Do You Love Me???

    “So when they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, ‘Simon, son of John, do you love Me more than these?’  Peter answered, ‘Yes Lord, you know that I love you’  Jesus replied, ‘Tend my lambs’ (John 21:15).  For the longest time, I honestly believed that  Peter was a hypocrite and a liar.  It was not until the Lord posed the same question to me that I came to realize that it took a “conscious decision” on my part to respond “yes” as Peter did.

    We tend to think that our personal trials and temptations are allowed into our life as a “testing of our faith” (Luke 5).  Indeed they are, but we are in a spiritual season of an evaluation that goes a bit deeper than our faith to a testing of our love for Him.  Do we really love Him?  In verse 17 of John 21, Peter said, “Lord you know all things.”  He actually believed that he did love Jesus.  He could not have been lying.  Think about it for a moment.  Peter was obviously sincere in his own mind, but deceived.  He did have a measure of love for Him.  Perhaps it was a brotherly love, but not enough to lay down his life for Him - Agape Love.  When Jesus asked, “Do you love Me more than these” He was asking Peter if  he loved Him more than the other disciples loved Him, because they were willing to die for Him (John 21).

    Jesus is asking us today, how far will we follow Him?  Will we follow Him at all?  Just because we know Him as Lord and Savior, does not necessarily mean that we love Him.  We can deceive ourselves just as Peter did.  When we are tested, we can say, “of course I do, Lord.”  We would all like to believe that we love God.  Would we die for Christ?  I mean, would we literally surrender our lives for Him?  If we cannot pass the test of dying to “my” rights, “my” reputation, and “my” ego, then it would only be truthful to say that we would not die physically for Him either.  We will not be able to follow Him to the point of dying to ourselves, based on our “knowledge” of Him, or even our “faith” in Him.  It will take a sincere “love” for Him.

    Isn’t it true that sometimes we wish that He would follow us - our plans, desires, hopes and dreams?  May we be willing to follow Him wherever and whenever He leads us, and do whatever is required of us in demonstrating His perfect Love for His sheep?  Lord, give us a revelation of what it means when You say, “Deny yourself, take up our cross, and follow Me!!

    Corporately, as the Body of Christ, we have passed through the season of “the testing of our faith”, and are entering a new season of “the testing of our love for Him.”  The “faith” test must precede the “love” test, because we would naturally have to know Him, and believe in Him before we could love Him.  In the past 20 years or so the church has experienced an outpouring of Father God’s Love through an increased measure of emotional healing.  Now that we have grasped His great Love for us, our love for Him will be tested with fire like never before.  “We love Him because He first loved us.”  He’s saying, “if you love me, keep my commandments” - not just the ones we want to obey as Peter did, but those that will require a death to self as Jesus did.

    It’s never our strong will against sin that causes us to obey, nor is it our strong faith.  In fact it is “His strength made perfect in our weakness” that enables us to obey.  “He gives grace to the humble.”  Are you compelled by a pure love to follow Him and obey Him?

    Are  you being tested and tried in the face of affliction or temptation and asking yourself, “Do I want to go on in my relationship with Jesus Christ?  Do I want to follow him any further?”  Then you are at a wonderful place of life and growth in Him.  Do not grow weary, and become discouraged with these questions, but rather rejoice!  In reality it is Jesus asking you, “Do you Love Me?”

                                                                 “Feed My Sheep”

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                                                                                                                                    Charlotte Cosden

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