Love for Christ: The True and the False

 

 

“If you love me, keep my commandments.”    John 14:15

“Keep my commandments.”  This is the best proof of love. The text indicated does not suggest a lawless liberty. It is true that we are “not under the law, but under grace” (Rom. 6:14). But we are still “under the law to Christ” (1 Cor. 9:21); and if we love Him, we are to keep His commandments. Let us never enter into the counsel of those who do not believe that there are any commandments for believers to keep. Those who do away with duty, do away with sin, and consequently, do away with the Savior. It is not written, “If ye love me, do whatever you please.” Jesus does not say, “As long as you love me in your hearts, I do not care anything about your lives.” There is no such doctrine as that between the covers of the Holy Book. He who loves Christ is the freest person outside of heaven, but he is also the most under bonds. He is free, for Christ has loosed his bonds, but he is put under bonds to Christ by grateful love. The love of Christ constrains him, from this time forward, to love for the Lord who loved him, lived for him, died for him, and rose again for him.
    No, dear friends, we do not desire a lawless life. He who is not under the law as a power for condemnation can yet say that with his heart he delights in the law of God (Rom. 7:22). He longs for perfect holiness, and in his soul he yields heartfelt homage to the precepts of the Lord Jesus. Love is law; the law of love is the strongest of all laws. Christ has become our Master and King, and “his commandments are not grievous” (1 John 5:3).
    Also, our text does not contain any fanatical challenge. We do not read, “If you love Me, perform some extraordinary act.” The test required is not an outburst of extravagance or an attempt to realize the ambitious project of a feverish brain. It is nothing of the kind. Hermits, nuns and religious madcaps find no example or precept here. Some people think that if they love Jesus, they must enter a convent, retire to a cell, dress themselves oddly, or shave their heads. Some men have thought, “If we love Christ, we must strip ourselves of everything we possess, put on sackcloth, tie ropes around our waists, and pine away in the desert.” Others have thought it wise to make themselves look absurd by odd dress and behavior. The Savior does not say anything of the kind. Rather, He says, “If ye love me, keep my commandments.” ...
    Why does the Savior give us this as a test? I think that one reason is because it proves whether you love Christ in His true position or whether your love is for a christ of your own making and your own placing. It is easy to want a half-christ and to refuse a whole Christ. It is also easy to follow a christ of your own making, who is merely an antichrist. The real Christ is so great and glorious that He has a right to give commandments. Moses never used an express such as our Savior employs here. Moses might have said, “Keep God’s commandments,” but he never would have said, “Keep my commandments.” That dear and divine person whom we call Master and Lord says here, “Keep my commandments.” What  a commanding person He must be! What lordship He has over His people! How great He is among His saints! If you keep His commandments you are putting Him into the position that He claims. By your obedience you confess His sovereignty and divinity, and you say with Thomas, “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28).
    I am afraid that a great many people know a christ who is meek and lowly, their servant and Savior, but they do not know the Lord Jesus Christ. Alas! My friends, such people set up a false christ. We do not love Jesus at all if He is not our Lord and God. It is all whining pretension and hypocrisy, this love for Christ that robs Him of His deity. I abhor that love for Christ that does not make Him King of Kings, and Lord of Lords. Love Him, yet belittle Him? It is absurd. Follow your own will in preference to His will, and then talk of love for Him? Ridiculous! This is only the Devil’s counterfeit of love. It is a contradiction of all true love. Love is loyal and crowns its Lord with obedience. If you love Jesus properly, you view His every precept as a divine commandment. You love the true Christ if you love a commanding Christ as well as a saving Christ, and if you look to Him to guide your life as well as to pardon your sin.

C. H. Spurgeon, from the book BEING GOD’S FRIEND, pages 117-120, Whitaker House, 1997