Personal from the President

Fulfilling Our Focus as Disciples of Jesus Christ

What's the most significant indicator by which others will know that we are Christ's disciples? In other words, what demonstrates most that we are Christians? Jesus stated it very simply in His last full day of His life on earth: "By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another" (John 13:36, English Standard Version, emphasis added throughout).

Shortly, we will have the opportunity to broadcast this to the world as many will travel to meet with those of like mind and shine their lights to those in the world who are not of like mind.

There is an ancient tradition where Jews are encouraged to mentally recite the Shema from Deuteronomy 6 immediately upon waking up. This tradition helps capture a spiritual mindset for the unfolding day. This is an important tradition for us to consider, as verse 5 was specifically defined as the Greatest Commandment by Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior and living Head of our Church.

Jesus makes this plain in Mark 12:30-31: "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' The second is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself'" (ESV).

Jesus declared that love—love for God and love for our neighbor (our brothers and sisters in the faith, our co-workers, our family, essentially everyone we meet)—was to be paramount in the daily lives and interactions for His disciples—no exceptions!

True Christianity is not found first in platitudes, fighting for our "rights" or making odious bravado statements that point to us and not necessarily to Jesus Christ.

Jesus magnified this further: "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you" (John 15:12, ESV). When Jesus spoke this commandment, He wasn't doing so from the top of Mount Sinai, but it is no less binding—Jesus speaks this directly to you and me!

We need to grasp that this means total commitment. All our resources are to be dedicated to loving God and our fellow humans; the latter specifically focused on our brethren in the faith!

Focusing on and working to achieve this fulfills two critical goals: first we set and renew ourselves to become more like God our Father—whose very definition is that of love (1 John 4:7, 16). Second, loving our brothers and sisters in the Church of God openly demonstrates and represents a vital part of preaching the gospel!

Is this easy? Often it is not. But that doesn't make it any less of our commitment and personal responsibility. We are expected to be disciples of action! As the apostle John declares: if anyone "sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth" (1 John 3:17-18, ESV).

Here is the standard that is set for us: "may you have the power to understand, as all God's people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God" (Ephesians 3:18-20, New Living Translation).

Here's our challenge, especially for these times we live in today. This focus on the spiritual gift of love, of not just receiving love from God, but passing it on, should be front and center for each of us.

The apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthians and to us today a beautiful example and framework to check our status in how we are learning to love God and our brethren. All of us know it well.

But I invite you to make it personal. Let's take a test based on 1 Corinthians 13. Where you read the word "love," substitute your name. Then ask yourself: can people objectively and truly say this about you?

"[Your name] is patient, [Your name] is kind, [Your name] does not envy, [Your name] does not boast, [Your name] is not proud. [Your name] does not dishonor others. [Your name] is not self-seeking, [your name] is not easily angered, [your name] keeps no record of wrongs" (1 Corinthians 13:4-5, New International Version).

How did you do? Did you find some room for improvement? We all do. This is a hard test, for certain. But this is the standard that we must all aspire to!

Paul provides us with another practical example. In the Corinthian congregation, brethren living in an environment of pagan worship looked differently at what they could or could not eat in good conscience. What should have been a simple personal decision ballooned up into a divisive issue. Paul appealed to the brethren there to be "sensible," noting that while eating some foods may be lawful, they were not necessarily helpful to the conscience of some brethren, to the point where "All things are lawful, but not all things build up" (1 Corinthians 10:15, 23, ESV).

Regarding personal situations, Paul made a broad point. He essentially told the Corinthians to be sensible, showing love and respect to each other, respecting potential differences in behavior or circumstances. As he states, which surely applies to us today, "Let no one seek his own good, but the good of his neighbor" (verse 24).

We may hold different opinions about health, about nutrition, about current affairs that may affect our individual consciences. Whatever they are, they are all subject to fulfilling our focus as disciples of Jesus Christ: "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you."

In these challenging times, none of us need energy-sapping quarrels, criticisms or expressed disrespect. We must guard our hearts, believing the best, for we are specially warned of a coming time when "the love of many will grow cold" (Matthew 24:12).

We need to renew our trust in God, asking Him to direct our paths. As David wrote: "Wait for the Lord; be strong and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord!" (Psalm 27:14, ESV).

Power is available to us in the Church of God. Spiritual love in plenty is available to us. As Paul declares to us today of God's will for us: "To him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever" (Ephesians 3:20, ESV).

The rewards are great—both now and in the time to come—for doing this. Let us fulfill our focus as disciples of Jesus Christ!