Day 4 w/ John 13

So today as I read through John chapter 13, I was struck by v. 1 "having loved his own who were in the world."  To me there are a couple of things that this verse implies.  Jesus actively loves those on earth and in heaven.  It also implies that Jesus love for this community of believers was an active thing that Jesus was and had been doing over time.  This has huge implications for us as as we strive to live in community.  We too often make the mistake of living too little; by this I mean that we fail to extend our love, in real and tangible ways to people outside of our nuclear family.  Maybe I am more acutely aware of this because my love language is one of gifts.  I want to love other people with what makes me feel loved.  So I give gifts.  As I bless others with this love of gift giving, my circle of community love grows.  

I was made aware of this one time in worship as I stood at the back door of my church greeting people.  I am a hugger.  I hug people.  And after hugging one particular elderly woman, she stopped me, took my hand and said, "Thank you, you will never know how much it means to me to be hugged.  I live alone, no one ever touches me, the hug you give me each week, is a reminder that I am loved."  People will know that we are His disciples by the way we love each other.  But how often do we demonstrate that love in tangible ways.?  Jesus chose to love on his disciples, and yet one more act of love was washing the feet of the disciples.  They needed this demonstration of love in action.

Along that line of thinking, then v. 22 jumped out at me, it says... "[the disciples] were at a loss to know which of them Jesus meant."  What has happened here is that Jesus has told them that one of their own was going to betray the community and Jesus.  and the "community" of the disciples were clueless as to what he was talking about.  Had they really been loving on each other, caring for one another, focused on the community rather than themselves, they probably would not have been at such a loss.  They would have known that Judas was not on the same page as they were.  But their community was not demonstrating love to one another, so they were clueless and Jesus did have to give them a command to love each other in v.34.  Let's live out Jesus command to love each other and let's make our circle of community a growing circle!