In a world that is becoming increasingly complex because of innumerable opportunities to which our cell phones connect us, it is refreshing to remind ourselves of what Jesus said was at the core of following him. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment (Mt 22:37-38.) The primacy of this first and greatest commandment resonates with me. If I could just love God more:
- My heart would have less room to love sin.
- The pleasure of pleasing him would overpower my selfish pleasures.
- I would want the approval of God more than the approval of men.
- I would love his Word more, meditating upon it, because obeying his commands is the way he wants me to express love for him.
- I would shut out the world more often to be in his quiet presence.
- I would be a better reflection of the new humanity, Christ’s kingdom. This is what Augustine called the city of God, the place where the evil impulse “the love of self to the contempt of God,” is replaced by the godly impulse, “the love of God to the contempt of self.”
Jesus, the perfect man who fulfilled all righteousness, obeyed the great commandment—loving the Father perfectly. This episode seeks to throw back the curtain of that devotion to the Father, so we may be inspired and challenged by it.
As some of you have heard me say before, when I hear the biblical commandment, Love the Lord your God with all your heart, my brain immediately jumps off the track and goes back to my memories of second grade on Valentine’s Day, when we gave our favorite female friend a silly card that said, “I love you with all my heart.” Of course, the biblical term used here for love does not mean romantic attraction. The Greek term for that is EROS. Nor is the term, PHILEO, the Greek word for friendship love used, nor STORGE, the word for family love. Rather, it is AGAPE, the word for undaunting allegiance. This Greek word describes not a feeling but a commitment, not a sentiment, but determined loyalty, not an emotion but a conviction to give supreme allegiance to another. Let’s observe five facets of Jesus’ AGAPE love for the Father, i.e. his allegiance to the Father.
A. HE EMPTIED HIMSELF OF HIS OWN WILL TO DO THE FATHER’S
Philippians 2:6-7 says, Christ Jesus… though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. Jesus was unalterably committed to do the Father’s will. He said, My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work (Jn 4:34) and, I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me (Jn 6:38). Out of supreme loyalty and devotion to the Father, Jesus denied himself in order to yield to the Father’s will. Such emptying of himself to yield to the Father is also reflected in his Gethsemane prayer. We read, Going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will (Mt 26:39).
Though God’s Son remained 100% God when he became 100% man, this emptying of himself seems also to point to his dependency upon the Father. Jesus said, Truly, truly I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord (Jn 5:19). In John 6:65, he said, No one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father. Emptying ourselves of self-reliance is foundational for walking closely with the Father. In the first beatitude Jesus taught that the riches of the kingdom belong only to those who admit they have no spiritual resources of their own. Blessed are the poor in spirit for the kingdom of heaven is theirs (Mt 5:3). Emptying ourselves, refusing to trust ourselves, even our own wills, precedes seeing the power of Christ poured out in us. God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble (Ja 4:6). Paul learned this dependency lesson through his thorn in the flesh: God said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weakness so that the power of Christ may rest upon me (2 Cor 12:9). True dependence upon God requires yielding our will—not just doing what God wants but doing it his way. We see Jesus resisting the temptation to do things his way in combatting Satan’s temptation in the wilderness: He was tempted to accomplish his mission a selfish way, an easy way, and a painless way.
- The selfish way. When Satan tempted Jesus to turn the stones into bread, Jesus was at the point of starvation. During a long fast, hunger pangs stop early on. When they return, it is a signal that you must eat, or you will die. Somehow Jesus knew that using his supernatural power selfishly, even to prevent his death, was not trusting God’s Word. He needed to wait upon God. The older I get, the more clearly, I realize how I default to concern for SELF. When someone hands me a group picture with me in it, where is the first place my eyes travel? To the picture of ME to see if it is a good picture! How profound is the challenge to empty ourselves!
- The easy way. Satan took Jesus to the pinnacle of the temple, tempting him to leap off and gain an immediate following the easy way. God had promised that the angels would bear him up. But the easy way would have cut moral corners. Jesus realized this was the temptation to force God’s hand—to tempt God—to needlessly put God in a position where he “had to” come through instead of quietly trusting God to build his followers. I think of words from Pat Morley, about cutting moral corne.
Some men have spectacular failures where in a moment of passion they abruptly burst into flames, crash and burn. But the more common way men get into trouble evolves from hundreds of tiny decisions—decisions which go undetected—that slowly like water tapping on a rock wear down a man’s character. Not blatantly or precipitously, but subtly over time, we get caught in a web of cutting corners and compromise (The Man in the Mirror).
