Derek Prince - True Disciples Keep The Word Of Jesus
And now, as I draw near the end, I want to take five vital facts about the Word of God and your relationship to it, which are contained in John’s gospel, chapter 14. Just three verses. Jesus is, in a sense, taking farewell of His disciples, He’s warning them that He’s about to leave and they’ll be left on their own for a while. And it’s a very traumatic time for the disciples. They’re overwhelmed with this revelation. But in the middle of it Jesus gives a marvelous revelation of what the Bible should mean to us as believers. He says in John 14 verse 19: A little while longer, and the world will see Me no more. But you will see Me. Because I live, you will live also.
So Jesus made a distinction there between the world, that's those who do not acknowledge Jesus, and His own disciples. He said the world will not see me but the disciples will see me. And then Judas, not Iscariot but the other Judas, asked Him a very relevant question in verse 22: Judas said to Him, Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us and not to the world? He said that because Jesus said: The world will not see me but you will see me. His question was how will you manifest yourself to us and not to the world?
Now, the answer that Jesus gave is just full of important truth. Jesus answered and said to him, in verse 23: If anyone loves me he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. I want to bring out five vitally important facts in the answer of Jesus. First of all, Jesus said He would reveal Himself to His disciples, not to the world. What’s the distinguishing mark between the disciples and the world? The answer is: keeping the Word of God.
True disciples keep the Word of Jesus. And they’re not marked out by denominational labels they’re marked out by the way they relate to the Word. That’s what makes you or otherwise prevents you from being a true disciple. It’s your relationship to the Word of God. Keeping God’s Word distinguishes disciples from the world. And in this congregation here this morning, every one of us, is in one or other of those two categories. If we’re disciples we keep the Word of God. If we don’t keep the Word we belong to the world, to the world that is not under the Lordship of Jesus.