“Better love has nobody than this, than to put down one’s life for his buddies. You might be My buddies should you do no matter I command you. Now not do I name you servants, for a servant doesn’t know what his grasp is doing; however I’ve known as you buddies, for all issues that I heard from My Father I’ve made identified to you” (John 15:13–15).
THE MAGNITUDE OF GOD’S GRACE IS NOWHERE SEEN MORE CLEARLY THAN IN HIS DESIRE FOR US TO BE HIS FRIENDS. We, in fact, could reject the phrases of His friendship. And after we refuse to stay inside His function for us, we put ourselves in a spot the place our Buddy’s goodwill can do us no final good. “You might be My buddies,” Jesus mentioned, “should you do no matter I command you.” A alternative should be made between the world’s friendship and God’s (James 4:4), and the assertion in John 1:11 is a tragic one: “He got here to His personal, and His personal didn’t obtain Him.” But so long as life lasts, God continues to be inviting us to be His buddies. Nobody has ever rejected God with out breaking the center of a Father who needs to indicate us His love. We’re staggered by this love after we hear Jesus say, even to Judas who led the mob once they got here to arrest Him, “Buddy, why have you ever come?” (Matthew 26:50).
So God’s need to be buddies with us is a very wonderful truth. However we should always reply to this truth with greater than mere amazement. We should always search God in a means that exhibits our gratitude for His supply, and our in search of ought to be characterised by the identical faithfulness and obedience that God noticed in His outdated buddy Abraham. “Do you see that religion was working collectively together with his works, and by works religion was made good? And the Scripture was fulfilled which says, ‘Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.’ And he was known as the buddy of God” (James 2:22,23). All these a few years later, friendship with God should work the identical means in our personal lives. To be His buddies, by means of His Son Jesus Christ, isn’t any passive or slothful factor. It’s the energetic enjoyment of all of the ideas and phrases and deeds that move forwards and backwards between these whose love is robust sufficient to manipulate their character and their conduct. It’s in His light friendship that our Best Buddy is at all times asking, “I gave My life for thee, what hast thou giv’n for Me?” (Frances R. Havergal).
“All the most effective qualities of friendship start in Christ, advance by means of Christ, and are perfected in Christ” (Aelred of Rievaulx).
Gary Henry — WordPoints.com + AreYouaChristian.com
