Experiencing the Love of Jesus
Abiding in Christ
When I was saved, I began to understand what love truly is, because Jesus entered my life. What I once believed was love — the kind I defined and received from others — was not divine love. Through Him, I was introduced to a deeper, truer love. Yet even now, I know I have only begun to experience a small portion of its fullness.
The Love of Jesus
The love of Jesus is immeasurable and infinite, reaching far beyond human understanding. It is a love that holds and comforts, strengthens and restores. It builds us up in Him, cannot be shaken or broken, and has the power to truly transform a person.
It is a love that is unconditional — not something we earn or achieve, but something Jesus freely gives. The question, then, is not how we attain God’s love, for it is already present like an endless ocean. The deeper question is how we come to experience it — how we immerse ourselves so fully in His love that our lives are completely saturated and transformed by it.
Abide in Me (John 15)
Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me (John 15:4).
Jesus tells us how we can fully experience His love, and it begins with abiding in Him. To abide means to trust in Him, to live in Him, and to allow His life to dwell within us. It is to remain close to Him continually — walking with Him, depending on Him, and growing in relationship with Him each day. If a branch is not connected to the Vine, it cannot experience the life and love that flow from Him.
How Do We Abide?
Jesus teaches that abiding in Him is expressed through keeping His commandments. We do not obey in order to earn His love, but so that we may truly experience it. Abiding is like walking along a path with Jesus — the further we walk with Him, the more deeply we come to know and experience His love. If we step off the path or walk only at a distance, we will not experience His love as fully as we were meant to. Without abiding, we cannot truly know His love, bear lasting fruit, or bring glory to Him.
What Does it Mean to Follow His Commandments?
If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love (John 15:9-10).
Following Jesus’ commandments is not merely about keeping the Ten Commandments, though they are certainly included. It means embracing all that He has called us to. It is His command to love the Lord your God with all your heart, and to love others as He has loved us. It is the call to imitate Him — to walk as He walked, to pray as He prayed, to worship and fast with a heart devoted to the Father.
It is the call to surrender our will, deny ourselves, put the flesh to death, and take up our cross daily. It is His command to go into the world as salt and light, proclaiming the gospel and making disciples of all nations. Following His commands is not mere rule-keeping; it is the path that leads us into a deeper experience of His love.
Jesus’ Words
“As the Father loved Me, I also have loved you; abide in My love. If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love.
“These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. You are My friends if you do whatever I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you. These things I command you, that you love one another (John 15:9-17).”
This is how we experience the love of Jesus, and how we experience it more deeply.
