Transformational Love (The Root of Resilient Love, 1 John 5:1-5)

Intro

1 John 5:5 NASB 2020

Who is the one who overcomes the world, but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?

What is the guiding principle of your life? There may be a variety of answers to this question, but for the Christian there can only be one answer. We believe that Jesus is the Son of God! That sincere faith which we have in Christ defines everything about us. It defines our time, our friendships, our family identity, and our practices.

Who has seen The Truman Show?

Question: If your life was a movie, and someone outside of yourself watched it, who or what would they identify as that which you love most dearly? Would it be Christ?

We were made for God. Any human life which is lived centralized upon anything other God and Him being our chief affection will be imbalanced and less than who we were created to be.

The more we grow to love God, the more like ourselves we actually are because the more like the One in whose image we were made we become. To love God is to be truly human and it is this love which enables us to also love other people well.

Truth

I. Love for the saints is a clear sign of new birth. (1)

1 John 5:1 NASB 2020

Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father loves the child born of Him.

How can we know who our true brothers and sisters in Christ are?

We can recognize our fellow Christians by the faith in Christ which we share.

Christians are those who believe that Jesus is indeed the only begotten Son of God.

This faith is natural result of having been born again of God just as Jesus said in John 3.

Belief is not the cause of the new birth, but the result.

We don’t muster up faith, it is a grace gift from God which transforms us from the inside out.

The Father’s work in us produces by the Spirit, through faith in Christ, a new kind of life which is marked by love for God’s family which we have been adopted into.

If we love God, it is natural for us to also love those whom God loves.

If Christ went through so much to bring the saints into eternal life, how could we deny Him by refusing to love those whom He deemed worth spilling His blood to redeem.

Those who love the saints most likely love God too, and those who don’t love the saints probably don’t love God either.

John 13:35 NASB 2020

By this all people will know that you are My disciples: if you have love for one another.”

II. In God’s kingdom, love is obedience and obedience is love. (2-3)

1 John 5:2–3 NASB 2020

By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and follow His commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome.

How do we know that we love the saints?

When we love God.

In God’s kingdom, the proof of our affection for God is obedience.

John 14:15–17 NASB 2020

“If you love Me, you will keep My commandments. “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, so that He may be with you forever; the Helper is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him; but you know Him because He remains with you and will be in you.

Today, people think that love is a feeling alone but God and D.C. Talk both know that love is a verb.

When I love someone, I pursue that person’s good even at my expense.

We obey God because we love Him and want to please Him.

We may not always understand what He is calling us to do, but we trust Him and know that obeying Him and honoring Him is for His glory and our good.

As Christ laid His life down to redeem us, we not lay our lives down in obedience to God.

If we are not in an active pursuit of obeying God’s Word, how can we say that we love Him?

When we follow God’s commandments.

Obeying God not only shows that we love God, but it is loving towards other people when we obey God.

Our world is severely broken. What people need to see is not more brokenness, but healthy living in Christ displayed for them.

Christian people who are radically dedicated to living out God’s word in our lives is proof positive that in spite of this world being a disaster, God’s Kingdom is here and there is hope for a better future.

Our obedience shouts to the world that there is indeed redemption and restoration in Christ.

Also, when we live for Christ we become a positive discipleship influence for other Christians.

When we fail to live obedient lives unto Christ we don’t only hurt ourselves. We rob other Christians of the blessing which they might have recieved by watching us live a Godly life in Christ.

1 Corinthians 11:1 NASB 2020

Be imitators of me, just as I also am of Christ.

We can quickly become a stumbling block in the lives of fellow Christians rather than a blessing and it is a true shame if we waste what God has given us on something less that His glory, His people, and His mission.

Matthew 18:6 NASB 2020

but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to sin, it is better for him that a heavy millstone be hung around his neck, and that he be drowned in the depths of the sea.

The good news is that we are not alone in our pursuit of obedience to God.

He knew we were in over our heads and so He sent us the Holy Spirit to teach us how to actually live as new Kingdom people.

If we are open, God will teach us to obey Him and thus love one another well.

III. Our love for God is what empowers us to overcome the world.

1 John 5:4–5 NASB 2020

For whoever has been born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world: our faith. Who is the one who overcomes the world, but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?

We can’t stop sinning so long as we still love sin and self more than we love Christ and His beloved ones.

It is our love for Christ and His church which has the power to finally root out the sin nature in us.

We won’t want to sin if we have come to truly love God and His saints.

If we love God and we know that sin hurts Him, would we not want to stop participating in what hurts Him?

If we love God’s saints and we know that sin hurts them, would we not want to stop participating in what damages God’s family?

It is the way of Satan to lead others into sin because he enjoys bringing harm to God.

When we are participants in sin, it is loving to no one and ultimately we participate with Satan in harming God’s heart.

Every one of our actions carries with it ripples either for good or for evil.

The real question is this: What is the chief love of our lives which truly motivates us?

Gospel Application

Only a new motivator can move us from being sinful participants in the world who are opposed to God and against His children. That new motivator must be a new all encompassing affection for God which flows from a new birth through faith in Christ.

Not a single one of us is capable of doing this within ourselves, but Christ renews in the Spirit all who truly come to Him by faith.

Our new affection for God leads us to want to honor Him which leads us to work hard at loving those whom God loves with all that we are.

Do you lack a desire to obey God?

This could be because you have never met Him and I think if that is you, it is no coincidence that you are here today listening to this message.

Do you have the desire to obey God but lack the motivation to actually do it?

Christ has not left you alone! You have the Holy Spirit and God desires to anoint you with His presence to empower you to do His works in your life.

How are you doing at loving your fellow believers?

As we draw nearer to God we will naturally grow in our love for other believers so the answer to a robust love for the saints is a deep devotion for God.

Challenge

“When it comes to knowing God, many of us constitute a culture of the spiritually stunted. So much of our religion is packaged to address our felt needs---and these are almost uniformly anchored in our pursuit of happiness and fulfillment, without rightly understanding where true happiness and fulfillment lie. God becomes the Great Being who, potentially at least, meets our needs and fulfills our aspirations. We think too little of what He is like, of His wisdom, knowledge, power, love, transcendence, mystery, and glory. We are not intoxicated by His holiness and His love; His thoughts and words capture too little of our imagination, too little of our discourse, too few of our priorities. Many of our religious exercises and verbal expressions feel painfully unreal, inauthentic, merely formulaic.

In the biblical view of things, a deeper knowledge of God is what brings with it improvement in the other areas mentioned: purity, integrity, a willingness to sacrifice, evangelistic faithfulness, better study of Scripture, improved private and corporate worship, better relationships with brothers and sisters in Christ, a heart for the lost, and much more. But if we seek these things without passionately desiring a deeper knowledge of God, we may be running after God’s blessings or pursuing God’s power without running after Him. We are worse than shallow lovers who want the advantages of having a spouse without wanting soul intimacy---worse, I say, because God is more than any wife, any husband; He is perfect in His love and He has made us for Himself, and our goals and joys are rightly found in Him.” -D. A. Carson (A Call to Spiritual Reformation)

What must you sell out to in order to go all in for God’s kingdom through loving Him and His saints by obeying Him well?

Whatever it is that hold you back from God, it is not worth holding onto. Our challenge today is to lay down our pursuits which lead us away from Christ that we might love as He loves.

A deep love for God transforms everything about us including the way we live and the way we love our fellow saints. What we need more than anything is more of God in our lives.

Let’s orient our lives in such a way that all who watch us would know that what we love most is God and that leads us to love everyone else well too.