Read­ing Time: 3 minutes

Introduction

This Sunday is a con­tinu­ation of the Gos­pel of the last Sunday. If Jesus is the good shep­herd and the true vine, then, Chris­ti­ans have no option than to remain in him. In this Sunday Gos­pel read­ing, Jesus explains to believ­ers that the effect of remain­ing in him, the true vine, is to keep his com­mand­ment, which, invari­ably, is the com­mand­ment of God. By defin­i­tion, a com­mand­ment is an order or injunc­tion giv­en by author­ity. As a good shep­herd, Jesus lays down his life for the sheep because he sin­cerely cares for them and loves them too; knows the sheep one after the oth­er. That is, he knows them indi­vidu­ally and can always identi­fy them any­where, every­where; he care­fully and con­tinu­ously leads the sheep; calls the sheep to order; pro­tects them from danger and if injured, dresses the wound; and he lives for the sheep. As the true vine, Jesus wants us to remain in him so that we can true wit­nesses. As Jesus said, he is the vine and we are the branches, and who­ever remains in him, with him in that per­son, bears abund­ant fruit. And cut off from him.….

Remain in my love

“As the Fath­er has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love” (John 15:9). Jesus’ love is real, self­less, assur­ing and salvif­ic because it derives from the Fath­er. Hence, the dis­ciples are exhor­ted to remain in that very love. The com­mand­ment, which the dis­ciples must keep, is to love one anoth­er as Jesus has loved them, because the Fath­er loves him. And the only con­di­tion to remain in that love is to keep to the com­mand­ment of love, not just any kind of love, but the love of God. One of the major obstacles facing Bible trans­lat­ors is the choice of words. Since the Bible is writ­ten in ancient lan­guages (Hebrew and Greek), and giv­en the diversity between the two lan­guages and the mod­ern lan­guages, it is not always easy to trans­late cer­tain words adequately. This also is one of the reas­ons we have many trans­la­tions of the Bible. One of such dif­fi­culties is.……

Conclusion

The effect of the dis­ciples keep­ing Jesus’ com­mand­ment by lov­ing him and by lov­ing them­selves, is that he sent them on mis­sion to con­tam­in­ate the world with this excep­tion­al love. As a dis­ciple, each Chris­ti­an is also sent on the same mis­sion to bear fruit of true love that will last forever. We can carry out this task because God’s joy is over­flow­ing in us (John 15:11). Jesus loved us to the extent of giv­ing his life. This is the mark of a good shep­herd and an abso­lute proof of love for one’s friends. Def­in­itely, no one pre­tends that you give your life. But there are oth­er ways of doing that: you can give your life and bear fruit by listen­ing, help­ing (with­in the lim­its of your resources), encour­aging, and advising oth­ers. Since we did not choose ourselves, we are bound to keep to the terms and con­di­tions of he who has chosen and sent us. Your voca­tion is your place of mis­sion. As a Chris­ti­an, you have been chosen to pro­claim and bear wit­ness to the Gos­pel. Are you aware of this? Are you faith­ful to your mis­sion as a Christian?

FOR DETAILS, GET YOUR OWN COPIES OF THE BOOK “THE WORD OF LIFE: SUNDAY REFLECTIONS” (vols. I and II)!! The reflec­tion for the SIXTH Sunday of Pascha (B) is found in vol. II pages 210–216. Happy reading!

For details on how to get it, con­tact the author on this link: https://m.me/uchennabiblia?fbclid=IwAR2yeg4a6sDGBp9QGkIvKj6FSADumMokN6lshdE0zuo-JHs6qOmlhA7jyHo or email me at: postmaster@uchennabiblia.com or simply send an SMS on 08116100926, and I will get back to you.

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