"If You Love Me, Keep My Commandments"

some thoughts on the weaponization of John 14:15

Oh, so you love Jesus? That sounds good, but only those who keep the commandments really love Jesus and are true Christians. What are the commandments, you ask? Well today is your lucky day because I happen to be one of the only people who actually know what they are. Let’s get coffee.

If you were on the receiving end of a conversation like this, I’m sorry.

That Daniel, which was like eight Daniels ago, really thought he had all the answers, and I promise you he was sincere.

And I want to give eight Daniels ago Daniel a whole lot of grace and mercy because he can’t possibly know what will happen to six Daniels ago, so let’s just love on that Daniel shall well?

Instead of calling him out, let’s call him in. Let’s invite him into what this Daniel (a still very immature version of Daniel that has a long ways to go) thinks about this passage and the others that were floating around his skinny head ten years ago.

IF You Love Me

So people love pointing out when passages are conditional statements, but let’s not modernize this too much and think that Jesus is treating people like a well-written computer programs. If this then that.

I think we can all agree that humans are far more complicated than that.

But before people get too distracted by this point and want to argue it, let’s just move on to the text.

In John 14:23-24, Jesus says,

Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words, and the word that you hear is not mine but is from the Father who sent me.

So verse 15 is less of a conditional statement, as if it is up to us to back up claims of love of Jesus with action, and more of a statement of transformation: love of Jesus and doing what he says are inseparable.

It is impossible to love Jesus without doing what he tells us to do—his “commandments.”

In fact, if one doesn’t love Jesus, then it is impossible to keep his word.

Wait. What are the Commandments?

When I would use this passage to try to convince someone else that their version of Christianity was wrong, the “commandments” were always things like worshipping with a cappella music (something Jesus never said to do), taking communion every first day of the week (something Jesus also never said to do), and following the plan of salvation (something else Jesus never talked about). Whether his disciples taught these things or not is up for debate.

In other words, the commands happened to look a lot like my version of Christianity.

But let’s think about this for a second.

Jesus said that it is impossible for someone to keep his word if they do not love him.

Let me universalize this list a bit before we continue so more people can relate.

Let’s imagine “keeping the commands” means going to church on Sunday, reading the Bible every day, and praying several times a day.

How many people have you known (maybe even yourself) who have done all of these things for years and don’t look like Jesus? They are rude to service workers, impatient, quick to gossip, and litter.

So if it’s possible to do these sort of religiousy looking things and not really look like Jesus, then that can’t be what he’s talking about when he keeps referencing his commands, right?

Lay Down Your Life

In the next chapter, Jesus said, “If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love” (John 15:10).

Again, keeping the commandments and abiding in Jesus’s love are connected, but now we get to see what the commandment is:

“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. John 15:12–14

Anyone can be baptized. Anyone can confess that Jesus is the Son of God. Anyone can go to church on Sunday, shake the preachers hand, and sing songs about the hereafter in that blessed promised land.

But only those who love Jesus will lay down their life for their neighbor day after day.

And some people who lay down their life for others might not even know they’re laying down their life for Jesus.

They might be like those in Matthew 25:

Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food or thirsty and gave you something to drink? And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you or naked and gave you clothing? And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?’ And the king will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did it to me.’ Matthew 25:37–40

Or they might be like the Samaritan who worshipped in the wrong place, was perpetually unclean, and had an incomplete version of the Scriptures but still managed to fulfill the greatest command—and thus the whole Law.

Just as it is impossible to love Jesus without laying down your life for your neighbor, it is impossible to lay down your life for your neighbor without loving Jesus.

As Paul said, some people fulfill this command without ever having heard it.

Commandment or Commandments?

In a post from over four years ago, which was like three Daniels or so ago, I shared some thoughts from the Anchor Yale Bible Commentary on Jesus oscillating between “commandments” and “commandment” throughout this context.

You can read that below, but, to sum it up, Jesus uses a few technical terms to tie what he is saying to the Ten Commandments. If you love one another (the new commandment, singular), then you will fulfill all the commandments (plural).

So when Jesus says “if you love me, keep my commandments,” he’s saying “those who love me will follow me in laying down their lives for others and naturally do all the things I expect of them.”

By the way… demanding that everyone conform to the way your church does things and the way your church interprets the Bible seems like the opposite of laying down your life for others instead, it’s as if you want them to lay down their lives for you. That seems kinda backwards.

In short…

Love your neighbor. It actually is that simple.

Everyone who loves is born of God, and where God has a son or daughter, there I have a brother or sister.

Posts Referenced in this Article