Love Came Down at Christmas
John 14:19-24
Today is the Sunday before Christmas. Whether you enjoy the decorations, gifts, carols, and goodies or whether you are just ready to get it over with and move on to a new year—Christmas confronts us with the most amazing story ever. Behind all of the red and green externals, there is still the story of the child in the manger, announced by angels, God made flesh, Who became the Savior of the crucifixion and Lord of the resurrection.
Surpassing the colored lights and holiday cheer we find the breathtaking story of redemption. We find the Son of God who left the glories of heaven to dwell among us. We find God revealed to us in a Bethlehem manger, on an old rugged cross, and at an empty tomb. We find a God who is near—Emmanuel, God with us. We find a God who loves us in spite of our sin. We find forgiveness, acceptance and eternal life. We find love. We find God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The truth of Christmas is that God came to us, became one of us, dwelt with us.
The Gospel of John as you recall, does not have the details of Christmas, the birth of Jesus, but John does give us the theology of Christmas, what it means. Remember John 1:14? “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.” The truth of Christmas is that the Word, the only begotten Son of God who was with God and was God, the Word became flesh and dwelt with us. That is He resided among us (as God did in the Tabernacle of the Old Testament). Only in Christ, God resided in a human body of flesh and blood. He truly is Emmanuel, God with us (Matthew 1:23).
And that introduction brings us to our text today in John 14. Jesus has dwelt with His disciples for over three years. As John wrote, they beheld His glory. They saw Him turn the water into wine (John 2); heal the sick (John 4, 5); feed the multitudes (John 6); give sight to the blind (John 9); and raise the dead (John 11). They experienced His grace.
And they received His truth. They heard Him proclaim that He is the Bread of Life (John 6:35); the Light of the World (John 8:13; 9:5); the Door for the Sheep (John 10:7); the Good Shepherd (John 10:11); the Resurrection and the Life (John 11:25); and the Way the Truth and the Life (John 14:6). They believed that He was the Christ, the Son of God, the Holy One (John 6:69). They believe the truth of Christmas, Jesus is God dwelling among us.
But now Jesus is telling them that He is leaving them (John 13:33). He is going away to the Father (John 14:12). They cannot go with Him now (John 13:36). Jesus is going to the cross where He will lay down His life (John 10:15; 15:13). The amazing truth of Christmas, God is with us, is about to come to an end—Jesus is leaving them. So Jesus spends this Passover night with His disciples preparing them for His departure. He spoke words which brought comfort and peace to their troubled hearts (John 14:1, 27). In these chapters Jesus gave them great and precious promises to encourage them. They are words of love spoken from the heart of God.
And the promise of Jesus to His disciples this night is really the message of Christmas, God will be with you, even in you (John 14:17). Jesus’ going does not mean that God will no longer be with them. It doesn’t mean that Christmas is no more. It means God will be with them in an even better way. The message of Christmas is that God comes to dwell with men, in a man, Jesus the Christ. But the message of Jesus to His disciples is that God comes to dwell in men—Christmas is forever!
Listen to the words of Jesus, John 14:15-24,
15 “If you love Me, keep My commandments. 16 “And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever– 17 “the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you. 18 “I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you.
19 “A little while longer and the world will see Me no more, but you will see Me. Because I live, you will live also. 20 At that day you will know that I [am] in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you. 21 He who has My commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me. And he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and manifest Myself to him.”
22 Judas (not Iscariot) said to Him, “Lord, how is it that You will manifest Yourself to us, and not to the world?” 23 Jesus answered and said to him, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him. 24 “He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine but the Father’s who sent Me.
What Jesus is promising here is nothing less than the full presence of the triune God. He promised the Holy Spirit of God to abide with them and in them forever (John 14:16-17). He has promised Himself to come to them (John 14:18) and be in them (John 14:20). And He promises that God the Father will make His home with them as well (John 14:23). What Jesus is saying to comfort His disciples is that when He goes away they will have God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—with them and in them. How comforting is it to know that you are in constant union with the triune God, the God of the universe, in all three persons. How comforting is that?
And what is most comforting about having God like that is having God is all about love. As I have pointed out in my other messages, this whole section is saturated with love. Jesus said (John 14:18), “I will not leave you orphans…” Orphans feel unwanted and unloved, but Jesus is assuring His disciples, and us who have believed their message, that God manifests His love to us. Here Jesus promises Christmas, God with us, loving us, living in us forever.
