You’re Included

“If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.”

John 15:10-12 (NIV) 

Our rational minds struggle with the biblical truth that God is a Trinity—three in one and one in three. No wonder so many Christians call it a mystery. Even the Apostle Paul wrote, “the mystery of godliness is great” (1 Timothy 3:16). But whatever your level of understanding, one thing you can know for sure: The Triune God is unchangeably committed to including you in the wonderful fellowship of the life of the Father, the Son and Holy Spirit. 

There are not three Gods, only one; and that God, the only true God, the God of the Bible, is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We might say that they mutually indwell one another—that the life they share is perfectly interpenetrating. In other words, there is no such thing as the Father apart from Son and Spirit. Or the Son apart from Father and Spirit. Or the Holy Spirit apart from Father and Son. 

When you are in Christ, you too are included in the fellowship and joy of the life of the Triune God—that the Father receives you and has fellowship with you as he does with Jesus. The love God demonstrated in the incarnation of Jesus Christ is no less than the love the Father has always had for you—and always will. God has declared in Christ that you belong to him, that you are included, that you matter. That’s why the Christian life is all about love—God’s love for you and God’s love in you. 

Jesus said, “By this shall all people know that you are my disciples, if you have love one for another” (John 13:35). When you are in Christ, you love others, because the Father and the Son live in you through the Spirit. In Christ, you are free to love others the way God loves you. 

There is no act of the Father that is not also the act of the Son and the Holy Spirit. For example, our salvation comes through the unalterable will of the Father, who is unswervingly committed to including us in the joy and fellowship he shares with the Son and Spirit. The Father sent the Son, who was born, lived, died, was resurrected and then ascended to the Father’s right hand as Lord and Saviour and Mediator, having purified the sins of humanity. Then the Holy Spirit was sent to sanctify and perfect the church in eternal life. 

All of which means that your salvation is the direct result of the Father’s ever-faithful love and power, proven incontrovertibly through Jesus Christ and ministered to us by the Holy Spirit. It’s not your faith that saves you. It’s God alone—Father, Son and Spirit—who saves you. And God gives you faith as a gift to open your eyes to the truth of who he is—and who you are, as his beloved child. 

Prayer

Holy Father, thank you for your love towards us. You have demonstrated by your actions that everything done by you, in love, had in mind us and our salvation. Your commitment to include us in your love is overwhelming. So we ask for your continuing help to make us as committed to you as you are to us. In Jesus’ name we pray.

 Amen 

Study by Joseph Tkach