Love and Fear | 1 John 4:17-21
Notes
Transcript
[Scripture Reading]
17 And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect. So we will not be afraid on the day of judgment, but we can face him with confidence because we live like Jesus here in this world.
18 Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love. 19 We love each other because he loved us first.
20 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? 21 And he has given us this command: Those who love God must also love their fellow believers.
There are two main words in our passage tonight: love (surprise surprise) and fear. If y’all remember from our last passage a couple weeks ago, we learned about how the Holy Spirit is THE proof that we are saved. And in that passage, John repeats the idea that has been our focus for the past few months which is that those who have God living in them lives in love.
And we’re still talking about love, but here he begins to contrast love with fear. I’ve gotta admit, this passage has caused me to do some soul searching. To identify based on my past experiences why fear is contrasted with love in this passage.
And that’s our topic tonight: as God’s love is being perfected in us as it says in verse 17, we will not be afraid.
1. Loving God means expelling fear. (vv. 17-18)
1. Loving God means expelling fear. (vv. 17-18)
17 And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect. So we will not be afraid on the day of judgment, but we can face him with confidence because we live like Jesus here in this world.
18 Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love.
So as I mentioned a few weeks ago, verse 12 of this chapter provided a blanket statement for the next couple passages we’d be going through.
1 John 4:12 (NLT)
12 …if we love each other, God lives in us, and his love is brought to full expression in us.
Last time we talked about how God lives in us through His Spirit and John used the trinity to explain the Holy Spirit’s role in our lives. In this passage, John uses fear to talk about God’s love being made perfect or being brought to full expression in us.
Now it’s important for us to make a distinction before we dive into this. We should fear God. Now you might be wondering, “Well verse 18 says, ‘Such love has no fear.’” Let me explain.
9 Fear the Lord, you his godly people,
for those who fear him will have all they need.
There are countless spots in the Bible where it says we are to fear God. Many in the old testament said that it was wise to fear God.
7 Fear of the Lord is the foundation of true knowledge,
but fools despise wisdom and discipline.
28 And this is what he says to all humanity:
‘The fear of the Lord is true wisdom;
to forsake evil is real understanding.’ ”
10 Fear of the Lord is the foundation of true wisdom.
All who obey his commandments will grow in wisdom.
Praise him forever!
And in many of those quotes and countless others, it says fearing God is keeping His commandments.
13 All who fear the Lord will hate evil.
Therefore, I hate pride and arrogance,
corruption and perverse speech.
So it is wise to fear God and fearing God is hating evil and keeping God’s commandments.
It’s similar to what you do when your parent tell you to do something. You do what they ask you out of love to them, but you also do it because you fear what would happen if you didn’t do it. It would cause division between you and your parent which would then result in you being punished.
In a similar way, we ought to fear division with God; separation from Him.
The best way I can describe it is we hold God in such a high place in our lives that even the thought of disobeying Him brings fear because we want so badly to be in a close relationship with Him. A good word for that is reverence. In fact, David even describes fear of God as reverence in Psalm 33.
Psalm 33:8 (NLT)
8 Let the whole world fear the Lord,
and let everyone stand in awe of him [or “revere Him”].
So let’s take a look at our passage and see what John means by fear in this passage.
Verse 17 says that we won’t need to be afraid on the day of judgment, but we can face God with confidence. And why is that, because we lived like Jesus here in the world.
John just finished up talking about how the Holy Spirit is proof that we are saved. And that’s what he is referring to here when he writes this. Because we have the Holy Spirit, we are going to live like Jesus on this Earth. And because of that, we won’t need to be afraid of what God is going to do to us on the day of judgment, because we know we are saved. We know that Jesus died and took the wrath of our sin.
He goes on to write in verse 18 that love has no fear because love expels fear. If you’re afraid on judgment day, it’s because you’re afraid that you’ll be punished for your sin. And then he writes that if you have that fear, you have not fully experienced His love.
Try to think about what John might mean when he says that. If you’re afraid God might punish you for your sins, you have not fully experienced His love.
I can think of two reasons why he might say that. Number 1 is if you see God on the day of judgment and you know you didn’t accept Jesus as your Savior, you know what’s coming next. You know you ARE about to be judged for every sin you’ve committed and you’ll be afraid.
Another reason he might say that is as we are growing in our relationship with God, we begin to know God more. And we begin to understand how loving and gracious He is. And as we live our lives on this Earth, we may still mess up and be afraid of the consequences. We might still fear the consequences of our actions. But the more you experience God’s love, the less afraid you are when you mess up. You’re still convicted and realize what you did was bad, but you’re not as afraid of the consequences because you know Jesus died for your sins and you know that sin is paid for.
