No Greater Love than To Lay Down One's Life for a Friend.

Jesus said there is no greater love than To lay down one's life for one's friends (John 15:13).

This includes rushing into a fire to save a friend, or fighting in a war to save loved ones, or even slowly laying down one's life in service to others as a parent, or caretaker, or teacher, or any role which requires sacrifice of one's own preferences, hobbies, time and attention for the sake of another person.

But most of all, Jesus was underscoring the fact that his own death was an act of the greatest form of love…laying his life down as proof of his love for us…an act of love that would open the gates of heaven to us and baptize us as children of God.

In short, after the death and sacrifice of Jesus, when God the Father looks at us he first and foremost sees that we are loved so much by his Son that Jesus died for us. Each of us is defined not only by our own natures, but by the history of our own actions and the history of those who have interacted with us. And therefore, each of us is defined by the FACT that Jesus loved us so much that he died for us so that we might be forever united in that love with Him and the Holy Trinity. And that is a HUGE fact. And given the immensity of the Love of Christ poured out to us, it is the biggest and foremost fact about us which God the Father sees each time He looks at us. And that is why our sins are not only forgiven, but forgotten…as far as the east is from the west….a limitless distance.

Here I should note that God the Father is not a vengeful God who only concedes to overlook our flaws and sinfulness because of the love of the Son poured out on us. Instead, he is the loving God who sent His only Son to pour out his love on us.

This pouring out and uniting with the Trinity through the Cross is part of the Trinitarian Plan. To the best that theologians can tease apart the most likely differences in the Three Persons, the initial desire and imagination of this plan arises within God the Father, and it is performed and brought into reality by the Son, and it is sustained and imbued with holiness by the Holy Spirit. So the love that Jesus pours out to unite us with the Trinity was planned and intended by the Father and is sanctified and constantly strengthened by the Holy Spirit.