The following words of our Lord Jesus Christ are recorded in John, chapter 13 and verse 35: "By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another." It is a mystery to me, why so much of the teaching that we hear, regarding how we are to love, is based on the principal of the law, that we are to: "love our neighbor as ourself." In contrast to this, Jesus is telling the disciples, in the upper room discourse (of which John chapter 13 is a part of), that the world will know that we are His disciples, by how we love each other; that is, by how each christian loves those others who are also christian. Jesus, further sets this christian principal of love apart from the legal principal of love, when He introduces the evidence of discipleship (in verse 35), by saying in verse 34: "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another." To "love our neighbor as ourself" is one thing; to "love one another" as He has first loved us, is an entirely different matter. As we take on the task (during the days and weeks ahead of us), of going deeper into our understanding of this supernatural love principal, we will also find ourselves getting closer to our understanding of "victorious discipleship in Jesus Christ." Until next time, my beloved brethren, I continue to be:
Your servant and fellow pilgrim,
Elder Theophilus
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