With this answer, Jesus states clearly how he will continue to be present in the midst of his own after his death, and he explains how it will be possible to have contact with him.

Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.

He can be present in Christians and in the midst of the community right now. There is no need to wait for the future. The temple that welcomes him is not so much one of bricks and mortar, but the very heart of the Christian, which becomes the new tabernacle, the living dwelling place of the Trinity.

Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.

But how can a Christian achieve this? How can we bear God within ourselves? What is the way of entering this deep communion with him? It is love for Jesus. A love that is not mere sentimentality but translated into concrete life and, specifically, into keeping his words. It is to this love of a Christian, verified by deeds, that God responds with his love: the Trinity comes to dwell within.

Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.

‘… keep my word’. What are the words that the Christian is called to keep? In John’s Gospel, ‘my words’ often mean the same as ‘my commandments’. So the Christian is called to keep Jesus’ commandments. But these should not be viewed as a list of laws. Rather they should be understood as summed up in what Jesus illustrated through washing his disciples’ feet: the commandment of mutual love. God commands each Christian to love the other to the point of complete self-giving, as Jesus taught and did.

Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.

So how can we live this Word of Life well? How can we reach the point in which the Father himself will love us and the Trinity will come to dwell within us? By putting into practice with all our hearts, radically and with perseverance, precisely this kind of love for one another.

It is here, mainly, that the Christian finds the way of that profound Christian asceticism demanded by Christ crucified. Indeed, it is in love for one another that the various virtues flourish in our hearts and that we can respond to the call to our personal holiness.

Chiara Lubich

This commentary on a sentence from Scripture suggests ways of putting the Gospel into practice in our daily life. It was first published in full as the Word of Life for February 1983

Read More:

Chiara Lubich, “The spirituality of unity and Trinitarian Life” in New Humanity Review, n.9.

Chiara Lubich, “The Law of Heaven,” A New Way, New City Press, 2006, pp. 48–51.

Marisa Cerini, “God who is Love”, New City Press, 1992.