I Love Jesus Yes I Do, I Love Jesus, How About You?

My Utmost For His Highest

 

Do you love Me? —John 21:17

 

“Peter’s response to this piercing question is considerably different from the bold defiance he exhibited only a few days before when he declared, “Even if I have to die with You, I will not deny You!” (Matthew 26:35; also see Matthew 26:33-34). Our natural individuality, or our natural self, boldly speaks out and declares its feelings. But the true love within our inner spiritual self can be discovered only by experiencing the hurt of this question of Jesus Christ. Peter loved Jesus in the way any natural man loves a good person. Yet that is nothing but emotional love. It may reach deeply into our natural self, but it never penetrates to the spirit of a person. True love never simply declares itself. Jesus said, “Whoever confesses Me before men [that is, confesses his love by everything he does, not merely by his words], him the Son of Man also will confess before the angels of God” (Luke 12:8).” CHAMBERS

 

In the ‘90s I was involved in a ministry called Promise Keepers.  Football stadiums and arenas would be filled with men, singing songs and listening to very strong preaching and teaching.  At almost every event, while waiting for a speaker men on one side of the stadium would begin to shout “We love Jesus, yes we do.  We love Jesus, How about you?” and then men on the other side of the stadium would respond in kind.  This would go on, back and forth, and then end with a shout by all of the men.  Weeks after the event, I would hear wives say that their husbands had been changed by the meeting, but only for a few weeks, and then the men drifted back to the place they had been before the conference.  Like Peter, saying ‘I love Jesus’ was an easy, emotional response to the moment.  But like Peter, as Jesus was asking, “Do you love Me?”  the men were mostly saying, “I love what Jesus can do.  I love the idea of walking with Jesus.”  But Jesus was asking more.  (John 15:13) “No greater love has one man than this, to lay down his life for his friends.”  Sacrificial love.  The kind of love the wives say in their husbands on their return, but faded like the glory on Moses face after a few weeks.  Loving Jesus means that you must offer your life … crucify the flesh (every day).  Your devotion must be to Jesus, not just what He can do for you.  When Jesus asked Peter “Do you love Me?”, He followed the question with a command.  “Show me.” Not just through physical acts .. although what you do in Jesus name is important .. but by a devoted heart, from which those actions will flow.  Do you love Jesus?  ELGIN

 

Charley Elgin