With finals starting this week, Bible study is on hiatus for the time being, but here is this week’s gospel reading and some questions for reflection. Take a few minutes in the midst of your busy week and let the care and love of God wash over you. This week’s passage is a good one for that!
John 15:9-17
9 As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. 10 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. 11 I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. 12 “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. 13 No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command you. 15 I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. 16 You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. 17 I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.
Reflections
What strikes you in this passage?
What do you make of the connection between commandments and love?
What does it look like to love one another?
Do you more often feel like a friend of Jesus or a servant of Jesus?
Does it change how we read/hear this passage to notice Jesus is using the plural “you” here?