Loving God

1 John 4:7-11

INTRODUCTION

This series is DNA: How We Are Designed.

When we talk about man being created in the image of God and what that means, we often talk about self-consciousness, which only man possesses. Man has the capacity to understand himself. Man has the capacity to think abstractly because that’s necessary for relationships, to appreciate beauty, to feel emotion, to be morally conscious, to reason, and to acquire wisdom. All of that is to have the ability to connect and relate to others personally. The core of the image of God can then be summed up with the words “personal relationship.” Man is made with a capacity to love, to love others, and to love God. Within the frame of that love, there is fellowship, care, and the sharing of thoughts, attitudes, and experiences, which makes love the richest of all human experiences. The image of God is the capacity for personal relationships, which come down to giving and receiving love. That's how we are designed, that’s our DNA.

The human heart cries for love more than anything else. It’s the theme of more songs, more plays, more books, more films, more … more literature in general, more poems than any other topic. We long to love and be loved. We long to find that perfect love. All the forms of human discourse tell us that because we have been made in the image of God, love is a driving force in our lives. We want so much that perfect love relationship. That understanding draws us all the way from Genesis 1 to 1 John 4. In 1 John 4, John presents us with the study of love. It is not hard to understand, and it unfolds with simplistic beauty and yet with theological depth.

Christianity is the only religion that identifies the Supreme Being as love. The gods of worldly creation are angry, ill-natured beings who need appeasing. But the Christian God is one of love. That profound reality transforms when we really dig deep and understand it. When we understand it, we as a church begin to see and know how we are to love God.

1 John 4:7–11 (ESV)

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

SCRIPTURAL ANALYSIS

Verses 7-8

Love flows from and out of God and has God as its source of origin. Not only is this true of God, but all who love have been born of God. In other words, inasmuch as anyone has even the slightest capacity to love, this comes by a gift from God.

John is making a bold statement here. Unless someone has been born of God and knows God, which is only through Jesus, their capacity to love isn’t what we think. It is not the person’s ability to love that causes the new birth, but his ability to love flows from his being born again in Christ. It takes knowing Jesus to know love. We are not born with it, and we cannot learn it. Believers receive God’s love only through Jesus.

The phrase “anyone who loves is born of God” does not trivialize the relationship with God as given to anyone who simply knows how to “love.” Only those who have experienced the new birth are able to have the love described here. Those who have received this gift are endowed with God's nature and become partakers of godly love.

When verse 8 says, “God is love,” it is important to note what John is not saying. He is not saying that “God is loving” (though this is true). Nor is he saying that one of God’s activities is “to love” us (though this is also true). John is saying that God is love, that “all of his activity is loving.” Love is the essence of his being. But the reverse is not the case. We cannot say, in other words, that “love is God,” as if any display of affection suddenly qualifies as godly. John is carefully defining the character of God and what it means to live in a relationship with him. To genuinely contemplate the true nature of God is to seek to be like him. A proper comprehension of the personhood of God should lead us to change how we live, behave, and, most importantly, understand love.

Verses 9-10

In these verses, the purpose of sending the Son is not the incarnation but the atonement. God sent his Son to die. Further, God’s love is primary, not ours. The death of Christ is praised and revered. In concluding the verse with the phrase “our sin,” John is keenly aware that all humanity, including himself, has sinned. Our act was to sin. God’s was to love and send a rescuer.

Love is always demonstrated by actions. It is not abstract; it is never complacent or static. Since God is love, all our definitions of what love is and how it behaves must be drawn from him if they are to agree with reality. This also helps to elaborate and explain the quality of love, which John refers to in the previous verses. The love that is the proof of a genuine relationship with God is a love that is manifested in actions for the benefit of others, even to the point of self-sacrifice. Love is defined by constant sacrifice.

God had only one Son, and he was sent into a hostile environment, into a rebellous world, on a rescue mission to redeem and reconcile us to God. Jesus sacrificed himself to save us. This is the defintion of love.

All our love is but a reflection of his and a response to God’s sacrifice. The origin of love lies beyond human effort and initiative. Left to ourselves, we would not love him or each other. We would oppose him and be consumed with self and ego. His boundless, sacrificial love broke our hearts of stone and brought us to Himself. The standard of love is not what humans feel but what God has revealed in Christ’s life and death on the cross.

