EVEN AS I HAVE LOVED YOU
This is My Commandment, That Ye Love One Another, Even as I Have Loved
You--John 15:12
This is the second time our Lord uses the
expression--Even as I. The first time it was of His relation to the
Father, keeping His commandments, and abiding in His love. Even so we are to
keep Christ's commandments, and abide in His love. The second time He speaks of
His relation to us as the rule of our love to our brethren: "Love one another,
as I have loved you." In each case His disposition and conduct is to be the law
for ours. It is again the truth we have more than once insisted on--perfect
likeness between the Vine and the branch.
Even as I--But is it not a vain thing to
imagine that we can keep His commandments, and love the brethren, even as He
kept His Father's, and as He loved us? And must not the attempt end in failure
and discouragement? Undoubtedly, if we seek to carry out the injunction in our
strength, or without a full apprehension of the truth of the Vine and its
branches. But if we understand that the "even as I" is just the one great
lesson of the parable, the one continual language of the Vine to the branch, we
shall see that it is not the question of what we feel able to accomplish, but
of what Christ is able to work in us. These high and holy commands--"Obey, even
as I! Love, even as I"--are just meant to bring us to the consciousness of our
impotence, and through that to waken us to the need and the beauty and the
sufficiency of what is provided for us in the Vine. We shall begin to hear the
Vine speaking every moment to the branch: "Even as I. Even as I: My life is
your life; and have a share in all My fullness; the Spirit in you, and the
fruit that comes from you, is all just the same as in Me. Be not afraid, but
let your faith grasp each "Even as I" as the divine assurance that because I
live in you, you may and can live like Me."
But why, if this really be the meaning of the
parable, if this really be the life a branch may live,who do so few realize it?
Because they do not know the heavenly mystery of the Vine. They know much of
the parable and its beautiful lessons. But the hidden spiritual mystery of the
Vine in His divine omnipotence and nearness, bearing and supplying them all the
day--this they do not know, because they have not waited on God's Spirit to
reveal it to them.
Love one another, even as I have loved
you--"Ye, even as I." How are we to begin if we are really to learn the
mystery? With the confession that we need to be brought to an entirely new mode
of life, because we have never yet known Christ as the Vine in the completeness
of His quickening and transforming power. With the surrender to be cleansed
from all that is of self, and detached from all that is in the world, to live
only and wholly as Christ lived for the glory of the Father. And then with the
faith that this "even as I" is in very deed what Christ is ready to make true,
the very life the Vine will maintain in the branch wholly dependent upon
Him.
Even as I. Ever again it is, my blessed
Lord, as the Vine, so the branch--one life, one spirit, one obedience, one joy,
one love.
Lord Jesus, in the faith that Thou art my
Vine, and that I am Thy branch, I accept Thy command as a promise, and take
Thy "even as I" as the simple revelation of what Thou dost work in me. Yea,
Lord, as Thou hast loved, I will love.