Let's go ahead and get started.
If you would, be turning to John 15, and I want you to hold your
place there when you get there. Because I'm not gonna actually
start there, but that will be my text. But John 15, and I'll
give everyone a minute to get there first. Okay, everybody in John 15 now?
So if you would turn over with me real quick to Proverbs 18
and verse 24. Proverbs 18 verse 24. A man that hath friends must
show himself friendly. And there is a friend that sticketh
closer than a brother. Now let's stay here just a minute
because I want to talk about this verse. A man that hath friends,
that is a fellow or a companion, just as we might say today a
man that has a best friend, it then says must show himself friendly. It struck me when I looked at
this word. I'm thinking friendly, you're
going around talking to people and that's what I'm thinking
when I looked at this word, but I was taken back a little bit.
The one Hebrew word translated into four English words here
as must show himself friendly means good for nothing, evil,
or to break or shatter. This is telling us that the one
who has friends is the one that shows himself vulnerable, no
good, broken, and in need of help. Isn't that what friends
do? They help one another because
they know one another's faults. They open up to one another. You might hear some say of an
individual, they just won't let anybody in, they won't open up.
And this is the idea here, that a friend is someone who you can
share deep, intimate things with. We do have friends and we are
friends with some. When you become friends with
someone, you know how to help them. And they know how to help
you. Or you might could say comfort
you. But we as fallen sinful men and women do this hit and
miss. Sometimes we are there for someone
and at other times we are not. But then there is something else
that is said here and this all goes together, this all goes
together. And there is a friend that sticketh
closer than a brother. Let me say right off, this is
not one of us. I dare say that even most families
that have actual brothers and sisters do not even stick closer
than a brother. And I say that only from my experience
of myself. We are fallen, sinful men and
women and we cannot do this. As Earl used to say, you lean
on me, you're leaning on a broken stick. That just always sticks
in my mind. But there is one, and this is
not a question, it's a statement of scripture, there is only one
who sticketh closer than a brother. That one is who we'll read of
in John 15. We may not come to others showing
ourselves to be broken and of no value, but there is one friend
who will make it so that you will come to him broken. This
friend sticketh closer than a brother. He tells us in Matthew 11, 28,
come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will
give you rest. Those who labor, and that is
they are fatigued from their laboring. They feel themselves
broken by their laboring. He says, come unto me. Heavy
laden, overburdened with ceremony is what the word means. They
know themselves about to be squeezed to death by this heavy burden
of doing, doing, doing. He says, come unto me. This is that one that sticketh
closer than a brother. Now turn with me back over to
John 15, John 15. And for now, we're just gonna
read verses 12 through 14. This is my commandment, that
you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love hath
no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever
I command you. We have three things here that
stick out to me in these verses. Commandment, love, and friends. I do not want to take these words
out of context. There's a lot more that Christ
has said than these words themselves. And they do matter in this case
especially. And let me give you some of those
before we look at some of these things. And I may take some time
this morning because I want to go through this. He tells them he is going to
go away. But when he does, he's going
to prepare a place for us. Why? So that where he is, we
may be also. Verses three in chapter 14. And if I go and prepare a place
for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself, that
where I am, there ye may be also. Jesus Christ says he is the way,
he is the mode or the means to this journey we are all in and
will go. He is the truth. There are no
lies with Jesus Christ because he is truth personified. He is
the life. Anything outside of Him is death. He is life itself. As has been
said before, He is not the people's way of life. He is their life. To come to God means you will
come by and through Jesus Christ or you will not come at all.
Come at all, verses six of chapter 14. Jesus said unto him, I am
the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father
but by me. Amen. Jesus Christ is God. You will
see God only in the face of Jesus Christ, chapter 14, verses 9
and 10. Jesus saith unto him, have I been so long time with
you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? He that hath seen
me hath seen the Father, and how sayest thou then, show us
the Father? Believest thou not that I am
in the Father, and the Father in me? The words that I speak
unto you I speak not of myself, but the Father that dwelleth
in me. doeth the works. He that believeth
in me, those who have been given faith so that they believe him,
they will do the works of Christ. They will do his commandments.