Verse 11

Verse 11 calls not so much for comment as it does for grateful, obedient implementation. Repeating the call of verse 7, in which the section begins, ‘Let us love one another,’ John has now immensely strengthened his case and his readers’ motivation. Note the little adverb so in the phrase since God so loved us. This takes us back to all the details of the preceding verses. The one who suffered was the eternal, unique Son of the Father. It was his blood that flowed for our forgiveness. And those who have been forgiven will demonstrate this revolutionary change at the heart of their life by a new love for one another. God’s love supplies both the reason and the resources for love.

If God so loved us—and keeps on loving us—then we have no other recourse but to forgive people who have knowingly or unknowingly offended us. The amount of grace we receive is the amount of grace we are to give. John states that if you’re having a hard time forgiving someone, ask the Lord to give you a glimpse of your own sin, a peek at how much He has forgiven you.

Because believers are born of God, they should resemble their Father, who is love. As they grow in appreciation of God’s love for them, their love for him and for other Christians will grow as well. The way God loves people—sacrificially, unselfishly, completely—provides the example for how believers should love.

TODAY’S KEY TRUTH

We Love God by Reflecting Inwardly and Modeling Outwardly the Gospel.

APPLICATION

The background to this scripture is the Jewish understanding of God as living, personal, and active, rather than the Greek concept of deity, which was abstract and very detached. God’s love means that God eternally gives of himself to others, us. That is the Gospel. God gave Jesus for our redemption. God’s love for us in Christ inspires us to love God with all we are, love our neighbor as we love ourselves, and love the lost so they will come to know our loving Father.

To assert comprehensively that “God is love” does not ignore or exclude the other attributes of his being to which the Bible as a whole bears witness, notably his justice and his truth. Our sin required a sacrifice. Somehow, we as sinners had to be made righteous and unblemished by sin to be welcomed home by God. Yes, God is love. But He is also Holy, just, and true.

Some modern theologies tend to transpose the equation “God is love” into the reverse, “Love is God.” But this is not a Johannine or a biblical idea. As John makes absolutely clear in this passage, the controlling principle of the universe is not an abstract quality of “love” but a sovereign, living God who is the source of all love and who loves. God is love.

To imagine God as completely and only loving runs another risk. That is the risk of losing profound respect for him because we have made him too personal, too easygoing, too mushy, and emotional. Perhaps he becomes a grandparent in our thinking, a wise relative who is sage and generous. For some, he is a “bestie” or “friend” but hardly a holy, all-powerful, and sovereign God.

No doubt this was less of a problem in the first century when audiences with any Jewish heritage held God in the highest of respect. His holiness and majesty were commonplace and preeminent in Jewish spiritual life. His grandeur was primary. Thus, when the New Testament speaks of God as a loving Father, a scandal is presented to the first-century hearer: This great, awesome Lord is also interested in profound intimacy with me. However, it is not an either-or proposition. God is holy, powerful, and supreme, and at the same time, we affirm his shocking action to bring about intimacy with us. The good news is a holy, just, all-powerful, and majestic God loves us personally.

When we reclaim the awesomeness and power of God, giving him the utmost respect, then his loving-kindness takes on a new depth and potency. We should feel fear, awe, privilege, and love all at the same moment. This is the good news. The lion’s paw is soft yet powerful. The lion’s growl is deep and loud, yet it utters my name affectionately. That reality should strike us at our core. The God powerful enough to create the entire universe, that of which we are still learning today, chose to love you personally.

So, in this balance of love and holiness, something had to be done for humanity to satisfy God's justice and remain true to his full nature. The Gospel is the "good news" of Jesus Christ, centered on God's plan to save and redeem humanity. This plan begins with recognizing that all people are separated from God due to our sin. In response, God sent His Son, Jesus, to live a perfect life, die on the cross as a sacrifice for humanity's sins, and rise again on the third day. This act of love and grace provides forgiveness and the promise of eternal life to those who believe and trust in Jesus as their Lord and Savior. The Gospel calls individuals to repent from sin, place their faith in Christ, and live a life transformed by His teachings, sharing His love and truth with others. This is the core message of Christianity. The gospel is what God did.

And the gospel is how we grow in love for God each day. Reflect on the gospel. Reflect that out of His great love, immeasurable grace, and mercy, He chose to save you. He chose to rescue you. He chose to seek you out, even while your back was turned on Him in rebellion. I mentioned a few weeks ago that all sin is a power play against God. In your futile power plays against Him, God still loved you.

