Eye-Opening Moments
We all have these fascinating, eye-opening moments while reading God’s Word. For me, a really big moment was while I was living in Africa as a missionary sitting in my backyard under a large tree, getting some shade from the heat of the day. I had my pocket New Testament with me, and I opened it to the Gospel of John and began reading. It was a beautiful day, though extremely hot; sitting in the shade while nice breezes blew made the afternoon more bearable.
I enjoyed going through John's Gospel, stopping every now and then to meditate on what I was reading. As I was reading through John Chapter 13, the 34th verse caught my attention.
“A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.”
Like many believers, we were taught to love God with all our hearts, souls, and strength. Suddenly, I saw that Jesus emphasized His love for the disciples, telling them to love one another in the same way He had loved them.
It is hard for me to describe that moment, but I knew on the inside, something was about to shift in my heart concerning how I understood the love of God.
I closed my New Testament, laid it on my lap, and just got lost in thought about verse 34, where the disciples were instructed to love others in the same way Jesus loved them. At the time, it seemed like a simple verse, but as I went back in my memory, thinking about my Bible school education and the many sermons I had heard, I couldn’t recall anywhere I had been taught that to love like Jesus, we must be loved by Him. This bothered me immensely because almost all the teaching I was given about God’s love focused on how we are to walk in love or prove to God how committed we are to being loving people so our faith would work.
Please don’t misunderstand me; I believe walking in love is essential to living a victorious life in Christ, but I came to learn all those years ago that walking in love had nothing to do with my behavior or performance. Rather, it is about what my heart embraced as the truth about how God loved me.
For years, I did my best to walk in love as I understood it: to forgive everyone, be kind and gentle, etc. But no matter how hard I tried to walk in love, I always felt I had fallen far short of what God required of me. This led to feelings of guilt, shame, and inadequacy. If my prayers weren’t answered, I was sure it was because somewhere in my life, I hadn’t walked in love, or I had held a grudge or unforgiveness against someone. My life was filled with self-condemnation because I believed I had failed God in my love walk.
Suddenly, sitting under a tree all those years ago, the Holy Spirit opened my eyes to see something in Scripture I had never seen before. He showed me that God’s love for us isn’t about us loving Him or anyone but all about embracing the love He has for us. Discovering Jesus taught His disciples that His love for them would enable them to love one another was a life-changing moment for me. I jumped off the proverbial hamster wheel of performance and found rest in receiving the love God has for me. I have never looked back.
Today, as believers, we can love others because we are loved by God. We can forgive others because we have been forgiven. The power of a heart fully persuaded to the truth that God loves us is how we are transformed.
