Welcome to the Daily Decibel Podcast, where we seek daily to be with and to become like Jesus, our teacher. Good morning, everyone. This is Travis, and welcome to the Together on Mission Podcast, where to just begin every morning with Jesus. Get back to the basic, the heart of the gospel to learn to pray, to relearn to pray, to enjoy scripture, to journal a little bit, and just carve out time with Jesus every morning and start a conversation with Jesus in the morning that then lasts throughout the day.
And we have stayed on point, and we've done it in season and out of season. And to be completely honest, sometimes I have not felt like doing the podcast, and sometimes I have not felt like spending time with Jesus, but you and I have done it, and we've pressed in. And sometimes we have felt like doing it. And that's just the way that relationship works, and that's how character is formed, and that's how a love, a true love relationship is developed.
So, anyway, speaking of love, the question of this morning, the title of the podcast, this morning, the question of this morning is what is love? What is love? And that's the question of a great deal of music and literature and relationship. It's a question we don't necessarily talk about at parties because we're too busy talking about politics or sports or cars or whatever.
I think probably at parties we should talk a little bit more about what is love, because ironically, I'm rambling a little bit this morning, ironically, what is love will inform how we think about politics and relationship and everything else. And so what is love? And I'll pause, I'll just pause, which will be hard for me because I am a talker, especially in the morning. Not at night, I'm a morning person.
Maybe you can tell I've drank quite a bit of coffee this morning, I am rambling. What is love? I'll pause. And you and I will think about what love is, and we'll come up with an answer.
So what is love? Maybe we think we know. Maybe we've been told by someone, and we've believed what they have said love is, or they said they loved us and they acted thus, and so we thought, well, that must be what love means because they said, I love you and they acted thus, and so there it is, there's the definition embodied. Maybe we haven't thought much about what it is, but it's one of the most important words, concepts and ideas to think about.
And too often we throw this word around in all kinds of contexts. Like I could say, I love coffee, and I could say, I love Angie. So obviously there's a semantic, a wide semantic range to what we mean when we say love. So what is love?
It's the key to a life well lived. It's the key to a relationship. It's honestly the key to putting a relationship back together. If there was a fracture or a break, it's the key to being like God, because according to John, John doesn't say this in the Gospel of John, but he says this in a small letter called an epistle that he wrote later on, God is.
God is love. Boom, period. So what is love? I'll pause and we'll ask that question.
And it's just something I want us to think about in the presence of God this morning. Whatever definition we came up with, are we trying to do it? Are we giving it our very best shot? Are we starting fresh every day to love?
What is love? Well, so let's go to the end, which is verse 31. When he had gone, that is Judas had gone, Jesus said, now the Son of man is glorified and God is glorified in him. If God is glorified in him, God will glorify the Son in himself and will glorify him at once, my children.
I will be with you for only a little longer. You will look for me and just as I told the Jews, so I tell you now where I'm going, you cannot come. A new command. I give you love one another as I have loved you.
So you must love one another. By this, everyone will know that you are my disciples if you love one another. First of all, some of us are very familiar with that famous statement. Love is I have loved you and this is how you know that you are my disciples if you love one another.
And some of us are maybe a little bit let down right now because I asked the question 15 or 20 times a moment ago, what is love? Maybe you think, gosh, I thought you were going to read a verse that defines love. Like Jesus or Paul or someone says, love is this and gives us a good definition. Well, we never get that in Scripture.
That's not really how narrative and how life and how Scripture works. Jesus doesn't define it like that. He just says, love, love one another. And the word there is agape, which it's hard to get our mind around the philology of that word, but like self-giving love.
Give yourself away. But again, context is crucial. Even more than philology, context and historical context helps us along the way in the definition of words. But gosh, I thought you were going to read a verse where it gets defined.
We'll come back to that in just a second. Let me give an example of another way John's going to do this. Maybe you're familiar with Jesus and Pilate talking a little bit later in John's Gospel. And Jesus says something and Pilate says to Jesus, this Roman governor says to Jesus, what is truth?
What is truth? And Jesus doesn't answer. And we're like, oh my gosh, seriously, Jesus, we would love to know the answer to what is truth. I mean, that would have saved so much pen and paper.
I mean, for philosophers or pastors or anybody, what is truth that Jesus would have just given us an answer, but he doesn't or does he? Because a couple chapters earlier in John's Gospel, Jesus says, I am the way. I am the truth. I am the life.
And so Jesus doesn't have to answer Pilate because Pilate honestly doesn't even care. John has answered that question earlier. Jesus is truth. Similarly, here in John 13, verse 34, Jesus says, love one another.
What does Jesus mean? Well, although we know this verse, maybe we didn't know where it was located in John 13. And so Jesus has just done the shocking, unthinkable thing. And then he says, I want you to go, and I want you to do likewise.
And at the very, very end of this chapter after Jesus has watched his disciples feet, he says, love one another is I have loved you, so you must love one another. So what does love mean? It means humble service, honoring the other person. It means washing someone else's feet.
It means preferring them and then preferring them again and preferring them again and preferring them again in self-giving service. That's exactly what Jesus does in the story. That's what love is, pouring yourself out again and again and again and again. So the question is, what does it look like to love?
Maybe think of the five people that are closest to you in your life. Maybe it's your family, your best friend, your girlfriend, your parents, those you work with. Think specifically, what does it look like to do exactly what Jesus did to his disciples and exactly what he asks us or commands us to do as his disciples. Now, Jesus also says something incredible in verse 35.
This is how people will know that you are my disciple. If you're willing to love others, even enemies, because remember Jesus watches enemies feet, Judas. If you love in this way, that's a pretty big statement. And not to be too heavy on a Monday morning right before I land this plane.
We go off and spend a little time praying, but not to be too heavy on a morning. But if we're not seeking with everything that we have to love in this way, every day with all that we have, can we even call ourselves disciples of Jesus? I'm not saying if we're not doing it perfect, can we call ourselves disciples Jesus? No, no, I'm saying if we're not seeking with everything that we have to love in this way, every day with everything that we've got, can we call ourselves disciples of Jesus?
So right now, we've talked about what is love. In this morning in the presence of Jesus in scripture and in prayer, let's just say yes to doing exactly what Jesus has done, especially with those closest to us. And let's not just talk about it. If we kept reading the passage, we would read about Peter saying, I would die for you Jesus.
I would die for you Jesus. And then Jesus says, actually you're going to deny me three times. You talk a big game Peter. But right now, you're all talk.
So let's not be all talk. Let's not talk a big game. I can talk a big game. You can talk a big game.
We can all talk a big game. Let's shut up, kneel down, grab a towel, and a basin, and let's just love. Thanks for listening to the Daily Deciple podcast. We truly hope that you were encouraged by it today.
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