Live to Love Scripture Encouragement

John 16:5-6 "But now I am going to Him who sent Me; and none of you asks Me, 'Where are You going?' But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. Had the disciples been tuned in to what was happening with Jesus, they would have asked Him where He was going? Instead, apparently all they could think of was the loss and disappointment they were going to experience. This i...

John 16:5 "But now I am going to Him who sent Me; and none of you asks Me, 'Where are You going?' Most of the time when we talk of Jesus’ return, we are thinking of His return to earth. In this verse we know Jesus was referring to His return to His Father in heaven. He was sent by the Father to be the way, the truth, and the life and to be the only way for fallen, sinful human beings to be reconci...

John 16:4 “But these things I have spoken to you, so that when their hour comes, you may remember that I told you of them. These things I did not say to you at the beginning, because I was with you.” We are witnessing an age of apostasy and hostility toward the gospel. Many fall away because they were told that if they accept Jesus they will have a good and happy life. Then when persecution or tri...

John 16:3 “These things they will do because they have not known the Father or Me.” Why can we expect to be rejected, cast out, and possibly killed by others who think they are serving God? We can expect it because they do not know the Father or Jesus, His Son. Again, John applied this truth in his first epistle. “See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children...

John 16:2 “They will make you outcasts from the synagogue, but an hour is coming for everyone who kills you to think that he is offering service to God.” What will make the disciples outcasts from the synagogue? Jesus’ words and their love for Him and others made them outcasts in the synagogue. The disciples went into the synagogues preaching Christ crucified and risen and giving His commandment,...

John 16:1 "These things I have spoken to you so that you may be kept from stumbling.” One of the ways we know what Jesus meant is by looking to see how the disciples took what He said. We are able to do that in this case because the author of John commented on it in his first epistle. In 1John 2:10 he wrote, “The one who loves his brother abides in the Light and there is no cause for stumbling in...

John 15:27 “And you will testify also, because you have been with Me from the beginning.” God has provided two witnesses to the living, risen Jesus, the Son of God. The Holy Spirit bears witness by producing the life of Jesus in His disciples. Jesus’ first disciples, provide a second witness to the life of Christ as they testify that the Holy Spirit is the same spirit as was present in Jesus when...

John 15:26 "When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me,” This verse helps us discern the spirit of truth from the spirit of error. It helped John. He wrote in 1 John 4:2, “By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God; and eve...

John 15:25 “But they have done this to fulfill the word that is written in their Law, 'They hated Me without a cause.’” I’m not sure where in the Law Jesus was referring, but in Psalms 69:4 we find these words. “Those who hate me without a cause are more than the hairs of my head; those who would destroy me are powerful, being wrongfully my enemies.” To say that they “hated without a cause” is to...

John 15:24 “If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would not have sin; but now they have both seen and hated Me and My Father as well.” It’s miraculous and supernatural for anyone to live to love with Jesus. It takes a work of grace and glory to transform a hater of God into a lover of God. Look what sin has done to mankind. We live to hate God. We don’t know we hate Go...

John 15:23 “He who hates Me hates My Father also.” Hate is a strong word, isn’t it? In Deut. 5:9, God speaks to us. “You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, and on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me.” Hatred for God is judged and revealed when we put anyone or anything in His...

God has spoken. Man has no excuse for sin. John 15:22 “If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin.” Notice the importance of Jesus’ words. They judge sinners. Jesus said this earlier in the day that He said these words recorded in John 15:22. John 12:48 “He who rejects Me and does not receive My sayings, has one who judges him; the word...

John 15:21 “But all these things they will do to you for My name's sake, because they do not know the One who sent Me.” What are “these things” that Jesus referred to? Persecution and rejection of what you say. The reason we will be rejected, ignored, and dishonored will be for Jesus’ name sake. If we live by and keep His words, then we identify with Jesus, His name. Those who know God, know that...

John 15:20 “Remember the word that I said to you, 'A slave is not greater than his master.' If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they kept My word, they will keep yours also.” Earlier in the evening, after Jesus washed His disciples’ feet, He had said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, a slave is not greater than his master, nor is one who is sent greater than the one who sent him.”...

John 15:19b “But because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you.” Jesus reminded them that they did not choose Him but He chose them out of the world. He chose them because their source isn’t the world, rather they are “of” God. The world hates those who go “out from them” to Jesus. It exposes them for who and whose they are. But let’s pause...

John 15:19a “If you were of the world, the world would love its own;” The word Jesus used for “love” in this verse has the same root as the word for “friends”. Philos, friends. Phileo, love. So we can understand that Jesus was saying that if the disciples were of the world, the world would be friendly toward them. Friendship with the world reveals that the world is your source. Friendship with Jes...

Worship in Spirit and Truth Welcome, new subscribers to my monthly Live to Love blog. I’m honored that you would join us here at The Spirit of Elijah Ministries International in turning our hearts to God. John 4:23-24 “But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. God is spirit, and th...

John 15:18. "If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you.” John 15:18-25 comprise Jesus’ commentary on the unbelieving world. The previous verse revealed the most identifiable characteristic among the believing community—love. They love one another because they love Jesus and He lives in them. In contrast, verse 18, reveals the most identifiable characteristic of the...

John 15:17 This I command you, that you love one another. This is now the third time Jesus commanded His disciples to love each other since they had finished the evening meal. The Father really wanted His disciples to get the point of their existence and relationship with His Son. I don’t want us to miss the point. We were saved to live for one purpose: to glorify the Father through loving others...

John 15:16 “You did not choose Me but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit, and that your fruit would remain, so that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give to you.” These words were shared for the purpose of giving His disciples confidence and honor. They were His friends because He wanted to befriend them. Let us remember, Jesus’ enemies intended to sham...

Let’s live in John 15:15 for another day. Jesus said to His disciples, “No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you.” The transformation from slave to friend occurred as He loved them as the Father had loved Him. The Father had given His Son the word tha...

John 15:15 “No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you.” Earlier in the evening before their last meal together, Jesus had called His disciples slaves. ““If I then, the Lord and the Teacher, washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. F...

In this month's Live to Love blog, we look at God's Vineyard. You'll learn about the vinedresser (God), the vine (Jesus), the branches (people), the fruit (love of God), and the burn pile (hell). God loves the fruit of His love, so He made the world (the vineyard) for the purpose of enjoying the fruit and glorifying Himself in His Son, Jesus Christ.

John 15:14 You are My friends if you do what I command you. Yesterday we considered Jesus’ incredible words recorded in John 15:13. “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.” Verse 14 reveals who it is that Jesus lays down His life for. He does not lay down His life for everyone. He lays down His life for His friends. And who are His friends? His friends are o...

John 15:13 Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends. After commanding His disciples to love each other as He had loved them, He explained how He had loved them. His entire life from His first breath in this world, was to surrender His life, to lay down His life, to love those His Father commanded Him to love. What did He lay down? He laid down His life with the...