What Christ is saying here is to make sure His disciples got the message right. He wanted to make sure they didn't get the CORE of this statement and that of His teachings wrong, in order to avoid them doing things in reverse.
Paraphrasing:
"If ye love Me (Christ), you must keep/DO My commandments."
If you are pretty sure you LOVE Christ, then you are expected to KEEP (or DO) His commandments/Will. And Christ knows very well that you can't DO His commandments by yourself without His help. When you love Christ, you will always seek His help to do His commandments, which are beyond what the flesh with sin nature can do. It's practically IMPOSSIBLE to keep the commandments of Christ without His Help. And to want to do His eternal commandments, you will be needing His Help abiding with you FOREVER.
The Comforter.
"And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;"
Now that you have an idea of what it will take to love Christ, then you must know all you can about This Helper/Comforter sent to abide with you. You must seek to know and regularly commune with The Helper to be intimately in love with Christ. Do you know that as it is in heaven, so it is on earth (Mat 6:10)? If you are married, your wife should be a comforter, that should satisfy the needs of your flesh, like the Holy Spirit is in the spirit to Christ and now to you. [Note: Many marriages do not have comforters, but accusers as wives. And the accuser's primary goal is to dishonour and tear down the man.]
What Are His Commandments?!
"A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." (Joh 13:34-35)
This is a powerful EVANGELISTIC statement greatly lacking today in many Churches. The growth and effect of many churches in their communities have being seriously hampered by not taking heed to this new commandment/law of love. "...ye also love one another. By this shall all men know..." and many, many, many souls will be easily won over into the kingdom of Christ if we simply obey. But are we doing it this way?
Loving ourselves is so difficult today because we are seeking to love with the wrong motives - for showoffs and to gain recognition, and the few that are doing it right are under serious divers kind of persecutions, slanderings, and isolation... Nobody want to stay where the Word of God is without the Love of God... that for sure is a very dangerous ground! In comparison, it is like this saying goes: the mouth that bites the hand that feed's it, will surely go on compulsory fasting or hunger strike.
In conclusion, let us learn to work this knowledge as one Body in wisdom and understanding, so the kingdom of God will spread and be positioned to rescue the lost sheeps from this dying (loveless) world. So therefore, let us always seek to fan the flame of love and not kill it. Seek to love, it's the new commandment!
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