love there in verse 13. Now, we know of men who will lay down their lives, do we not? We rightly esteem those of our armed forces or those in law enforcement who lay down their lives to protect others. Rightly we esteem them. What great and almost unimaginable sacrifice that is for us. the ones who have had lives laid down for. We can scarcely imagine that kind of sacrifice, giving your life that others might be preserved. But actually the love that is spoken of here is of a greater magnitude than even that great sacrifice. The greatest love of which our Lord is speaking of here is not motivated by duty, but by love. It's not motivated by a desire to physically protect those around them, colleagues, that those who serve alongside in the armed forces. It's not just duty, it's love. Love is the motivating force. And moreover, it's for friends. That can't really be said for those in the armed forces. It's possible to give your life up for those you don't even like, that you have to serve. But this is love for friends. And that's not a generic friendship of which our Lord is speaking about here. This friendship has a much, much deeper sense than just a general friendship. Our Lord explains that in the text you see, verse 14. You are my friends if you do what I command. And he goes on to say, you're not servants anymore. You're friends because I've made known what the Father made known to me. I have revealed to you all that the Father has given. Before we come to that greatest love, let's consider this idea of friendship. What does that friendship of verse 14 and 15 look like? Jesus says, verse 14, you are my friends if you do what I command you. Do you see how the Lord is tying friendship to obedience? He's done the same earlier, to love. If you love me, you will keep my commandments. That is to say, not everyone can be considered a friend of Jesus Christ. Not everyone can be considered a friend of Jesus. For there are those who wantonly and willfully disobey, but he says, friendship of Christ will lead to obedience in our lives. And then in verse 15 he says, 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, there's the reason, for all that I have heard from my father I have made known to you. That's a wonderful thing that Christ says here. There's a categorical shift between Old Covenant and New Covenant, a shift that has taken place with the actual coming, not the prophesied or promised coming, but the actual physical coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. I'm not sure I did some quick searches on this, but I don't think you find the concept of friendship with God in many places in the Old Covenant. Now James 2 verse 23 says, Abraham was called a friend of God, but that's not written, I believe. I might be wrong. I believe it's not written explicitly in the Old Covenant. It's an inference that James is saying about Abraham's special relationship with God. Friendship with God in the Old Covenant is not the dominant theme. As we've seen in weeks past, we've seen the vine, the flock imagery. Especially we see the imagery of servants. servants of the Lord. And servants of the Lord, even in the Old Covenant, had a remarkably blessed and privileged status. They were set apart, sanctified to carry out the will of God, frequently to speak for God or to rule for God. But they spoke what God told them to, often not knowing the background or what was to happen in any great detail. But Jesus says, no! Not with you, my friends. Verse 15, he says, no longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing. Something has changed at the coming of Christ. He says, I have called you friends for all that I have heard from my father I have made known to you. What does Christ mean when he says, all that I have heard from the Father? Clearly he's not speaking in a sense, though he always is the Son, he's not speaking as the Son who knows everything with the Father. As Calvin rightly points out, Christ here is speaking as the mediator, the one between God and man. He is saying, everything you, my friends, need for faith, life, and salvation that I have heard from the Father, I have passed on to you. No longer promise, no longer prophecy, but the real thing. The coming of Christ was a categorical change in redemptive history. They've been let in on a secret, as one theologian writes. That secret, what was it? It was Jesus himself. that which was only seen distantly and dimly by prophecy and promise has now come. Jesus himself has revealed what? Himself. That's why John says back at the beginning of the gospel, we have beheld his glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth. When Christ came, they saw things differently. They saw the fullness of grace and truth previously hidden in prophecy and promise. That's what it is to be a friend of Jesus. It is to see him and to know him and to know him intimately. Perhaps even we might say in a way that any old covenant saint could not know God. We have seen Jesus. We have beheld his glory. He is full of grace and truth and we see that on every page of scripture. We have seen it. We are his friends. There's many implications to this idea of friendship. We can only touch on a few this morning. The first is