Lay down your life…Jesus did

Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. ~ (John 15:13).

Friendships are important to everyone, but they’re especially important to Jesus, the creator of friendship. There is no greater love than he that lays down his life for his friends. Love lays down its life for another. We all know how fully Jesus Himself exemplified this. His is the greatest love that anyone can demonstrate toward friends. Obviously this means more than simply dying physically for them. If it meant only that, there would be very few of  who could or would ever fulfill this, largely because we would lack the opportunity to do so. And, of course, one could do so only once! But our Lord is commanding us to do this repeatedly. So what He means by this is that we are to give ourselves up for one another. When you go out of your way to meet a friend's need and giving unselfishly of your time and resources…you are laying down your life.  This is what Jesus had in mind. Jesus forfeited His own time of resting and even eating for others that followed Him. He gave of Himself even when He was tired and stopped in the middle of His journeys to teach and heal. How can we do less? How can we not give up some sleep, a shopping trip, or any leisure time? To  truly serve in this capacity, the ego must be crucified and self must be denied for the benefit of one's brother. Yes, this may seem hard to do, but in the end, it will be immensely rewarding for the other person and for God’s glory!