People often ask and desire to know, “How do I grow closer to God?” How do I grow in my love for God? The answer is the Gospel. Contemplate, study, think on, ponder, read, and reflect on the Gospel. Each day, reflect on the act of love and grace that provided forgiveness and the promise of eternal life to you. Think of how God sought you out. Reflect on how patient God has been with you. Contemplate just how much grace God has had to show you. Reflect on how deep and wide such a love is that despite knowing your every deed and thought He still sent his only son to be sacrificed to rescue you. There is no magic formula to love God. Reflect on the grandness of the gospel. That's how you grow in loving God and obeying God. Meditating on the Gospel is what causes the heart change we all need.

We Love God by Reflecting Inwardly and Modeling Outwardly the Gospel.

CONCLUSION

Love is not like any other subject. It cannot be understood and then practiced. It can only be understood by practice. John affirms that the essence and evidence of Christian living is love. We are commanded to love one another, and John gives the reasons for doing so. The reason is that love has its source in God. Just as light radiates from the sun, love radiates from God’s very nature. And because God is love, he gets to define it, which is done as a sacrifice per the example of Jesus. Love is not a sentimental, squidgy, emotional feeling. It is not an Oprah group hug word. It is more than a description of how you feel. “Love” is a word that can involve your emotions, but its much more than that. The Biblical concept of love is sacrifice. Love is sacrifice. Love seeks the highest good for the one who is loved, not themselves. The Gospel defines love. Love is sacrifice.

When God loves in the Bible, he does not say: “I love you if …” or “I love you because …” God’s love for us does not have anything to do with something in us that caused God to love us. God’s love for us is motivated by who he is, not by who we are. And our love for others should be the same. What John is saying here is that loving God means loving others regardless of who they are. So, the Christian church should be a community of love, unlike any other human society or organization. For the church, loving God is demonstrarted by loving others.

If the church is the body of Christ on earth, then she must reflect Jesus’ character in her relationships. The supernatural love of God for sinners like us is made more credible when unbelievers have seen it reflected in the lives of Christians. Dr. Francis Schaeffer rightly described such love as ‘the ultimate apologetic,’ for the Lord himself said, ‘All men will know that you are my disciples if you love one another’ (Jn. 13:35). Love should be our defining characteristic. People should be able to see Christ’s love in our fellowship and in everything we do.

We love God by loving others as God has loved us. God loves each of us fully. John says, “If God so loved us, they should love each other.” We love God by outwardly loving others. And again, how does God define love? Sacrifice. We love God when, in our love, we sacrifice for others. That is exactly what Jesus did: He sacrificed himself as the greatest demonstartion of love. At the cross Jesus demonstrated and defined love.

We Love God by Reflecting Inwardly and Modeling Outwardly the Gospel.

Since God is love, all our definitions of love and how it behaves must be drawn from him if they align with reality and truth. The love that is the proof of a true relationship with God is a love that is manifested in our constant reflection on the gospel and in our actions for the benefit of others, even to the point of self-sacrifice. The more we focus on the gospel, the more we will live out the gospel to others.

We have complicated the Christian faith with way too many ideas of how to live out our love for God. There’s no magic formula, no universal action steps, no set pattern of practice. Reflect on, think about, meditate, and focus on the Gospel. Jesus sacrificed Himself for you despite knowing everything about you. He came to rescue you despite your deepest, darkest secret. When you do that daily, your faith will grow exponentially. Want to be more comitted to church? Want to be better about studying your Bible and praying? Want to change that attitude or destructive behavior? It starts with setting your heart and mind on the gospel daily. Jesus came from Heaven to earth to rescue you from your sins and the eternal consequences of sin. He willingly sacrificed himself for your salvation. Its the gospel that will cause your love for God and others to grow daily. Its the gospel that will drive us to greater obedience and faith. That's how we, as individuals and as a church, put into practice our mission of “Loving God.” Stay focused on the gospel.

We Love God by Reflecting Inwardly and Modeling Outwardly the Gospel.

There is nothing you can do to make God love you any more than he loves you right now. There is nothing you can do to make God love you any less than he loves you right now. How can we not love Him back with that reality? And how can we not love those around us?

We Love God by Reflecting Inwardly and Modeling Outwardly the Gospel.