obvious. There was a time when you were an enemy by nature and by deed. But now you who are enemies, we who are enemies, and we're far off, we have been brought near by the blood of Christ. Christ calls us friends, the one himself who would give his life and shed his blood for us. That's to say, dear friends, we are friends by grace. Grace, not by merit. not by right. Please remove those ideas from your theological glossary or dictionary, your own personal rights and merits. There's a place for right and merit, it's with Christ. It is the grace of God that we have been brought into this friendship and relationship. What else is there to say about this friendship? Friends trust each other, do they not? At least good friends do. We are being received into the inner circle of Christ Jesus and he says, you are my friends. Notice the disciples don't call him friends, he says of them, you are my friends. Christ receives these brethren and receives the Christian into his bosom. Christ reveals himself. Notice he sent Judas out. Not the insincere, the externally Christian, but those who truly are Christian, they've been sent out. Christ has received these disciples into his own bosom and he has entrusted himself to them. Remember what it was said earlier of Christ in the Gospel of John. He did not entrust himself to the crowds because he knew what was in their heart. Now, Jesus entrusts himself to these men. He entrusts his person. He entrusts his work. This is remarkable that Christ should do such. All the more remarkable when we consider what these friends would do to our Lord this very night. Peter would deny him. the disciples would be scattered. They would not follow him, as Peter said he would do, and lay down their life for him. Do we not see the grace of our Lord? Do we not see the wonderful grace of our Lord, who just hours before they desert and deny him, he says to them, you are my friends. Even with that attachment of a condition, if you do what I command you, do we not even see more of the grace of Christ when these men were about to do the opposite of what He had commanded and desert Him? He still says to them, you are my friends. This is the greatest love, dear friends. This is the greater love of which he speaks in verse 13. Has no one done this, that someone may lay down his life for his friends? Jesus was going to lay his life down for them, even though he knew what they would do to him that very night. Kindness to the weak. Mercy to the cowardly. Jesus, the friend of sinners. What a great Savior we have. He loved them. Greater love has no one than this. Christ was the very fulfillment of that. Yes, he was the pattern of it as well, that they ought to love each other in the same way. Remember what he said in chapter 13, verse 15, I've done this, I've washed your feet, to set you an example. That is the pattern of our conduct one to another, but Christ himself fulfills this command in a peculiar way. Great love for his friends. I want to read you a rather large section of what David Clarkson, the old Puritan, said of this very verse. He says this, the love of Christ, oh boundless love. Oh, the unsearchable riches of Christ's love. Oh, happy souls that have interest in this love, in these riches. This love made God willing to be made a curse. The Lord of life to die a base, accursed, and cruel death. Lord, there was no sorrow like your sorrow, no love like your love. Was it enough, dearest Savior, that you condescended to pray, sigh, and weep for us, but were willing also to bleed and die for us? Was it not enough that you were hated, slandered, and blasphemed, but also scourged, nailed, wounded, and crucified? Was it not enough that you felt the cruelty of men, but also underwent the wrath of God? Was it not enough that you died not only once, but actually twice in soul and body, enduring the second death? Oh, the transcendent love of Christ. Heaven and earth are astonished at it. What tongue can express it? What heart can conceive it? The tongues, the thoughts of men and angels are far below it. There is nothing lovely in man. Christ knew all this clearly. In eternity past, Christ saw all our faults, and not one after another, but all together. This adds great wonder to the love of Christ. He saw every perverse look, every unkind gesture, every rebellious motion, every disingenuous act. Every heart was visible from eternity. Here is the wonder of Christ's love. It is fixed upon man, the worst of creatures. Consider his resolution and wonder, I will give eternal life to those who have dishonored me. