A New Commandment

“I give you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, so you also must love each other.  This is how everyone will know that you are my disciples, when you love each other.”

-John 13:34-5

Being a good Christian means that we obey God’s commands or God’s laws, right?  Living a holy life means that I don’t do things that non-Christians do, right?  Being a Christian means that I now have the power to be good, right?

The answer to these questions is that Jesus did not come to start a new religion.  Anthropology seeks to categorize Christianity among the world’s religions.  But Jesus never came to set up a new religion.

Websters dictionary describes “religion” as, “an organized system of beliefs, ceremonies, and rules used to worship a god or a group of gods.”

Jesus got rid of the priesthood (every Christian is now a priest), the temple (every Christian is now the temple of God), and the sacrifices (Jesus was the once-and-for-all sacrifice).

Judaism was a religion, that included the Mosaic Law.  It served it’s purpose until Jesus came and fulfilled it (1). 

Christians are people “in-Christ”.  When you are in Christ, you are in the one who fulfilled the law and has obeyed the law.

Unlike the word’s religions, Christians are people who are all about a person.  They are not only followers of him, but have given their lives to him, so that he can now live through all his followers.  Christians have God with them 24/7, and so do not need to do something at a religious edifice to get God’s attention.

All Christians are lights, lit up by The Light, and attracting others to that light, in their daily lives.  So, people who do not yet know Christ meet him through his people whom he is indwelling,  and not at a some special place.

And the marker of the people who Christ is in, is their love for each other, in deed, in servant-hood, in being as a slaves to one another, as first modeled by The Master.

Christians are not anti-law or somehow above it, but now under Christ’s law (1 Cor. 9:21).  Christians fulfill the law of Christ (Gal. 6:2) by obeying his command.

Jesus is the example for us to follow in loving each other (John 13:15) as servants, serving one another out of his love (John 13:17) and walking in the blessing of God.

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The artwork above is Love One Another by Ivan Guaderrama, found here.
1. (Romans 10:4; Galatians 3:23–25; Ephesians 2:15)