When Jesus declared, “He who loves Me will keep My commandments,” He was not laying a fresh legalistic burden on His disciples. He was not pointing us back to the law of Moses, nor was He issuing a new set of external requirements for us to strive after in our own strength. To interpret His words as a demand for human effort is to miss the entire point of the New Testament revelation. The apostle John, in his epistles, gives us the doctrinal foundation for understanding what Jesus meant: the “new commandment” is not an outward demand, but an inward reality—Christ Himself as Eternal Life, installed within every believer.
The New Commandment: Not an External Demand, But Christ Within
The new commandment stands in stark contrast to the “letter” and the “law.” The law was written on stone, always outside of us, always demanding, always exposing our inability. But the new commandment is not something required of us; it is something God has installed in us. It is Christ Himself—Eternal Life—dwelling within all who believe (1 John 5:11-12). John makes it clear: the new commandment is “true in us” just as it is in Christ, because “the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining” (1 John 2:7-8). This is not a call to produce something for God, but a declaration of what God has produced in us by the indwelling of His Son.
Faith and Love: The Evidence of Christ’s Life
John summarizes the new commandment as believing in the name of Jesus Christ and loving one another (1 John 3:23). These are not two separate requirements, but two sides of the same coin. Faith in Christ is the root; love for the brethren is the fruit. When you believe the Gospel, you are born of God and indwelt by Christ as Eternal Life. This life recognizes itself in others who have believed. To love the brethren is simply to recognize and credit other believers as fellow heirs, justified by the same blood and standing in the same grace. This is not a sentimental feeling, but a practical cooperation with God’s work in the body of Christ (1 John 4:7-12).
The new commandment is not burdensome because it is not a demand placed upon your flesh. It is the outflow of Christ’s own life within you. “For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments: and His commandments are not grievous” (1 John 5:3). The believer who has Christ cannot help but manifest faith in Him and love for those who are His.
Distinguishing the Brethren from Antichrists
The Spirit bears witness to the truth of Christ in the believer. If someone confesses the testimony of Christ—His Person and His work—it is because the Spirit has borne witness in them that they have believed God’s testimony concerning His Son and are therefore born of God (1 John 5:1). We cannot deny their salvation by faith alone without denying our own. To do so is to undermine the very foundation of justification and sonship.
Paul recognized the believers in Corinth as brethren, not because of their behavior, but because “the testimony of Christ was confirmed in them” (1 Corinthians 1:4-9). The utterance to speak the doctrine of Christ accurately is the evidence of faith and the assurance of eternal life (1 John 5). To refuse to acknowledge another’s salvation on the basis of faith alone is to align oneself with the spirit of antichrist, who denies the children of God and the sufficiency of Christ’s work.
The antichrists in John’s day denied the Person and work of Jesus Christ and refused to recognize the children of God. They boasted that they had no sin and separated themselves from the fellowship of the saints. But we are not antichrists, even if we are sinners. We believe in the blood of Jesus Christ, who is the propitiation for our sins and the sins of the whole world (1 John 2:1-2). This is the basis of our love for the brethren—faith in the Gospel, not human merit.
What Is Lost If We Miss This?
If you reduce Jesus’ words to a legalistic demand—if you make “keeping His commandments” a matter of your own effort or performance—you forfeit the assurance that comes from Christ’s finished work. You lose the reality of sonship and the rest that comes from knowing you are justified apart from works. Worse, you set yourself against the very testimony of God concerning His Son, and you risk denying the brethren whom God has accepted. This is no secondary matter; it is salvific. To collapse the new commandment into law is to undermine the Gospel itself.
The True Evidence of Salvation
Keeping Jesus’ commandments is not a burdensome striving. It is the natural result of Christ’s indwelling life—faith in Him and love for the brethren. This is the evidence of genuine salvation. The Spirit’s witness, the confession of Christ, and the recognition of the brethren: these are the marks of those who are born of God. Anything less is to fall back into the bondage of law and to deny the very life God has given.
Let us not be moved away from this doctrine. Let us hold fast to the truth that Christ Himself is our life, our righteousness, and our assurance. To believe in Him and to love those who are His is not a work we perform, but the manifestation of the life we have received. This is the new commandment, and it is true in us as it is in Him.