B. HE HUMBLED HIMSELF IN OBEDIENCE TO THE FATHER
Philippians 2 continues, And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross (Phil 2:8). Closely linked to emptying himself to yield to the Father’s will was humbling himself in obedience. To begin to grasp the meaning of these words we must remember that this being is the Second Person of the Trinity, transcendent over everything that exists—except the Father. Yet, he chose to embrace the humiliating role of a slave obeying his master in devotion to the will of his heavenly Father for him. Jesus told his followers, I have not spoken on my own authority, but the Father who sent me has himself given me a commandment—what to say and what to speak (Jn 12:49). Jesus explicitly tells us that he obeys the Father because he loves the Father. I do as the Father has commanded me, so that the world may know that I love the Father (Jn 14:31). And in return the Father loves Jesus for his obedience. For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again (Jn 10:17).
In short, obedience is personal to Jesus and to the Father. Obedience was an expression of his love—his unwavering allegiance to the Father. King David saw his choice to obey or disobey God in the same light. In Psalm 51 after his adultery with Bathsheba and murder of her husband, Uriah, David wept, Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight…. Hide your face from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities. How could David say “Against YOU and YOU ONLY have I sinned?” What about Bathsheba and Uriah? Yet David’s sin was so personal to David, so massive on his mind’s screen that it pushed aside his other evil. It was a personal offense to the Father
Jesus’ personal devotion to obeying the Father is revealed in his response to Satan’s third temptation. After tempting Jesus to choose the selfish way, and the easy way, Satan tempts Jesus to choose the painless way, but it required just one compromise. Satan showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world that had been surrendered to Satan’s control when Adam sinned allying his kingdom, earth, with evil. How Jesus must have been tempted to accept Satan’s offer to sit on kingdom earth’s throne as the benevolent king who could establish his rule of justice, compassion, and wholeness. He wouldn’t have to defeat Satan at the cross to recover earth’s kingdom; Satan promised to give it to him, without a fight. “But, there is one condition,” says Satan. “Just hit your knee once, Jesus, bowing to me. Just one second to momentary genuflect—and you can escape the pain of taking all that evil upon yourself, excruciatingly ripped from your unity with the father, not to mention escape the agony of the cross.” At this point in the conversation, I think we can detect Jesus’ anger rising from his supreme loyalty to the Father only. Be gone Satan. For it is written, “You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve” (Mt 4:10). How often we hear of ministries that continue to flourish—the kingdom seems to be expanding through the work—only to discover that behind the scenes the leader began compromising with evil. Jesus eschews the easy way out of his devotion to righteousness. When I think about it a big part of my complaining spirit when things go wrong is rooted in simple laziness. I want ease, I want pain-free followership of Jesus. If God loves me, why can’t he make things easier? It is a deadly temptation. But Jesus had emptied himself—he had no will of his own that would contend with the Father’s difficult for him.
C. HE KNEW THE FATHER’S CHARACTER
In John 10:15, Jesus says, the Father knows me and I know the Father. In John 6:45, he had already said, no one has seen the Father except he who is from God; he has seen the Father. In John 17, Jesus prays, “O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you.” Jesus knew the character of the Father. In his human nature there was something about other humans Jesus marveled at; it was unbelief. Mark 6:6 reports that in his hometown of Nazareth, He could do no mighty work there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and healed them. And he marveled because of their unbelief (Mk 6;5-6). I don’t know how an all-knowing being can marvel—but I believe that Jesus knew the character of the Father so well, that, somehow, he experienced the emotion of astonishment that anyone would not trust him. It was as if he knew the Father so well that he couldn’t comprehend ANYONE not trusting him.
A few years ago, my friend, Rick, told me this story about his trip to the nearby water park with his six-year-old son, Michael. They had climbed all the way to the top of the sliding board at the waterpark. But then Michael looked down the slide and stopped dead in his tracks. Rick said, “Michael, trust me, it will be okay. Its safe. You won’t get hurt.” But Michael wouldn’t budge. “Michael trust me; I’m your father. I wouldn’t let anything happen to you. Go down the slide; it is safe.” But Michale refused to go down—holding up everyone in line and infuriating my friend Rick. The two of them had to climb all the way back down the ladder. Rick later remarked, “I was angry that Michael refused to trust me, but then I realized I am the same way, refusing to trust God.
