By This They Will Know

“By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35).

Often times, when God is speaking to my heart about a matter, the subject seems to come up again and again, it comes up in that which I am reading, in sermons to which I have been listening, and also in the normal course of conversation. It happened again yesterday.

Yesterday morning, I was a guest speaker at a church whose pastor is presently on a sabbatical leave. The topic of my sermon was Love One Another. My text came from John 13, where, after washing the feet of His disciples, He gave them a new commandment, “Love one another just as I have loved you. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:34-35).

Later in the day, I came across something that was written by the late Francis Schaefer in 1970, in his book The Mark of the Christian.

“How, then, is the dying culture going to consider us? Jesus said, ‘By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.’ In the midst of our present culture, Jesus gives the unbelieving world the right to judge whether you and I are born-again Christians on the basis of our observable love for all Christians.”

“Jesus turns to the world and says, ‘I have something to say to you. On the basis of My authority, I give you the right, you may judge whether or not an individual is a Christian on the basis of the love he shows to all Christians.’ In other words, if people come up to us and cast in our teeth the judgment that we are not Christians because we have not shown love towards other Christians, we must understand that they are only exercising the prerogative which Jesus gave them.”

“And we must not get angry, if people say, ‘You don’t love other Christians!’ We must go home, get down on our knees, and ask God whether or not what they say is true.”

“But there is something even more sobering. And to understand it we must look at John 17:21, here, Jesus is stating something else which is more cutting, much more profound. We cannot expect the world to believe that the Father sent the Son, that Jesus’ claims are true, unless the world sees the reality of oneness in our Christian lives, ‘… that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.’”

That was twice in one day that God pressed the truth into my heart that love for one another and unity with one another is undeniable evidence to a watching world that Jesus is who He claimed to be and that we truly are His disciples. But it didn’t stop there. In my reading before I went to bed, I came across the following prayer, offered by Michael Phillips in his book Commands.

“God, bring to my remembrance this day the command of Jesus to love my brothers and sisters in Christ. Remind me that in doing so, I demonstrate to the watching world that I am Your disciple. Remind me that when I fail to love the brethren, by arguments, by criticism, by judgment, by sectarianism, the world has every right to conclude that I am not a Christian. Give me opportunities to practice such love by demonstrating visible unity with other Christians who believe differently than I do. Remind me that the world will come to know that Jesus came from the Father, not from my proclamations but by observing my oneness with other Christians. Give me opportunities to learn that Christians of differing perspectives and outlooks are all required to love one another in unity. Thus, Heavenly Father, by my demonstrable love for other Christians, may I be an instrument in my small corner of the world for the ultimate salvation of mankind. Amen.”

My brothers and sisters in Christ, for the sake of His kingdom, let us love one another.