In other words, chapter 14 verse 12, Verily, verily, I say unto
you, he that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he
do also, and greater works than these shall he do, because I
go unto my Father. If you ask anything in my name,
and it does not say that if you ask and use my name, Or that
is say my name. It says if you ask in my name,
he will give it to you. Verses 13 and 14 of chapter 14. And whatsoever ye shall ask in
my name, that will I do, that the father may be glorified in
the son. If ye shall ask anything in my
name, I will do it. If you love Him, keep His commandments,
and He will ensure that you will, because He will send the Comforter
to you that He might dwell in you and guide you into His commandments. Chapter 14, verses 15 through
17. If ye love me, keep my commandments, and I will pray the Father, and
he shall give you another comforter, that he may abide with you forever. Even the Spirit of truth, whom
this world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth
him, but ye know him, for he dwelleth with you, and shall
be in you. Jesus Christ will give us peace
so that we will not be troubled or fear, verses 27 and 14. Peace I leave with you, my peace
I give unto you, not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let
not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. He has told
us these things, those things which He is about to do in being
made a curse and sin for His people. He tells us these things
that we might believe when we are revealed them, chapter 14,
verse 29. And now I have told you before
it come to pass that when it is come to pass, ye might believe. He is the true vine, and those
branches that abide in Him, that is, bear fruit, they bear fruit.
If they do not then, then they are not one of His, and He will
take away and cast out. Chapter five, verses one through
four, and I won't read that. You can read that some other
time. We are in Him, and we get all our sustenance from Him,
and without Him, we can do nothing. verse 5, I do want to read that,
verse 5. I am the vine, ye are the branches. He that abideth in me and I in
him, the same bringeth forth much fruit. For without me ye
can do nothing. All he does is because he loves
us just as the Father loves him. And he has done and is doing
all these things that we might have joy and that our joy might
be full. That means to cram or level up. You know, like when you're leveling
up flour or something like that, it's all the way to the top.
All that's needed. That's verses six through 11.
You can read that on your own sometime. All of these and more
than what I have read leads up to these verses that I'm about
to go through so that we might see what he is saying to us.
So now we are here where we read of a commandment, love and a
friend, and that is my title, my friend. Jesus Christ speaks
of the union of the Father and the Holy Spirit who keeps such
a one as Christ speaks of until he returns. So let's look at
these three things in this message to his people that Christ is
speaking to us directly. Commandment, love, and friends. Commandment. So first, let's
look at the commandment Christ is speaking of in our text. This
is my commandment, that ye love one another as I have loved you. I want to be clear here, the
way it is manifest that someone does love Christ or does not
love Christ is that they, one, hath his commandments. Chapter
14, verse 21. He that hath my commandments
and keepeth them. That is to hold, and it's kind
of like this. That's what it's like. And second,
to keep his commandments. That is, they guard his commandments. They're eager to hear. This is
not a Sinai commandment. These are the commandments of
Christ. And if you don't think there's a difference, then I
can't help you. In having them, and this they
do by the Holy Spirit coming in to dwell in them, it's in
the context and his gospel, which they are quick to hear, they
guard his word and keep it right close so that they can always
hear of him. This commandment is that ye love
one another. And let me stick with this part
of it first, but it cannot be totally separated from the rest.
But let's look at the first part of this statement. Remember,
this is a commandment. That is what Christ tells us
to do, love one another. First of all, he's not talking
about loving everyone in the world. No. I will be honest with
you. I have a hard enough time loving
my brethren, much less loving everyone else. And that's not
because of my brethren. That's because of me. And I'm
just being honest. There's a lot of times when this
flesh says to me, self, self, self, or me, me, me. What do I want? What do I want is my thoughts
most of the time. What do I want? My love is tainted
with this flesh. I'm not saying that we should
not nor that we cannot love our brethren. We can and we do. But
we fall. I preached a message on God is
love, if you remember. How do I love my brother? We are told that it is manifested. 1 John 4, verses 13 and 14, we
read, hereby know we that we dwell in him and he in us, because
he hath given us of his spirit. And we have seen and do testify
that the father sent the son to be the savior of the world.
We love the brethren by speaking of Jesus Christ and him crucified. I don't want anyone to get me
wrong. There are other things that we do for our brethren who
we love. First of all, if we see someone
in need or know that someone is in need and we say to them,
be ye warmed and filled and just let them go on their way, that's
not love. Now, I know some people will
hear that and think of themselves, well, they did not do what I
wanted them to do, so they must not love me. It does not say
that they do what you want them to do. It says you do for them
that which is needed, and that can take many different forms.
