Friends With God Forever • John 15:9-17

Notes

Video teaching begins at 8:13

The result of sin is that we naturally have no relationship with God. The increasing trend in this world is like it says in Psalm 2: “Let us break Their bonds in pieces and cast away Their cords from us.” That’s a good idea! Who needs the slavery and confinement to obey an arbitrary tyrant?

The problem with that is when we have no bond with God we don’t have bonds with those around us. We want loyalty, we want commitment, and trust. But if we lie and cheat and take, then we can’t trust, and we have to guard ourselves and suspect everyone. There’s no relationship there. It becomes you against everyone else. There’s no joy there.

Friend is a word that has come to mean practically nothing. But God wants to restore us to friendship. Friendship means everything to God. It’s what His life is about. God wants to restore us to a relationship of giving that results in joy to the fullest forever. God is not a tyrant. He is truly our friend.

We are reading in John 15, from verse 9.

1. The Father has loved Jesus. They have a relationship. Jesus describes in the gospel of John how the Father has loved Him and what resulted from that love.

A. John 3:35 The Father loves the Son and has given all things into His hand. Jesus is the heir of all things, the possessor.

1. Colossians 1:16 For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him.

2. Hebrews 1:2 in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world.

B. Not just the universe and all things in it. Before anything was created the Father shared His own Spirit with Jesus. There you have perfect deep intimate communion with the Father.

C. John 5:20-23 For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself is doing; and the Father will show Him greater works than these, so that you will marvel. For just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, even so the Son also gives life to whom He wishes. For not even the Father judges anyone, but He has given all judgment to the Son, so that all will honor the Son even as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him.

1. The Father communicates with the Son and shows Him all things that He is doing. There is sharing and involvement in the Father’s purpose.

2. The Father has given all judgment to the Son. When God judges the world in righteousness, it will be Jesus Christ sitting on the throne.

3. The Father has given all glory and worship to the Son. When you worship the Son you glorify the Father.

D. Jesus says to the disciples, “As the Father loved Me, I also have loved you.”

1. Remember John 13, the beginning of this section with His disciples at the last supper. Having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end, to the uttermost, completely.

2. He has communicated with them. Notice verse 15: “All things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you.” These men knew that if they asked any question they would get an answer.

3. There is sharing the Holy Spirit. That’s a bit in the future still for the disciples, but Jesus said it’s going to happen. The same Holy Spirit the Father shares with the Son, the Son shares with us.

4. Given the disciples all things? Luke 10:19 Behold, I have given you authority to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing will injure you. Romans 8:16-17 The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him. Glorified means He is sharing His glory with us. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 3:21-23 So then let no one boast in men. For all things belong to you, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or things present or things to come; all things belong to you, and you belong to Christ; and Christ belongs to God.

5. Authority and judgment. Luke 22:28-30 “You are those who have stood by Me in My trials; and just as My Father has granted Me a kingdom, I grant you that you may eat and drink at My table in My kingdom, and you will sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel.” And in 1 Corinthians 6:2 “Or do you not know that the saints will judge the world?” He says in verse three, “Do you not know that we will judge angels?”

E. So Jesus really gave to His disciples as the Father gave to Him. He loved them and us, in the same way. This relationship is trusting and entrusting, sharing, giving, communicating.

2. Along with being given all things, there is responsibility and trust. There are commands to be obeyed.

A. Abide in My love. That’s a command to be obeyed. Remember we are to abide in Jesus as a branch abides in the vine.

B. We can ask the question, what does this connection look like practically? How do we express this?

C. One point we have already seen, letting Jesus’ words abide in us.

1. That’s the whole word of God, Old Testament as well as New Testament.

2. It’s that sharp knife that the Father uses to prune us as branches. That keeps us continually fruitful.

3. You see how practical that abiding is. If we don’t let His words abide in us, then that’s a place where we lose that connection with Jesus.

D. Keep Jesus’ commandments. Hear Him and do what He says. Obedience.

1. That means submitting your will to another and doing what the other person wants. That person is your authority, the one you should obey because you submitted yourself to Him.

2. You see how practical obedience is for abiding. If you don’t obey, you break connection with Jesus. You oppose Him. You resist Him. You say, “no” to Him.

E. This is Jesus’ commandment to keep: love one another just as I have loved you.

1. Just as the Father loved Jesus, just as Jesus loved us, now we are to love one another.

2. Which means, communicate, share all things, obey, submit, give loyalty, give glory.

3. Love gives of itself. Love gives life to others. When you give of yourself to others you are loving them. You give food, water, shelter, comfort, support. I know a pastor who gave a guy who wasn’t a Christian one of his kidneys when it turned out he was a match to be a donor. He gave of himself, he gave life.

