HE WILL KEEP MY WORDS

Wednesday 26 February

Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him. John 14:23 (KJV)

But whoever keeps His WORD, truly the love of God is perfected in him. By this we know that we are in Him. 1 John 2:5 (NKJV)

Let the WORD of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. Colossians 3:16 (NKJV)

Have you ever heard people say that the proof of your love for Jesus is that you keep His Word? They are usually talking about the scriptures. Some even think it is about the Old Testament commandments and not the commandments regarding faith and love. Let’s examine this more in the context of our first scripture; John 14:23. Firstly, it is clear that this passage is referring to receiving the indwelling of the Spirit which was to occur after the resurrection in the upper room during Pentecost.

Once the background to this verse is clear, it begs a very pertinent question. How could anyone that just got saved have the ability to keep His words? It’s not like we all swallowed the Bible when we got ‘born again’. Does that make sense to you? This is why we have to take our religious or super spiritual goggles off when we study the Word of God.

The word for ‘words’ in this verse is ‘logos’ which has a plethora of different meanings. Let’s think about this for a moment. What would be the correct synonym to use now that we know the context is receiving the indwelling of the Spirit at the point of salvation? ‘Logos’ means God’s thinking pattern which gives rise to us using ‘the sayings of God’.

Another thing to consider is what words were Jesus referring to in this passage? In the gospels, Jesus said words to the effect that He was the Son of God and whoever believes in Him being God in the flesh, would be saved.

Fast forward to Romans 10:9 and the Apostle Paul is using the same words Jesus said about Himself to bring people into this great salvation. The words mentioned in John 14:23 are therefore the sayings of God and not talking about obeying the Word of God as a pre-requisite for salvation. Apart from not adding up scripturally, that would be law and not grace.

The phrase ‘he will keep’ which is ‘tereo’ in Greek means ‘to carefully attend to.’ What sayings do you think that we should be carefully attending to the most? The words that encapsulate all that Jesus Christ came to do i.e. ‘seek and save those that are lost’. Again it is all about the faith confession for salvation.

In our second scripture the same writer Apostle John, uses a similar verbiage ‘whoever keeps His Word’. The same Greek word ‘logos’ is used which tells us what was in the mind of the writer about the sayings of God in direct relation to Christ’s finished work of salvation.

This brings us to another writer Apostle Paul in Colossians 3:16. ‘Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly’. Notice what it doesn’t say here. It doesn’t say ‘let the Word of God dwell in you richly’ it says the Word of Christ. Why did Paul use ‘Christ’ and not ‘God’ here? What was this word of Christ? I believe it is the sayings of God regarding (you guessed it) salvation in Christ. Why do I make this assertion?

Because everything about the word of Christ begins and ends with Christ and the salvation plan of God. Remember everything that pertains to your life and godliness is a result of receiving His salvation. This is why if someone doesn’t teach the irreversibility of salvation by grace, through faith in Christ, they are fundamentally preaching a confusing and empty message. A mixture of law and grace, not Christ.

He has given us His sayings in regard to salvation and told us to attend to them carefully and let them dwell in us richly. What will you do with what He said?

APPLICATION

Jesus the logos of God is now living on the inside of every believer to empower us to be doers of all the words of Christ.