Posted by The WORD in Other Words by Fr Benigno Beltran SVD (Philippines) for Friday in the 5th Week of Easter
The death of Jesus showed his self-giving love for his friends. It’s a love that bears fruit and expressed foremost in obedience: “We can be sure we love God’s children when we love God and do what he commanded” (1 Jn. 5:2).
More than encouraged, we are commanded to remain in Jesus, receive from him, and bear fruit in him. We become strong enough to lay down our life for our friends because Christ’s command comes to us as a gift that the Holy Spirit places in our hearts. Christ’s law is a law of freedom, of grace and of love. It requires a self-giving and openness to God and to our neighbors which makes us Jesus’ friends – it changes our attitude from servile constraints into a force which liberates our true humanity. Christ’s command to love sets us free by showing us the meaning of true freedom, and through the Holy Spirit of love, offers us the power to fulfill it. Jesus’ command helps us become all that we can be.
Discipleship is at the same time a way of seeing and thinking (doctrinal), a way of living (moral), and a supernatural relationship (religious experience). The integration of the doctrinal, moral and mystical defines the essence of Christian discipleship that transforms one’s life in the faith community.
What kind of fruit do you think God would like to see in your life as a Christian? The life of a disciple that has been transformed by radically new values bears fruit in meekness and compassion, in the thirst for justice and mercy, in purity of heart, in the single-minded working for peace, and in detachment from things of this world that pass away.
Source – The WORD in Other Words, Bible Diary 2020
