One Another: The Love That Makes the Church Different
The world has plenty of ways to measure a church. We notice attendance, programs, music, preaching, buildings, and activity. Jesus gave His followers a very different standard. He said the identifying mark of His disciples would be the way they love one another.
This week, Pastor David Sellstrom continued The Remnant Church’s Activation Season, Phase 3: Stand Watch, with a message titled “One Another.” After considering our responsibility as watchmen who recognize what is happening in the surrounding culture, this message turned the focus inward. What should a community of watchmen look like among themselves? What should people see when they look beyond what Christians believe and begin examining how Christians actually treat one another?
Jesus answered that question clearly:
“By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” — John 13:35, NKJV
That kind of love is much more demanding than being friendly on Sunday morning. It is a covenant love modeled after Christ Himself—a love that gives before receiving, stays when relationships become costly, carries people through hardship, rejoices with them in good seasons, weeps with them in painful ones, and chooses grace instead of keeping score.
When Love Comes With an Invoice
Much of the love we encounter in the world is transactional. Relationships can quietly operate under an unwritten agreement: I will continue loving you as long as this relationship works for me. Affection is easy when another person meets our expectations, appreciates us, agrees with us, or gives something in return. The real test comes when the relationship becomes inconvenient or costly.
Pastor David described this as loving with an “invoice attached.” We may never say it aloud, but we begin keeping a ledger. We remember how much we have given, how little someone else has returned, who disappointed us, who failed to appreciate us, and who has become more work than we think the relationship is worth. Eventually, love becomes another transaction governed by the question: "What have you done for me lately?"
That mindset can enter the church as easily as anywhere else. We can evaluate a congregation by what it offers us, judge relationships according to what we receive from them, and withdraw when our expectations are not met. Yet the church was never intended to function as a spiritual commodity. We are not merely consumers attending the same weekly event. In Christ, we have been joined together as a body and called to carry one another.
This is where Christian love must look different from the culture surrounding us. The world may love until the cost becomes too great. Jesus loved at immeasurable cost.
The Cross Changed the Standard
On the night before His crucifixion, Jesus told His disciples:
“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another.” — John 13:34, NKJV
The most challenging word in that verse may be “as.”
Jesus did not leave us free to define love according to our feelings, preferences, or sense of fairness. He gave us Himself as the standard. We are to love as He loved us. The measure is no longer what another person deserves; the measure is the cross.
Christ did not wait until humanity became worthy of His love. Romans 5:8 tells us that “while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (NKJV). He moved toward us before we could repay Him, and He gave what we could never earn.
That is the difference between a contract and a covenant. A contract can be broken when one party fails to fulfill the terms. Covenant love is rooted in a commitment that goes beyond convenience. During Communion, Pastor David described the cup as a reminder of the new covenant in Christ’s blood—not a contract waiting to be canceled, but a promise that is kept.
When that becomes the model for our relationships, love begins to look very different.
Communion Is Also About One Another
Because this message was shared on Communion Sunday, the theme carried an especially meaningful connection. Communion certainly draws our attention to Christ’s sacrifice, but it also reminds us that through Christ we have been joined to one another.
Paul writes:
“The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? For we, though many, are one bread and one body; for we all partake of that one bread.” — 1 Corinthians 10:16–17, NKJV
Communion reminds us not only that we belong to Jesus but that, because of Jesus, we belong to one another.
The church is a common union formed around Christ. We share His grace, His forgiveness, His Word, and the blood that purchased our salvation. That common union is not supposed to remain at the Communion table. It moves outward into our relationships and eventually into the community around us.
This makes unresolved bitterness, grudges, and withheld love more than interpersonal problems. They contradict what we declare when we gather around the Lord’s table. If Christ has extended grace to us, that grace should begin appearing in the way we treat one another.
Romans 12 Puts Love Into Everyday Clothes
It is easy to talk about love in broad spiritual terms. Romans 12 makes it wonderfully practical.
Paul writes:
“Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil. Cling to what is good. Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another.” — Romans 12:9–10, NKJV
He continues by telling believers to distribute to the needs of the saints, practice hospitality, bless those who persecute them, rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep, live humbly, refuse to repay evil for evil, and pursue peace whenever possible.
This is love with work clothes on.
It means celebrating someone else’s blessing without becoming jealous. It means sitting beside someone in grief when there is nothing we can say to fix the situation. It means honoring another person even when it gives us no advantage, forgiving when we would rather keep the offense alive, and choosing peace when our pride wants the final word.
Romans 12 takes love out of the realm of sentiment and places it into ordinary relationships. An activated church is not merely a crowd that gathers; it is a family that carries one another.
What the World Sees Matters
Christians rightly care about truth. We should know what Scripture teaches, recognize where culture departs from biblical truth, and be prepared to explain what we believe. But truth must be communicated in love.
A culture that disagrees with Christian doctrine may dismiss our arguments. It is much harder to dismiss a community where people genuinely carry one another through suffering, forgive offenses, meet needs, honor those who cannot repay them, and remain faithful when relationships become difficult.
That may be one of the church’s most powerful witnesses.
If the world not only heard what Christians believe but actually saw the love Christians have for one another, it could change the entire narrative. The issue is ultimately not proving that we are right and someone else is wrong. The issue is Jesus, and our lives should make Him visible.
Signs, wonders, giftedness, knowledge, and powerful ministry may attract attention, but without love they become what Paul called sounding brass and clanging cymbals. Christian love is not an accessory to the gospel. It is part of the evidence that the gospel has actually transformed us.
Who Are You Loving on Contract?
This message leaves us with a question worth carrying beyond Sunday morning: Is there someone in your life whom you are loving on contract?
Perhaps you have not ended the relationship, but you have quietly put the person on probation. You remain cordial while withholding affection. You keep an emotional ledger of what they have done wrong, how much they have cost you, or how often they have disappointed you. Maybe you have decided they will receive your love again when they apologize, change, appreciate you, or become easier to deal with.
That is where the cross becomes personal.
We all tend to withhold love when someone frustrates us, demands too much from us, or gives us what feels like a legitimate reason to pull away. Yet when the love we have received at the cross begins flowing through us toward another person, something changes.
That does not mean pretending sin does not matter, abandoning healthy boundaries, or refusing to address harmful behavior. Biblical love is not the absence of truth. It means that even when truth must be spoken, our goal is restoration rather than punishment, and we refuse to make love a reward another person must earn.
This week, choose one of the “one another” instructions from Romans 12 and put it into practice. Rejoice with someone. Sit with someone who is hurting. Give another person preference when it actually costs you something. Encourage the person God places on your heart. Forgive where you have been keeping score.
These actions may seem small, but together they reveal what an activated church looks like.
The city is watching, and not only to see whether Christians are right. People are watching to see whether following Jesus actually makes us different. Jesus told us what would convince them:
“By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
The world will know us by what we do for each other.
Continue the Journey
If this week’s message encouraged you, continue growing in your faith with Pastor David Sellstrom’s books, Weapons of Mass Distraction and The Authentic Gospel, now available on Amazon. Both offer practical, Scripture-centered teaching for believers who want to recognize what competes for their attention, remain grounded in biblical truth, and live an authentic faith centered on Jesus Christ.
Whether you’re reading for personal spiritual growth, sharing a book with a friend, or using one as a resource for conversations about faith, these books offer another way to continue engaging with the biblical themes Pastor David teaches at The Remnant Church.
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