Either way, you need a better understanding of who God is. Whether you aren’t saved and need to accept Him as your Savior or you are saved and need to understand Him more fully, you still need more of Him.
If you aren’t saved and you need to accept Jesus as your Savior, let me just explain who Jesus is and what He did for you. Jesus is God, but He chose to take on flesh or become a human. He lived a perfect life on this Earth without sin, then He died on a cross to pay the penalty that you owe for being a sinner. He did this because He loves you. And if you confess Him as your Savior, you can be saved.
And this will come at a cost. The call to follow Jesus can be tough. We’re gonna face trials in life that are gonna be difficult to walk through. But as you begin to understand God more fully; as you fully experience His love, you don’t have to be afraid. And you can love others as He loves you.
Verse 19 says, “We love each other because He loved us first.”
2. Loving God means loving people. (vv. 19-21)
2. Loving God means loving people. (vv. 19-21)
20 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? 21 And he has given us this command: Those who love God must also love their fellow believers.
Did you know that when you love another believer you are loving God? Why do you think that is? A good spiritual answer is if you have God living in you then that means you’re gonna love the way He does. And that’s true, but I think there’s a more practical answer as well.
If you’re a christian and you have the Holy Spirit living in you, you have God living in you. Therefore, loving you literally means loving God because God lives in you.
We need to love the church. We’re called to live in community with our fellow believers and love them. So that means confessing sin to one another, holding one another accountable, helping each other where you can.
Now these verses don’t explicitly use the word fear, but I want to show you why it is still a factor in these verses.
Why do you think you would hate another person? Think about that for a minute.
Let’s say Nick tells me I look funny and punches me in the face right now and that causes me to hate him. Why do you think I began hating him? Well he told me I look funny in front of all of y’all and I care about how other people view me, so that could be the reason I hate him. He punched me in the face and I don’t really like to feel pain so that could be the reason I hate him.
Either way, fear plays into both of those reasons. I’m either afraid that my reputation is gonna go down or I’m afraid to get hurt.
A wise man once said, “Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, and hate leads to suffering.” You can thank Yoda for that bit of wisdom.
But honestly when you think about it, it’s true. Your fear of others is going to lead to hate.
So that introduces a new idea. You should fear God or have reverence for God, but you shouldn’t fear man. There are countless verses in the Bible that say this, but I’ll just quote a couple.
14 But even if you suffer for doing what is right, God will reward you for it. So don’t worry or be afraid of their threats.
6 So we can say with confidence,
“The Lord is my helper,
so I will have no fear.
What can mere people do to me?”
What can people do to you? Anything other people can do to you, I bet you won’t even bat an eye to it when you get to heaven. It’ll be nothing!
I want to take these verses a step further. Jesus calls us to love everyone, even our enemies. And we love everyone by sharing the love that God has shown us to the world.
And what’s the reason we don’t share the gospel? We’re afraid! We’re afraid of rejection. We don’t want them to reject us, those around us to reject us. But when you get to heaven and you see even one more person there because you chose to step out of your comfort zone, stop being afraid, and share the gospel with someone who needed it, you won’t be worried about that other time you struck out. What’s a few strike-outs if one more person is saved from eternal damnation to live in Heaven for all eternity.
Fear of God drives you toward God and people. Fear of man drives you away from God and people.
I’m not trying to get you to question your salvation. But you love the world through bringing others to Christ. You’re actually hating others when you choose to fear them over God. And that doesn’t mean you have to tell others about Jesus in every conversation you have. It may just look like showing them how a Christian forgives, cares, loves. But if you can’t love a person sitting right beside you, how can you love God whom you can’t even see.
And I’m preaching to myself here. I’m disappointed at how many times I’ve had the option to share Christ with someone and chose not to. But thanks be to God. Because I know He saves me when I fall short, and He changes my heart so that next time I’ll be bold enough to share my faith.
25 Fearing people is a dangerous trap,
but trusting the Lord means safety.
I wanna close out tonight with a quote from a famous psychiatrist. Her name is Elisabeth Kubler Ros. Do y’all know the five stages of grief? She came up with that. She said this about fearing other people,
“There are only two emotions: love and fear. All positive emotions come from love, all negative emotions from fear. From love flows happiness, contentment, peace, and joy. From fear comes anger, hate, anxiety and guilt. It's true that there are only two primary emotions, love and fear. But it's more accurate to say that there is only love or fear, for we cannot feel these two emotions together, at exactly the same time. They're opposites. If we're in fear, we are not in a place of love. When we're in a place of love, we cannot be in a place of fear.”
You can’t love people if you’re afraid of them. You can love God if you’re afraid of Him. You can also love people if you’re afraid of God. Who are you afraid of? Do you hold God with reverence in your life? Or are you still more afraid of man than you are God?