God dwelling in us is:
1. Made possible by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ (John 14:19-20)
Jesus says, 19 “A little while longer and the world will see Me no more, but you will see Me. Because I live, you will live also. 20 At that day you will know that I [am] in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.” Less than 18 hours from this point, Jesus would be crucified. The disciples would think that was the end (Luke 24:21). But that would not be the final word. Jesus promises they will see Him again. This is a reference to the resurrection that will follow His death and a promise that they would see Him again after that, and that they would also live because He would live. This would only be true for believers—those who love Jesus will see Him. He says, “A little while longer and the world will see Me no more.” The last time the world saw Jesus was when they took His dead body down from the cross. The unbelieving world will not see Jesus, will not really know Him, will not have His life in them. But the disciples would see Jesus again. He appeared to them on multiple occasions.
The result of His resurrection would not only be life for Jesus, but life for those who are joined to Him as well, “Because I live, you will live also.” Jesus had said it before in John 6:57, “As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who feeds on Me will live because of Me.” Feeding on Jesus, the Bread of Life, means believing in His death for our sins and resurrection from the dead (John 6:47, 51, 54). Paul writes about those of us who have believed in Jesus (Rom. 6:4-5), “Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection.” In Galatians 2:20 he writes, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.”
In John 14:20 Jesus says, “At that day you will know that I [am] in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.” At what day? The day of Pentecost after His resurrection and ascension when Jesus fulfilled His promise (John 14:16-17) to send the Spirit. This promise is for us as well. Believers today of course do not see Jesus bodily like the disciples did after the resurrection, but we are united to Him by the indwelling Holy Spirit. And that would mean a love relationship with Jesus that would be similar to Jesus’ relationship to the Father. We know Jesus and He knows us. We are in Jesus and He is in us.
God dwelling in us is made possible through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is what Christmas is all about.
Also God dwelling in us is:
2. Confirmed by having and keeping Christ’s commands (John 14:21)
Two things characterize those who love Christ and are especially loved as His own. You see it in John 14:21, “He who has My commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me.” Jesus has already said it once (John 14:15), “If you love Me, keep My commandments.” He says it again in John 14:23, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word.” Love for Christ motivates us to obey Him.
Jesus indicates that there are two parts to obeying Him:
A. To obey Christ’s commandments, we first must have them.
John 14:21: “He who has My commandments ….” We can’t obey what we don’t know or understand. To have Christ’s commandments you need to be in God’s Word consistently. Read it over and over until it shapes your worldview. One of the best ways to begin to experience victory over temptation and sin is to memorize God’s Word. As Psalm 119:11 states, “Your word I have hidden in my heart, That I might not sin against You.” You will seldom have a Bible and concordance at hand when you are tempted to sin. As you read and study God’s word the Holy Spirit living in you will write His commandments on your heart. Jeremiah prophesies about the New Covenant in Christ in Jeremiah 31:33-34,
“But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.”
God writes His law on your heart as you hear and obey the scriptures.
B. To obey Christ’s commandments, we must keep them.
Obedience is not just knowing His commands; it is doing what He commands. It is not just lip service to God, but obedience from the heart. In Mark 7:6, Jesus condemned the Pharisees, who knew the Scriptures well, because they honored God with their lips, while their hearts were far from Him. God looks on our hearts. Obedience begins on the heart level.
It is our love response to the love of God for us. “We love Him, because He first loved us,” (1 John 4:19). As Paul says (Gal. 2:20), “…I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” Our obedience to Christ is not some legalistic obligation, it the direct effect of our loving Him.
God dwelling in us through His Holy Spirit is made possible through the death and resurrection of Jesus when we believe in Him, it is confirmed by obedience to Christ’s commands, and third it is:
3. Living in a love relationship with God (John 14:21-24)
When we live in a love relationship with God through Jesus Christ it results in three wonderful benefits. God will love us; Jesus will reveal Himself to us; and, we’ll enjoy a relationship with God that the world cannot know. So living in a love relationship with God means:
A. The Father and the Son will love us.
John 14:21: “He who has My commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me. And he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and manifest Myself to him.” You’re might be thinking, “I thought that God’s love is unconditional. But this sounds like God loves us when we love Him.”
As Paul makes plain (Rom. 5:8), God loved us and Christ died for us while we were yet sinners. God so loved this evil world that He gave His only Son to die for it (John 3:16). But in our text, Jesus is talking about a deeper experience of His love. It’s parallel to what Paul prays in Ephesians 3:17-19:
… 17 that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may be able to comprehend with all the saints what [is] the width and length and depth and height– 19 to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God..
If we have trusted in Christ, He already dwells in our hearts and we already know His love. But Paul prays that we will experience His presence and His love on deeper and deeper levels. Jesus is saying that we will experience His love more and more as we love Him by keeping His word.