4. The greatest love is giving one’s whole life completely for his friends. Jesus is saying I’m going to die so that you may live forever and not die forever because of your sins. Jesus gave His whole life for us.

5. You can see how practical this is for abiding in Jesus, maintaining our connection to Him. If Jesus laid down His life for us, then we lay down our lives for Him. We are His friends. Friends lay down their lives for one another. So we lay down our lives for one another as well. If we love Him, then we love one another. If we don’t love the one whom Jesus loves, we are disagreeing with Him, we are opposing Him, and we break connection with Him.

3. If you obey all that Jesus commands, you are His friend.

A. Thanks to Facebook “friend” is a word that is practically meaningless today. We have the barest connection to some of these people. We don’t even know these people but we “friend” them anyway!

B. But this is how God defines the concept of “friend”.

1. Someone who has received and knows the love of the Father that is in Jesus Christ. Not that we loved God but that He loved us and gave His Son as a propitiation for our sins.

2. Someone who responds to the Father with submission, obedience, loyalty, sharing, communication, and love, giving one’s life. All that means “abide” in Christ.

3. You can see that if you don’t obey, aren’t loyal, don’t give, don’t submit, don’t love, how can you be a friend? You are instead an enemy.

C. Jesus says I don’t call you slaves anymore.

1. That’s a name He used before when He taught that a slave is not greater than his master; if they blasphemed Me they will blaspheme you.

2. Master/slave is a kind of relationship. There is a bond there that ties the master and the slave together. But it’s not voluntary, it’s not sharing, there’s no love in it. I bought you. You are my possession.

D. Jesus says you are My friends. That is a relationship with a bond that ties, but it is voluntary, it’s sharing, communicating, submitting, obeying, giving. It’s about love.

4. The secret of this friendship is that Jesus became our friend first. He befriended us and He will sustain us.

A. He chose us first. Somebody has to choose to be a friend first. We would never have chosen to be friends with Jesus. So He chose us first.

B. I appointed you. It was an authoritative act with power to connect us as branches to Him as the vine. Being connected to Jesus is the only way to bear fruit. He saved us. 1 Corinthians 1:30 But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption.

C. His appointment was that our fruit should remain. Because everything done in love is eternal. It’s Jesus’ choice that our lives would not be in vain, futile, meaningless. He wants our lives to be significant, meaningful. He wants the best for us.

D. What Jesus begins He sustains through us asking the Father for what we need. And we need the very things that make relationship. Love from God, the character of Jesus, indwelling of His Spirit, ability to lay down our lives for those around us. We don’t have these things but He does. The Father gives these things to us out of His infinite riches in Jesus.

5. So what?

A. God is our true friend. He Himself is loyal, self- sacrificing (He gives of Himself). He is love.

B. God is the one who defines friendship, not Facebook or anyone else. He says friendship is a bond of relationship. It’s communication, sharing, giving of oneself even to laying down one’s life for one’s friends.

C. No friend betrays his friend. No friend lies to his friend. No friend denies his friend, or disobeys him, or rebels against him. That’s what an enemy does.

D. God is your true friend, most surely. He is the one who chose you before you chose Him. Are you His friend? Are you connected to Jesus? Do you obey His commandments? Let His word abide in you? Communicate? Give of yourself to others? Are you loyal to Him? First, receive the love of God. That’s where we always start. He was your friend before you ever thought of Him. Receive Jesus as your Lord and Saviour.

E. Are you a friend to the believers? Do you love them as Jesus loved you? Do you communicate, submit, obey? Do you give of yourself? Do you lay down your life, especially for the believers? Friends submit to one another and they obey one another. Hey, it’s midnight and I need three loaves of bread right now. You submit and obey. That’s what friends do. You’re there for the bad times as much for the good times. If you aren’t there for the bad times, what kind of friend are you?

F. The result of being a friend is joy. You submit, you obey, you communicate, you share, you give of yourself, maybe even to the point of death, and then you get to share the joy of Jesus, made full.

1. It’s woven into the fabric of the universe: it is more blessed to give than to receive. There is joy in benefitting others, in giving life. There is joy in fruit that remains. There is joy in being in relationship forever.

2. The world can never have joy because they are faithless, liars, betrayers, takers. They will get all that they want, but there won’t be joy. There is no joy or relationship in hell.

E. Instead, we beg everyone to listen, to receive the love of God, and be friends with God now and forever.

Let’s pray.