John 14:21 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters

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John 14:21

Comments

This brings us to Christ’s promise. It is a promise, it is also a condition. So we study it carefully. ‘He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them.’ Yes, included in this, if you wish, are all the moral commandments of God. We are believers now, and we keep them. The Greek term translated ‘keep’ literally means guard. We guard them. We hold them closely to ourselves. We protect them. We keep them in every sense. It means, yes, the moral commandment, but even more it means his commandments to the apostles.The promise of Christ. ‘He it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him.’ I am absent, I am in glory. But I will mediate this love by the blessing of the Holy Spirit. ‘I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.’ Every time he reads my word, every time he prays, every time she speaks for me to a neighbour, to a child, to a friend. Every time you praise him and worship him, if you are an obeyer of Christ’s commandments to make him known, he will manifest himself to us. Those are the great words that are given in verse 21.

Application

‘He that hath my commandments.’ If we have been saved, we now have, we possess, the great commission, the commands of Christ to his people, to make known the Gospel, to represent him, to work together for the kingdom of God, to keep the ordinances of the Lord. You have come to Christ you have a great possession. It is a commission given to you, to be his and to live for him and represent him and obey him. He that hath my commandments and keeps them and guards them and carries them out, ‘he it is that loveth me.’ No other kind of love is valid, only commandment-keeping love.

Questions

And here is the promise and the condition – ‘And he that loveth me,’ by keeping my commandments, ‘shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.’ We are confused. It seems to be the wrong way round. There is an order here that bothers us, or should do, and yet it is here. He who loves me shall as a reward, shall in return, be loved of my Father. But that cannot be. We love him because he first loved us. We love him because he worked in our unworthy hearts, and broke down our pride, and showed us Christ and brought us to him. We are saved by grace, it is all by grace. He worked first in such a way that we responded. And yet it seems to be turned round. ‘He that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.’ Which is it? It is God who works first and I respond? Or is it me who loves him and he responds? But we do not really have a problem because both are true. We only love him because he first loved us. But having been brought to love him, here is the gracious promise of God. If you love me and keep my commandments, I will even more reward you, and by the Holy Spirit, Christ will be manifested to you. And you will have such awareness of his goodness and power and nearness to you, and you will have so many experiences of his lovingkindness, and you will have such a view of him. What is this? I owe everything to him, but if only in my stumbling way I do my utmost to obey him and represent him, he will bless me even more. Both are true.

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Introduction

John 14:21 Commentary and Bible Study