In John 15:11 Jesus says to his disciples, “I told you this to fill you with my joy, real joy filled to the brim.” And the source of such joy? “Remaining in his love” (9) by loving each other as he’d loved them (12).
In other words, joy, the kind Jesus experienced as a human, comes from loving and being loved. Jesus knew he was deeply loved by his Father and remained in his love always, which in itself was a source of great joy to Jesus, but included in his joy in verse 9, was loving others with the same love his Father had for him.
And that’s the joy Jesus wishes on us. He got that point across in verse 13, when he said, “There’s no greater love than laying one’s life down for one’s friends.” And I imagine his disciples nodding in agreement, because the willingness to sacrifice one’s life for someone was such an obvious sign of love. But then Jesus says in verse 14, “You are my friends,” because that’s how much he loved them too.
So they got the point that they were deeply loved. But Jesus then added that being his friends also included “if you do what I command” (14), because it was in his command for them to love each other like he’d loved them (12) that would fill their joy to the brim, or make their joy “complete” as other translations phrase it.
So again it was both: joy included both being loved and being able to love. But, Jesus added, it was able to love on an even higher scale than love for each other, because back in John 14:21 Jesus told his disciples, “Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me.” Included in joy, then, would be the ability to love Jesus too. And it didn’t stop there either, because Jesus adds in verse 21, “He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love him and show myself to him” – so both he and the Father would be constantly showing the disciples how much they were loved.
So Jesus keeps pouring in the reasons for joy, which must have seemed overwhelming to the disciples, because how could they fill up on them all? Jesus’ answer was: “my Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. Ask and you will receive, and your joy will be complete” (16:23-24). In other words, recognize the source of such joy. It comes from the Father who gave it to Jesus who gives it to us. It’s a gift just begging to be asked for. But didn’t Jesus also say, “Now is your time of grief”?….(next blog)
