“If you have love for one another, then everyone will know that you are my disciples.” John 13:35 (GNT)

If you’re Jesus’ disciple, you can’t love just him; you have to love everyone in his family.

Jesus said, “If you have love for one another, then everyone will know that you are my disciples” (John 13:35 GNT).

The hallmark of being a follower of Jesus isn’t a bumper sticker, or a t-shirt, or some other symbol you wear. The proof that you are Jesus’ disciple is that you love every other disciple—that you love God’s church. It’s like Jesus is saying, “If you’re going to be my disciple, you can’t just love me; you have to love everyone who belongs to me.”

Maybe you’ve heard someone say, “I love Jesus; I just don’t like the church.” That’s not something you should ever hear from a disciple of Jesus. Christ died for the church. In fact, it’s the only thing on this planet that will last for eternity. Heaven is going to be filled with God’s family, so learning to love the church today helps us get ready for what’s to come.

The Bible is clear about our obligation to love other Christians: “If someone says, ‘I love God,’ but hates a fellow believer, that person is a liar; for if we don’t love people we can see, how can we love God, whom we cannot see?” (1 John 4:20 NLT).

Loving the people in God’s family is called fellowship. And it’s through fellowship that spiritual growth happens; you can’t grow to spiritual maturity on your own.

There’s a phrase you see over and over in the Bible: “one another.” The Bible tells us to love one another, care for one another, help one another, serve one another, greet one another, and pray for one another. Part of what we’re on this planet to do is to help out one another in the family of God.

You might listen to Christian podcasts or read Christian books every day, but that doesn’t make you grow—it just gives you more knowledge. You grow as you learn to love God and to love your neighbor as yourself.

That’s what makes a relationship with Jesus different than religion. Religion often tells you to isolate yourself from humanity to become more holy. But that’s the opposite of what Jesus taught. Jesus went to the marketplace, to weddings, to parties. He knew that loving God and others is key to growth—and you can’t love people unless you’re around them.

God measures our love by how much we’re willing to sacrifice for other believers in his family. The Bible says it like this in 1 John 3:16: “This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters” (NIV).