But we are told to love one another, and it's a commandment of God,
but it is manifested by testifying, you testify of him, Jesus Christ,
to your brethren. First John 4, 6 we read, we are
of God. He that knoweth God, heareth
us. He that is not of God, heareth
not us. Hereby, by what was just said,
know we the spirit of truth and the spirit of error. If someone
will not hear the record God gave of his son, then they are
not born of God. But let us not forget, we are
sinners. We have this flesh and we do
not always see things the way they really are. We are at times
worried about me, me, me. The scripture tells us that the
Lord knoweth them that are his. So let's not judge a man or a
woman's soul based on our feelings about them. It may be true that
a person for a time does not want to hear the record God gave
of his son. That does not mean that God will
never give them life and cause them to turn to him. Remember,
we are digged from a pit. And I'm sure when someone saw
me or when someone who knows me, they could certainly say
this, he's a Christian? There's no way. But if you have,
that is, you possess his word in you and you keep it close,
that is a manifestation that he lives in you and you in him. This being so, you will love
the brethren by telling them the truth. I know there are some
who get offended because certain men say things this way or that
way. Even if they're saying the very
same thing someone else says, they just say it with a different
emphasis or a different mannerism. If this is the case and some
do not want to hear them, if you do not want to hear the truth
of God no matter who is speaking it, then maybe what you're wanting
is not really the truth of God. Maybe you're holding men in admiration. It is about the gospel. Loving
the brethren is about loving the gospel and loving all those
who love that very same gospel. But let me also be very clear.
How you love the brethren does not come from yourself. How you
love Christ does not come from yourself. The scripture says
we love him because he first loved us. But we are told by
Christ that there is a standard. There is an example for us to
go by when it comes to keeping his commandment. That is, to
love the brethren. That is what we see next. Love. Verse 13 of John 15. Greater
love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his
friends. Now keep in mind, he has just
got through telling them what he would do. He tells them that
he is doing all of this for them. Him even telling them of these
things, he says, is for a purpose, John 14, 29. And now I have told
you before it come to pass that when it has come to pass, you
might believe. When he is crucified and put
in the grave, then ascends to the father's right hand and the
comforter comes, they will know what it was that he was doing.
Certainly brethren can love one another and circumstances come
up that might cause them to have to give their life to someone
and someone would actually give their life. That may happen.
But this is talking about what he would do. Remember verse 12
says, as I have loved you. Certainly Jesus Christ dying
on that tree, excuse me, certainly shows his love for us. But let's
go back to first John four for a minute. What does it tell us
in verse nine? In this was manifested the love of God toward us, toward
us. because that God sent his only
begotten son into the world that we might live through him. It is manifested by God sending
his only begotten son. This certainly includes him dying
on that tree. But his love is much more than
that. It is actually all that is involved
in him being sent. He condescended. God came down
and was born of a virgin. Christ made himself of no reputation. He sacrificed for us. And I'm not talking about that
sacrifice, but he also sacrificed for us. And that was before he
sacrificed his self for us. Love means sacrifice. It means
we will give up some things to ensure that we will be with God's
people and can hear his glorious gospel. Christ tells us to love
the brethren that way because that is the way he loved us. He was the sacrifice for us on
that tree. He actually gave himself a ransom
for his people, his chosen people, the elect of God, Joe. If you
hate election, then you hate the God who elected. Because
it is he who chose to love a people, he manifest this love fully and
completely by being made a curse and sin for us. He did give his
life for his friends. How you will know those whom
are his friends will be because they have and keep his commandments. This is they love one another
and they love Christ and they believe Jesus Christ the Lord. So next we have friends. Ye are
my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you. And I want to
first say that this if is not a qualification for Christ to
be your friend. He is not rewarding an individual
based on what they do. This is a manifestation that
you are a friend of Christ. If you love the brethren so that
you tell them the truth in all things and you love the brethren
in that you want to hear the truth, I mean you are eager to
hear his word when the opportunity arises. You want to share his
words with others who are eager to hear. This says that it is
manifest that you are a friend of Jesus Christ. But as we have
read in some of the previous text, He supplies all our needs. He gives us everything that we
need so that we might keep His commandments. It is He who is
our friend. We love Him because He first
loved us. We are His friends because He
is our friend. The scripture says He is the
friend of publicans and sinners. This is Christ speaking here
in Luke 7, 33. For John the Baptist came neither
eating bread nor drinking wine, and ye say, he hath a devil.
