In our Gospel extract this Sunday Jesus gives us a new commandment, the commandment to love. He tells us that it is by our putting into practice this commandment that everyone will know that we are Christ’s disciples.
What we have to understand is that this command to love is the key to everything. What is revealed here by Jesus is nothing less than the underpinning principle behind everything that God does. It is summarised in one short word: love.
He is telling us that love is the secret of the universe and that it is the motive behind everything God does; beginning with the act of creation and the granting of humanity free will, through to the great act of salvation which occurred on Mount Calvary and then leading on to our eventual welcome into his eternal Kingdom.
And more than this, because Jesus also wants us to realise that this ought to be the underpinning principle behind everything that we do too.
What Jesus is telling us is that there is nothing more important or more relevant for our lives than love. It should be the motivating force behind everything that we do and it should permeate every single aspect of our lives.
According to him love is the only thing that can bring us true fulfilment in life because it is only by living a life of love that our actions will be in full harmony with the divine will.
In the pages of the scriptures we see love revealed in the life of Jesus. Love is the motive behind each of his miracles whether it be healing or multiplying loaves; whatever Jesus did to aid the people he did it out of nothing other than love and concern.
Often we know when Jesus met with a difficult case his heart was moved with compassion for the person in difficulty. For example we know how he restored the son of the widow of Nain to her, realising what a predicament her son?s death would put her in. He is moved with pity and with great compassion in his heart his response is to raise her son from the dead.
We see then in this, and in many other examples, how Jesus was motivated by love for those around him. Even in his last agony as he is dying on the Cross he shows his love for his mother as he places her in the care of the Apostle John, thus ensuring that she has a home and someone to look after her in her old age.
On almost every page of the Gospels we find similar incidents which demonstrate Christ?s great love. We see his goodness and his kindness expressed on numerous occasions but these are not always because the plight of individual people has affected him. Quite often we observe how he wanted the mass of the people to understand the divine purposes. We recognise that it is also an act of love to help people to understand what God wants from them.
There is no better thing you can do for another human being that to help him or her to understand where they have come from and to where they are headed and what God expects from them. There could be no greater act of love that to help a person avoid eternal damnation.
We recognise that in our own day there are plenty of people who are on the road to perdition simply because they know no different. They are in ignorance because no one has ever told them the eternal truths, no one has ever helped them to see right from wrong.
This is precisely what Jesus does. He tells people about God and his will for mankind. He condemns sin loudly and clearly; not out of any malice towards sinners but rather in order to help them to return to the true path. He loves everyone and his main concern is that no one should ever be lost.
In everything that Jesus says and does, you will note that there is never any hint that he wants to violate anyone?s free will. It is actually an important expression of his love that he respects the personal autonomy of every single person. He might warn people of the consequences of their actions loudly and with power, but there is never any forcing of the issue. Each person is left completely free to make their own decisions in relation to the great issues of life.
In the text we see the use of a peculiar word. Jesus says, ?I give you a new commandment: love one another.? But this word commandment seems out of place. How can anyone command someone to love. Of its nature, love needs to be a completely free act.
I think that the answer to this lies in the fact that it is a reference to the Ten Commandments from the Old Testament. In the days of Moses when the people had only the most primitive understanding of the nature of God he issued them with the Ten Commandments as a set of instructions or as a rule for their lives.
What is happening here in the New Testament is that God is replacing these old Commandments with one single new one: love one another.
So we should not regard this new Commandment as we would any other order or instruction from a higher authority. Rather we should view it as a new principle which supersedes the much older Ten Commandments. This is no command or regulation but rather the revelation of a guiding principle behind the universe, a vital principle that we would do well to live in harmony with.
So in conclusion we as Christians living in the modern world respond to the words of Jesus by putting love at the very centre of our lives. We realise that sin is essentially anything that takes us away from love, anything that causes division or hurt between peoples and we instinctively want to draw away from anything like that.
We understand that the only way to live a truly fulfilling life is to live a life of love and we realise that this is the only way that we can be in harmony with our creator.
We understand too that it was out of love for us that Christ gave his life on the Cross of Calvary and opened up for us the way to eternal life. This knowledge is a great treasure and it makes us want to return love for love, it makes us want to respond to our Divine Saviour with a deep and yearning love.
It is only this that will make us truly happy, truly fulfilled in all that we do, truly contented in being an Apostle of Jesus.