Doubting the Father’s character seems to be endemic to all of Adam’s fallen race. And Satan used doubts about the goodness of God to tempt Eve. He began with a question that insinuates that God is the kind of selfish being that just might have created a garden with ALL of this luscious fruit and then forbidden them to have ANY of it. His words, “Did God really say that you can’t eat from the fruit of ANY of the trees in the garden?” He then lies that God is keeping something good from them, “He knows that when you eat of it you will be like god knowing good and evil.” Jesus faced hardship and pain we will never know. Yet HE KNEW THAT THE FATHER WAS GOOD. He trusted the Father’s character. So can we!
D. HE KNEW THE FATHER LOVED HIM
In John 3:35, Jesus says The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hand.” In 5:20, he repeats, the Father loves the Son. In John 17, Jesus prays, “Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.” Both at the inauguration of Jesus ministry in his baptism and on the Mt of Transfiguration, the audible voice of God the Father is heard saying the two things every son longs to hear, “I love you” and “I am proud of you.” In Matthew 3:17, we read, And behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”
How would our lives change if we ever grasped how much God loves us?
- Jesus used logic to persuade us of it: Which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him! (Matt 7:9-10).
- Paul prays for all Christians to grasp it: And I pray that you, firmly fixed in love yourselves, may be able to grasp (with all Christians) how wide and deep and long and high is the love of Christ—and to know for yourselves that love so far beyond our comprehension. May you be filled though all your being with God himself! (Eph 3:17-19).
- Paul irrefutably argues to prove it. In face of all this, what is there left to say? If God is for us, who can be against us? He that did not hesitate to spare his own Son but gave him up for us all—can we not trust such a God to give us, with him, everything else that we can need...I have become absolutely convinced that neither death nor life, neither messenger of Heaven nor monarch of earth, neither what happens today nor what may happen tomorrow, neither a power from on high nor a power from below, nor anything else in God’s whole world has any power to separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ our Lord!
They argued to PROVE it. It is for us to BELIEVE it.
E. JESUS DELIGHTED IN BRINGING HONOR TO THE FATHER
The motivation that lay beneath Jesus’ dogged determination to stay on the path to the cross is unmasked in John 12. Just a few days from the crucifixion, after his triumphal entry, Jesus reveals what is going on in his heart. “Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? But for this purpose I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name.” (vs 27-28). Just days before his crucifixion, Jesus reveals the inner conflict of his soul; he does not WANT to go to the cross. But he overcomes these feelings with a more intense desire—for the Father’s name to be glorified. The greatest desire of Jesus’ heart was to bring honor to the Father. In Jesus’ great final prayer (on behalf of you and me) in John 17:4, Jesus says to the Father, “I glorified you on earth having completed the work that you gave me to do.” Jesus love for the Father infused him with passion for the honor of the Father—his name, his reputation, his glory.
We are given the privilege of being consumed by the same great passion. In John 15, Jesus explains that he is the vine, his followers the branches, and the Father is the owner of the vineyard. The quality of the fruit of the vine is to the owner’s glory, honor, reputation. Jesus’ words were, By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. My prayer is that we too may be consumed with a passion to bring glory to the Father by the quality of the spiritual fruit in our lives.
But the story can’t end here, with just Jesus’ passion to bring honor to the Father. You cannot honor God without him honoring you. It is impossible. You can’t OUT -HONOR GOD. The words of Philippians 2 describe the result of Jesus emptying himself, honoring the Father by his obedience to Him. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father (vs 9-11).
The prayer of John 17 reveals the result of the Father and the Son loving each other; that love produces that passion to bring glory to the other. “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you…I glorified you on earth…And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed. When Jesus closes his prayer he returns to the theme of glory, “I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word… The glory that you have given me I have given to them, Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.”
The incredible truth is that our longing to bring glory to God through the quality of spiritual fruit produced in us results in God bringing glory to us. Do you think God would ever allow someone to glorify him and not turn around and honor him. To love another is to desire his honor. May passion for the Father’s honor by bearing spiritual fruit consume us. May the kingdom values of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness, and self-control prevail in our lives!
For Further Prayerful Thought:
- How do “emptying myself” and “humbling myself” to obey God demonstrate my love for him?
- Jesus was confident of the Father’s love for him. He and Paul wanted us to be confident of God’s love for us. Why might comprehending such love be foundational for our everyday walk with God?
- Why does it make sense that when you love someone, you want to see that person honored? When you are battling a bad attitude in a given situation, how can it strengthen you to know that Christ-like attitudes in us bring glory to God?
