Jesus’ farewell discourse, as recorded by John, may be regarded as the ultimate summary of the teaching Jesus brought to us and also as his testament. In fact, we should read the rest of the Gospel message in the light of this discourse.

The commandment of love, which Jesus truly placed at the heart of his teaching, was already present in the Old Testament and can be summarised in a single sentence: “Love God above all else and your neighbour as yourself.” He gave this when, in response to a lawyer’s question about which was the greatest commandment, He replied: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment. The second is like it: You shall love your neighbour as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets’ (Mt 22:37–40). In doing so, Jesus did not actually introduce anything new, but merely restored the commandment of love—which had, as it were, been buried under a mass of commandments and, above all, prohibitions—to the central place it deserved.

Yet, during his farewell discourse, he introduces a wholly new dimension to this commandment. Here he no longer speaks of loving our neighbour as we would wish to be loved ourselves, which is very much in line with the golden rule that we should not do to others what we would not want done to us. Jesus sets His own love, which He shows to us, as the new benchmark for our love for our neighbour. He states it explicitly: “A new commandment I give unto you: that ye love one another; as I have loved you, so must ye also love one another” (John 13:34). This perfects the old, existing commandment of love, whilst at the same time raising the commandment to love one another to an entirely new level.

Whereas previously the love we had for ourselves was the measure by which we were to love others, now it is Jesus’ love for us that becomes the new measure of our love for our neighbours. That is no small leap forward and at the same time presents us with an enormous challenge.

This immediately raises the question of where we can find the capacity to love others with the same measure with which Jesus loved and loves us. Is that not a supernatural task, a commandment that we will never be able to fulfil by our own strength? Saint Thérèse of Lisieux offered a very personal reflection on this and came to an even more unique conclusion: “When the Lord commanded his people to love their neighbour as themselves (cf. Lev. 19:18), he had not yet come to earth. Knowing to what extent people were capable of loving themselves, He could not ask His creatures for a greater love towards their neighbour. But when Jesus gave His apostles a new commandment, namely to love their neighbour as Jesus Himself had loved them, it is only with the love that Jesus gives us that we will be able to love.” After this reflection, in which she comes to the realisation that her own love is utterly insufficient to fulfil this new commandment, she concludes that she must therefore borrow love from Jesus. She expresses this in the following prayer: “Your love, Lord, has been with me since my youth. It has grown up with me; now it is an abyss deeper than I can fathom. If I am to love You as You love me, I must borrow Your own love. Only then will I find peace. This is my prayer. I ask You, Jesus, to draw me into the glow of Your love. To make me so intimately one with You that You live and act within me.” In this, Thérèse clearly expresses that we are not capable, of our own strength, of fulfilling the commandment of love, that we will always fall short. It is the same when we hear St Bernard say that the measure of love is love without measure. These are more than overwhelming statements that can discourage us in our endeavour to fulfil at least some aspect of the commandment of love.

But then, in the same farewell discourse of Jesus, we find a word that offers a reassuring answer: “Do not let your hearts be troubled” (John 14:1). The message of his imminent departure and the way in which they were to love one another had evidently caused the apostles some distress. One might well lose heart for less. He once again explicitly reiterates the commandment to love one another: “As I have loved you” (John 15:12). But then He gives them the key to unlock the door of this commandment of love: “I no longer call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for I have made known to you everything I have heard from the Father” (John 15:15). It is in our friendship with Jesus that we are allowed to share in the power of his love, that we are, as it were, kindled by this unconditional love which has its origin in God himself. What we can only experience in an imperfect way within human friendship, we shall be able to taste in a perfect way in the friendship of love with Jesus. This transcends all our human expectations and, even more so, our human capabilities. It is in our friendship with Jesus that we will be able to receive His love, which in turn will truly enable us to love as He loves us.

Many have praised the great value of friendship as essential to leading a happy life. Let us listen for a moment to the medieval mystic Aelred of Rievaulx, as he sings the praises of friendship: “Among human values, there is nothing holier to desire, nothing more useful to seek, nothing harder to find, nothing sweeter to experience, and nothing more fruitful to possess than friendship. It bears fruit in this life, in the present as well as in the future; its gentleness gives flavour to all virtues, its strength combats vices, it softens adversity and does not make prosperity a danger.” It is a small step to project this description of human friendship onto our friendship with Jesus. It is Jesus himself who calls us his friends and invites us to enter into his friendship. Just as with love, friendship cannot be forced upon us, but only offered. It is up to us whether or not to accept it.

We would therefore like to read the rest of Aelred of Rievaulx’s text in the light of his friendship with Jesus: “What joy, what certainty, what charm there is in having someone with whom one can speak without fear, as with oneself; to whom one can confess one’s faults without fear; to whom one can entrust one’s spiritual progress without shame; to whom one can lay bare all the secrets of one’s heart and reveal one’s plans.” Jesus himself tells his apostles that, as a friend, he has indeed been able to entrust everything to them: “I have made known to you everything I have heard from the Father” (John 15:15). It is up to us to truly invest in this unique friendship with Jesus and not to leave it at a vague theoretical concept. A spiritual life requires that we devote energy and time to developing this relationship with Jesus and that we become ever more open to his grace and his love.

Human friendship, too, helps us to grow in our friendship with Jesus. Let us listen one last time to Aelred of Rievaulx: “Friendship is a step closer to the perfection that consists in the love and knowledge of God. As soon as a person becomes the friend of another, he becomes a friend of God, according to this word of the Saviour in the Gospel: ‘Behold, I no longer call you servants, but friends’” (John 15:15). For we have heard that when formulating the criteria for judgement, Jesus says that whatever you did for one of the least of my brothers, you did for Me (cf. Matt. 25:40). And that includes friendship! It is as if this brings things full circle: Jesus’ love for us is the sole reference point for our love for our neighbour. We can receive this love of Jesus when we open ourselves to his friendship. But this friendship with Jesus can also grow through our friendship with a fellow human being, for Jesus is present in that fellow human being too. The core, then, is this relationship of friendship that we must develop with Jesus both directly and indirectly, and that as his invitation. We need only open ourselves to it, no more, but also no less.

Thus, this commandment to love our neighbour as the Lord Jesus has loved us inevitably leads us to the first commandment: that we must love God above all else. These two commandments, this double commandment, are thereby truly fused together. We cannot love God if we do not love our neighbour, and we cannot love our neighbour if we do not love God. Or to put it more positively: through love for God we can love our neighbour, and through love for our neighbour we can also love God, who is present in our neighbour. Here we hear John again in his first letter: “Whoever loves God must also love his brother” (1 John 4:21). “If anyone says, ‘I love God,’ yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For if he does not love his brother, whom he has seen, he cannot love God, whom he has not seen” (1 John 4:20). Our fellow human beings here become God’s representatives and, at the same time, the path to entering into God’s loving friendship.

It becomes a beautiful jigsaw puzzle when we manage to fit all the pieces together harmoniously. It may well be the jigsaw puzzle on which we spend the best time of our lives. In doing so, we will never waste our time, but will set out on the sure path to the true Life that the Lord has promised us. There is no other way, for He is the Way, the Truth and the Life (cf. John 14:6).

Reflection on the Solemnity of the Ascension of Our Lord, 14 May 2026,

Bro. René Stockman f.c.