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. That's the love of Christ for the Christian, for you and for me. A love which cannot be broken or undone. A love which never fades or is diminished. And Paul says to us, let this mind of Christ be also in you, in me. That means, brethren, we have to have that same kind of love that Christ has for us. We have to be willing to accept wrongs, to give ourselves eagerly to and for others, to bear each other's burdens, quick to forgive, quick to have mercy, not bearing grudges. You insist that others are counted better than yourself. You wash their feet. You don't wait for them to wash your feet. In that sense, we are to be little mirror images of Christ Jesus, our Lord. That is what we are called to do. And Christ provides us a test to this. He says, you are my friends if you do what I command. What a privilege it is to have a friend in Jesus Christ. What a great calling he calls us to, to reflect himself to each other. But I suspect if I was one of the disciples, I would have been mightily confused at this point in the upper room. John speaks a lot in his gospel about how they realized things after Christ had been raised from the dead. They understood things he had previously said. I suspect this is one of them because he then speaks to them, really, about how they will know this reality. How they will know that this friendship will last and continue. He gives them an assurance of such. How would they know this friendship would continue after Christ's death, after he ascended? Indeed, we might actually ask the question, what assurance did the disciples have that this friendship would even last the night, given what was about to happen? They're going to deny him. They're going to desert him. And yet he says to them, you are my friends, and I love you. And he knows, as David Clarkson rightly pointed out, he knew this before he said, you are my friends. The disciples were gonna be crestfallen by the end of this night. Peter, we are told in Luke's gospel, after he goes through the process of denial and the rooster crows, It says, and he went out and wept bitterly. He wept bitterly over the prediction of his own failure, of his own desertion. Brethren, I wonder if we know that experience also. We know we're believers, and yet we realize we've deserted Christ all too often. We've failed him. We've let him down. If we are at all honest with ourselves, we know something, do we not, of Peter's response? Of that bitterness and anguish of soul when we failed our Savior again and again. How are we assured of his friendship? What assures us in that moment of spiritual despair What assures us that we are friends of Jesus? Not just a short-term friend, not like a Facebook friend, but a real friend. A friend for eternity. What assured the disciples and what assures you? It's 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. We need to be very clear. Whatever this choosing means, and there's some debate about it, whatever the choosing means, it is clear that it is the choice of Christ, not of the disciples. The choosing comes from our Lord. He says, I chose you. He sought them. He pursued them. He called them. You see, this is the guarantee that the friendship which Christ himself declares of the disciples and of the Christian will remain unbroken. It is that he chose them in the first place to be friends, to be his brothers, to be his sisters. He chose them. Not even their obedience, which he demands in verse 14, not even their obedience could cause this choice. No, this choice was a free, sovereign, gracious choice. What choice are we talking about? There's two options. I think actually both are in view here. First is their earthly calling to office, to apostleship. You'll remember how our Lord went about them and simply said towards them, follow me. And they did! Why? Because the voice of God spoke to them. And the voice of God is powerful, and it does what it says it will do. He said, follow, and they followed. He called them. He chose them. He befriended them. But it seems to me that's insufficient to understand these words. You did not choose me. It speaks of the great decree of election. That sovereign, free, gracious decree of election. That our Lord identified, Father, Son, and Spirit identified those whom they would save and elected them unto such. Chose them unto such. Before they could do good or ill, before they even existed, God chose them. It's a free decision, friends. God's not forced, he's not coerced, he's not influenced, he doesn't look down the corridor of time and see that you might be useful in the kingdom. No, none of it. The choice is of God alone and through providence and his word in time, he brings that choice to pass through the calling of sinners. God did it. And because that choice is before the foundation of the world, both for the disciples and for us, before we could do any good or bad, it stands to reason that any good or bad that we could do cannot undo that choice. It is impossible. Every command that God gives us, we fail in. Even in verse 14, you are my friends if you do what I command you, is not speaking about an ultimate or causal relationship. Nothing we do, good or bad, can undo God's sovereign choice of election. Does that mean you can live how you want? No, that'll simply prove that you were never elected in the first instance. No, the choice was made. Listen to this. God chose you, having known you. or we can put it this way, God chose us in spite of ourselves. Oh, the depths of wickedness that exist in our hearts is unimaginable and God knew it all when he chose us. Two effects of this sovereign election, what should it do? It ought to banish pride from every single one of us. There is nothing in us that caused or influenced God to make that choice. It's an utter contradiction for Christians to be proud, disagreeable people. It's an utter