B. Jesus will manifest Himself to us.
Jesus says that when we love Him by obeying Him, He will manifest Himself to us. He will show Himself to us, disclose Himself to us, reveal Himself to us. In what way?
He isn’t talking about a mystical vision or appearance where we see Him physically. Rather, He reveals Himself by giving us deeper insight into knowing Him through His Word.
Just as Jesus spoke these words to comfort the disciples in their time of trouble, so a deeper revelation of Christ to our souls through the Scriptures will comfort us in our trials. Hudson Taylor, the courageous pioneer missionary to China who endured overwhelming trials including the loss of his first wife and of several children, wrote to a fellow worker who was going through a difficult trial (Hudson Taylor and the China Inland Mission: The Growth of a Work of God, by Dr. and Mrs. Howard Taylor [The China Inland Mission], p. 236, italics his), “The one thing we need is to know God better. Not in ourselves, not in our prospects, not in heaven itself are we to rejoice, but in the Lord.”
C. God will make His home in us.
In John 14:22, Judas (not Iscariot) thought about Jesus’ statement that the world would no longer see Him and that He would reveal Himself to those who obey Him. So he asked, “Lord, how is it that You will manifest Yourself to us, and not to the world?” The Jews thought that the Messiah would reveal Himself openly and rule over a political kingdom. Jesus’ triumphal entry had given the disciples hope that He would soon be on the throne. But they didn’t understand that in His first coming, Jesus’ kingdom was not of this world (John 18:36).
Jesus answers by repeating pretty much what He has just said: He will not reveal Himself to the rebellious world, but only to those who obey Him (cf. Matt. 13:10-13). John 14:23,” If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him.” Obedient believers enjoy a relationship with God that the world cannot know.
The word “home” is used only one other time in John, namely, John 14:2, “In My Father’s house are many mansions [same word as “home” in verse 23]; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.” Jesus promised a home for us in heaven where we will dwell with God forever. Heaven is not just a place (it is that), but it is really a relationship with the living God, the triune God. In Revelation 21:3 John writes, “And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God [is] with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them [and be] their God.” That is what heaven is. Home with God.
But Jesus doesn’t just promise us a home in heaven, He also promises to be at home with us now, “We will come to him and make Our home with him.” Which means Jesus is saying: If you love me and keep my word, my Father and I will come to you and give you heaven on earth. We have prepared a dwelling for you in heaven. We are that dwelling. And if you have me and keep my word, we will come and be that dwelling for you now.
What love! What grace! That God Himself would come to us and make His home in us! A home of love. That is what Christmas is all about.
What love! What grace! That God Himself would come to us and make His home in us! A home of love. That is what Christmas is all about, God dwelling with us and now in us. It is made possible by the death and resurrection of Christ Jesus—so believe in Him today. It is confirmed by our obedience to Him—so know and live His commands today. It is living in a love relationship with God—so let your heart be a home where Christ loves.
Christina Rossetti (1830-1894) was one of the most well-know Victorian poets, and she wrote frequently and passionately about her faith journey. She was born to an Italian refugee family that moved to London because of the political turmoil in their homeland. When she was thirteen her father’s health collapsed because of lung problems, and he spent the last eleven years of his life as a semi-invalid suffering frequent bouts of depression. Her mother and sister had to work to keep the family out of poverty. Pressures on her family contributed to Christina’s going through a “nervous breakdown” when she was 14. God used this experience to lead her into a deeper relationship with Him.
During Christina’s late teens and early twenties, she had three different suitors who seemed to be prospects for a life partner, but all these relationships fell through, partly because her spiritual standards were so high. Her closest friendship was with her brother, Dante Rossetti, who was a well-respected painter and poet himself. However, Dante went through his own emotional collapse in 1872 and he fell into a pattern of drug and alcohol abuse which dominated the last ten years of his life.
So instead of love, Christina Rossetti suffered a lot of pain through the personal relationships in her life. That’s why she valued her relationship with God so much. For her, “Love came down at Christmas,” and that divine love is what made her life worth living. Let her hymn speak to you:
Love came down at Christmas,
Love all lovely, Love Divine,
Love was born at Christmas,
Star and Angels gave the sign.
Worship we the Godhead,
Love Incarnate, Love Divine,
Worship we our Jesus,
But wherewith for sacred sign?
Love shall be our token,
Love be yours and love be mine,
Love to God and all men,
Love for plea and gift and sign.
This is the Christmas message: “Love was born at Christmas”; God was breaking into the human experience in that manger bed with love. Our response of love to God and our selfless love of other people are the evidence of the love that “came down at Christmas.”
Do you have that love at home in you this Christmas?
