Jesus calls us to be keepers of the word

John 14:15-31 from the daily reading in the One Year Bible

 “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.

¹⁶ I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever; ¹⁷ that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.

¹⁸ “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. ¹⁹ After a little while the world will no longer see Me, but you will see Me; because I live, you will live also.²⁰ In that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.²¹ He who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me; and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and will disclose Myself to him.” ²² Judas (not Iscariot) said to Him, “Lord, what then has happened that You are going to disclose Yourself to us and not to the world?”²³ Jesus answered and said to him, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him.²⁴ He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine, but the Father’s who sent Me.

²⁵ “These things I have spoken to you while abiding with you. ²⁶ But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you. ²⁷ Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful. ²⁸ You heard that I said to you, ‘I go away, and I will come to you.’ If you loved Me, you would have rejoiced because I go to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. ²⁹ Now I have told you before it happens, so that when it happens, you may believe. ³⁰ I will not speak much more with you, for the ruler of the world is coming, and he has nothing in Me; ³¹ but so that the world may know that I love the Father, I do exactly as the Father commanded Me. Get up, let us go from here.”

In today’s text Jesus says:  “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments… He who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me … If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word…”   The word keep is defined:  have or retain possession of - continue or cause to continue in a specified condition, position, course.   So, if we love Jesus, it is important that we both retain possession of His word and commandments, and that we do not try to change their condition, position or course.   In the text Jesus says:  “the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you.”    The Holy Spirit cannot bring to our remembrance what we have not already heard. We need to keep; to retain, we need to already have the word, so that the Holy Spirit can teach us and remind us concerning what Jesus said. We need to know it to be reminded of it. In Matthew 5:17-20 Jesus says:   “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”   If we love Jesus then, we cannot change the condition, position or course of His word; we cannot update, change or relax the commandments of God. We need to keep them. Jesus says:  “He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine, but the Father’s who sent Me.”  Without changing the meaning we could also say, he who does not keep His words, does not love Him. We cannot say we are for God; that we love Him, if we do not keep His words and commandments, it is contrary to what Jesus says.   

God is a triune God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. God does not have Schizophrenia though. Father, Son and Holy Spirit are always in unity with one another.  The Holy Spirit will never contradict the words of the Father and the Son. Jesus says:  “These things I have spoken to you while abiding with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you. Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful.”   It is good to have Christian teachers. But, in Matthew 24:4-5 Jesus says:  “See to it that no one misleads you. For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will mislead many.”   These that mislead many are teachers who falsely say that Jesus is the Christ, but that He has changed His mind; His position and His course regarding sin. We need to keep the word ourselves, so that if a teacher tries to teach something that is wrong, the Holy Spirit can remind us and guide us in truth. There is a saying that insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. We cannot then continue to sin and expect that we will not suffer the consequences of sin. We cannot justify our sin and expect to still be in Christ. We need to repent from our sin and be justified in Christ. Jesus says:  “Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you.”   Our peace does not come from the acceptance of sin by the world, it comes from the redemption from sin in Christ. 

Jesus has done as He said:  “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever;  that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.”

Thank You heavenly Father, Lord Jesus Christ and precious Holy Spirit; the Three in One God; I love You. Thank You for Your Word which is true and unchanging. Thank You for peace. Holy Spirit guide me and teach me concerning the Word. Help me to always keep the Word. Thank You that I can also be one with You because of the redemption from sin through Christ. Amen.