Do you love Jesus? If there is any love for Christ in your heart then it is evidence that you are saved (Jn. 17:3). It is true that this love for Jesus ebbs and flows. There are seasons of joy and also seasons of spiritual desertion. It is true that there are ways we ought to describe how true believers can experience these seasons of backsliding, spiritual desertion, and dullness. It’s not just that these seasons can happen to believers but do happen to all believers at some level. Nevertheless, the genuine convert is one that grows and increases in some degree over their life in love for Christ.
But, what does it mean to love Jesus?
If you love Jesus, you’ll grow in identifying yourself with Him (Gal. 2:20).
If you love Jesus, you’ll love His commandments and seek to increase in loving obedience (Jn. 14:15).
If you love Jesus, you’ll learn to yearn to be with Him in heaven (Jn. 17:24; 1 Jn. 3:2).
If you love Jesus, your sin will become more and more bitter (Ps. 32, 52; Rom. 7).
If you love Jesus, you’ll love His people (1 Jn. 2:10).
If you love Jesus, you’ll love that He is God (John 3:16).
If you love Jesus, you’ll love that He is Man (Heb. 4:15).
If you love Jesus, you’ll love that He is the propitiation for all the elect (1 Jn. 2:1-2).
If you love Jesus, you’ll grow to reject your works and depend solely on Him (Rom. 3:10-31).
If you love Jesus, you’ll love to spend time with Him in the public means of grace (Acts 2:42).
If you love Jesus, you’ll love studying God and His redemptive work (Ps. 111:2).
If you love Jesus, you’ll become more and more spiritually-minded (Col. 3:1-2).
If you love Jesus, you’ll receive and believe faithful preaching as God’s Word (Rom. 10:14-17; 1 Thess. 2:13).
If you love Jesus, you’ll increase in a biblical worldview (Rom. 12:1-2; Eph. 4:22-24).
If you love Jesus, you’ll grow a desire for prayer (1 Thess. 5:17).
If you love Jesus, you’ll mature in submitting to His Word (2 Tim. 3:16-4:5).
If you love Jesus, you’ll yearn more and more for participating in the benefits of His redemption through the Supper (1 Cor. 10:16).
If you love Jesus, you’ll learn to fight more and more against spiritual warfare (Eph. 6:10-20).
If you love Jesus, you’ll grow in loving to see Him in all of Scripture (Lk. 24:44-45).
If you love Jesus, you’ll love hearing the preaching and searching the Scriptures (Acts 17:10-12).
If you love Jesus, you’ll grow to fear God the more you see the forgiveness of your sins (Ps. 130:4).
If you love Jesus, you’ll increasingly mature in depending and delighting in His righteousness (Gal. 2:16-21).
If you love Jesus, you’ll grow to delight in justice, kindness, and humility (Micah 6:8).
If you love Jesus, you’ll grow to be amazed at the depth of God’s free grace forgiveness of you and others (Micah 7:18-20).