contradiction. But the second thing, the second implication of this choosing is assurance, a great assurance. Christ here is telling his disciples who are about to abandon him, I chose you. Peter will deny him three times. He says, Peter, I chose you and you're my friend. You see, brethren, when you're in the midst of great doubt, spiritual doubts, of fiery trials that you think are going to push you beyond that which you can cope with and deal with, think on your election. If by faith you are united to Jesus Christ, he says, you are my friend. and I have chosen you and your faith and your friendships are evidences of that divine election. There's good news. Nothing is going to change that divine decree. Nothing. Nothing can contradict almighty God. That's wonderful news, friends. Wonderful news. that nothing can snatch us out of the hand of Almighty God. To what end is our election in this passage? I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide. Now initially he's talking to the Apostles, by extension the whole church, Christians. I appointed you to go and bear fruit It sounds very much like what Paul says in Ephesians 2.10, What are these good works? What is that fruit of which our Lord speaks here? Well, for the apostles, it was most assuredly this, that they would become, along with our Lord, as Paul himself says, the foundation of the church. Christ Jesus himself being the chief cornerstone. Oh, what great work has abided as a result of Christ working through the apostles. You're an evidence of it today. that the church of Christ abides and will continue to, and nothing will overcome it or trample upon it. That is the greatest work I think that these apostles could ever choose, that we enter into also, dear friends, because we're not consumers, are we? This is not like our favorite restaurant. We go there and purchase a service. What can we get out of them? We come here because we are members of a family, members of a body, to serve, not to be served. And there's a time and place to be served. But if that's our default assessment of church life, what can I get out of it? You've got church badly wrong. It is so that we might serve. We might be part of this body, this divine, this royal, this blessed body, and we might serve. That is the kind of work and fruit that is going to abide. It's going to abide. It will last. We must take our own place, as it were, in the work of the Great Commission. We as a church must be zealous in doing things outside these four walls. outside these four walls and inside these four walls we must also be equally zealous to be serving each other according to the pattern of Christ that is fruit which abides which makes real tangible difference in the life of Christians and unbelievers to show that we love each other by which love and the manifestation of it everyone will know that we are disciples of Jesus Christ These are the works which abide, which bring great glory to our Father in heaven and serve and build up the flock. Christ also speaks of another benefit very briefly. Elect fruit-bearing Christians can do what? Can ask of the Father in Jesus' name. He will give it to you. Do you struggle with prayer? Do you struggle with your prayer lives? Here's a great motivator to your prayer lives being enriched and more constant. You're elect. You're elect. And because Christ chose you and appointed you to bear fruit, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he will give it to you. Do we doubt that God will give us good things? We do. We do. I'm sure we do. But brethren, consider this, if election, if salvation is our greatest need, which it is, and Jesus tells us God has given us that freely, do we not think he will give us everything else we need? Romans 8.30. And listen, those whom He predestined, He also called. And those whom He called, He justified. Those whom He justified, He glorified. What's the application of that? The very next verse. What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, how will He not with Him graciously give us all things? struggling with prayer, ask yourself this, am I elect? And there's no harm in saying, yes, I am. Because the evidence of election will be seen in your life, pray. Because Christ himself says this, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you. Election is a call to prayer. Friends, notice how our Lord concludes in verse 17. These things I command you so that you will love one another. It's interesting he uses the word command there when there's actually very few commands in the passage. He's saying, I'm instructing you these things so that you will love each other. What has he commanded them? Verses one to 11, that we abide in him and he abides in us. What else? That we are to love one another. Why? Because we're friends of Jesus and friends love each other. Let's pray. Blessed Father, we praise you for your great kindness to us, that we should be elevated to be children of God, to be friends with Jesus Christ. Oh, how we bless and magnify your name, that we are gathered in your presence. to dwell in unity and sing your praise, to dwell in union with Christ our Lord. Work these truths into our hearts. Give us peace and love. We pray in Christ's name. Amen.