He was a teetotaler, and they said, he hath a devil. Then Christ
says this. The Son of Man has come eating
and drinking, and ye say, behold, a gluttonous man and a winebibber,
a friend of publicans and sinners. He was no gluttonous man or a
winebibber. He did eat and he did drink wine,
but he was absolutely righteous and perfect in all that he did. And he, not was, is the friend
of publicans and sinners. He is the friend of publicans
and sinners is what it says. He says he will never leave us
nor forsake us. and he manifest his love for
us in his works. He died on that tree in the publicans
and sinners' state. We read in John 15, five, it
says, I am the vine, ye are the branches. He that abideth in
me and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit, for without
me ye can do nothing. So that means you cannot love
the brethren. So when it comes to God, we can
do nothing without him. We obviously have faults, failures,
weaknesses, inabilities. We are truly broken. But as we
have read, there is something else that it says there in Proverbs,
and there is a friend who sticketh closer than a brother. And this
is not any of us, as I've said. There's only one who can take
this place. That is Jesus Christ in you,
the hope of glory, Joe. Amen. Jesus Christ, because he
dwells in us once he comes to us in that time of love, and
he indwells his people, he sticks closer than a brother. How much
closer can you get than that? He guides us. He gives us strength. He gives us knowledge. He gives
us everything. if it is anything worth having. If it's not worth having, then
we can claim it. In fact, we own it. We come to Him with the claim
of we are nothing, yea, we're even less than nothing. Those
who bow to Christ are those whom He loves, and He is their friend. Jesus Christ is a friend of public
and sinners. So if you cannot take your place
there, he is not your friend. There
is not one of us who sticks closer than a brother, but he does. We cannot trust in ourselves
that we will do this or we will do that. We must trust him because
without him, we can do nothing. And with him, we can do the works
he does. We can do everything. What does
our text say again in verses 13 and 14? Greater love hath no man than
this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Ye are
my friends, if ye do whatsoever, I command you. He did give his
life for his friends. Those to whom he did this for
will be those who do his commands. They will keep his commands close
to them and look out for them. The manifestation of those whom
are his friends, not the qualification to be one. Jesus Christ has already
told us that without him we can do nothing. So this is not about
Christ giving us a qualification. He knows we cannot do it without
him. He wants us to know that you
will know them because, you will know them, you will know his
people because they will do my commands. If they do not do them,
this is not saying if someone will do them perfectly, they
hold his commandments close, as I said. But I thank God that
there are some who can and are the friends of Christ. And I
thank God that he is a friend, even though I am not. He is a
friend that sticketh closer than a brother. I need that. I want that. I am broken. Now I want to read an article
by Carol Poole in closing, and then we'll sing a hymn. Some
of you have this book, and I will be glad to let, once I'm done
reading it, let anyone borrow this. It's got a lot of little
articles from Carol. But this first one just touched
me, the first one in the book, and it really touched me. The
title is I Had a Friend. If you ask me today, How have
you continued these years? How have you made it this far?
My answer is just this, I had a friend. I never made it on
my own. Have you not made many mistakes
that should have destroyed you? Yes, but I have a friend. Have not many dear ones you love
turned away and in so doing broken your heart with a hurt too much
for you to survive? Yes, more than once, but I had
a friend. Have not self-righteous religionists
rejected you enough to stop you? How have you survived all the
criticism, ridicule, and accusations of men? Just one answer, I had
a friend. To have so many year after year
turn up their noses in disgust at the message of God's sovereign
grace, has this not discouraged you enough to quit? many times,
but I had a friend. Is this ingratitude, lack of
interest, and unfaithfulness of many not a depressing thing? Yes, but this is all about my
friend. When many as close as brothers
have forsaken, my friend sticketh closer than a brother. and has
promised never to leave me nor forsake me. They forbid me to
continue with them, but I continue with him. Why am I not this day right now
separated from God forever and tormented in the pits of the
damned? Only one answer, I have a friend. When the chief shepherd
returns to set the sheep on his right hand and the goats on his
left, if you stand among his redeemed sheep, there'll be but
one reason, you had a friend. One that day, fleshly religion
will have melted away. In his presence, all your professions,
pretense, and performance will mean nothing. If you stand with
the redeemed, your testimony will be the same as mine. I had
a friend. You'll not say then, I did better
than him. I did better than her. I tried
to be faithful. I did my best. Spare yourself
those words now. They will be worthless then.
The only testimony of every redeemed child of God is this, and this
for all eternity. I had a friend. Turn with me to 237, I think
it is. Yeah, 237. What a friend we have in Jesus,
all our sins and griefs to bear! What a privilege to carry everything
to God in prayer! Oh, what peace we often forfeit! Oh, what needless pain we bear! All because we do not carry everything
to God in prayer. Have we trials and temptations? Is there trouble anywhere? We should never be discouraged
Take it to the Lord in prayer Can we find a Prince of Faithful? Who will all our sorrows share? Jesus knows our every weakness. Take it to the Lord in prayer. All we weak and heavy laden,
Comforted with the Lord of care, Precious Savior, still our refuge,
Take it to the Lord in prayer. Do thy friends despise forsake
thee? Take heed to the Lord in prayer. In His arms He'll take and shield
thee. Thou wilt find a soulless fare.