Abiding Love
Notes
Transcript
Handout
Please turn in your Bible to 1 John 4:7-21 as we consider Abiding Love.
The song which we just sang was an appeal to Jesus to help us love one another as He loved us. That is not only a goal which we should seek to achieve, it is also a commandment from Christ. As I said last week, before I introduced that song, I wish I had thought to write this song a lot sooner. The reason for that is that this is now the third passage in our study of this epistle in which John deals with the topic of loving one another.
What have we learned about loving one another from our previous studies in this epistle? We have learned that an absence of love is the equivalent of hatred. A person who does not love their spiritual siblings is out of fellowship with God. They are not walking in the light. Instead, they are stumbling around in the darkness.
It is not natural for mankind to love others with a sacrificial love. But Christ calls for believers to exhibit a love which is unnatural to this world. And the truth is that though this love of which Christ calls us to is unnatural to mankind, it is natural to our new nature in Jesus Christ.
What is natural for mankind is to love the things of this world. But Christ calls for believers to deny our natural tendency to love the things of this world.
Further, we have seen that the commandment to love one another in a Christ-like fashion is the message this church had heard from the time it was first founded by the Apostle Paul. We have also seen that Cain was not the example we should follow regarding brotherly love. Cain was of the evil one, and he loved the things of this world. His love for the world caused him to hate his brother, and to murder him. And our love for Christ, as well as for our spiritual siblings, may cause the world to demonstrate their hatred toward us, just as Cain did toward Abel.
Rather than following the example of Cain, we should follow the example of Christ who demonstrated His love for us by laying down His life for our sake. The words of a Southern Gospel song that was popular a decade or two ago ring through my mind as I write this.
His life for mine,
His life for mine;
How can it ever be?
That He should die?
God’s Son should die
To save a wretch like me!
What love divine,
He gave His life for mine.
John also taught that since Christ laid down His life for us, we also ought to be willing to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters in Christ.
Finally, we saw a couple weeks ago that God gave one, two-fold, commandment. The first fold of the commandment is to believe in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ. The second is to love one another as He commanded us. One command, two aspects.
As we go through our lengthy passage for this morning we will see ten things as it relates to the believers love for one another. On some points we will spend quite some time, on others we will move rather quickly. Since this is a lengthy passage, we will not read the whole passage like usual. But we will read each verse as we come to it.
Let’s begin by looking at
The Commandment to Love
The Commandment to Love
Note that,
True Believers in Jesus will Love Their Spiritual Siblings Since Loving One Another is a Part of our New Nature in Christ
Look at verses 7-8.
7 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.
8 Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
Notice that John begins, once again by calling his readers beloved — loved ones. He is writing to a community of believers in Jesus Christ, and not to the world at large. Then John goes on to give another imperative command to love one another. What is the reason stated for this command? Because love comes from God.
I have stated previously that phileo love — brotherly love — is natural to our human nature. But agape love — a love of the will which is sacrificial in nature — is a supernatural love. It comes from God. Paul wrote of this in
5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
True believers in Jesus Christ have a supernatural ability to love because the Holy Spirit has taken residence within us. Sadly, sin can quench the working of the Spirit in us. That is why Paul exhorted believers to not quench the Spirit.
It seems rather obvious that the false teachers whom John was combatting sought to minimize the importance of love. In our society today, those who seek to indoctrinate us minimize the importance of loving others by emphasizing the need for self-love. I remember a song that was popular around the time that my wife and I were married, which was sung by Whitney Houston. It was a beautiful, moving song, but the message was deceitful — “Learning to love yourself is the greatest love of all.” There is room in Scripture for self-love — love your neighbor as yourself. But the implication is that it comes natural to people to love themselves, but God calls us to love others with very same level of love.
John puts forward a test regarding new birth. Look at verses 7-8 again.
7 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.
8 Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
If a person does not love others as much as they love themselves, there is room for questioning if they have truly been born again. I find this text to be so convicting because my nature is to be selfish rather than self-less, which is the requirement of love.
Having looked at the commandment to love, let’s look now at
The Manifestation of Love
The Manifestation of Love
Note that,
Believers are to Reflect God’s Love in Our Love for One Another
Look at verses 9-10.
9 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.
10 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.
John Stott wrote, “The sending of God’s Son was both the revelation of his love (This is how God showed his love … 9) and, indeed, the very essence of love itself (this is love … 10). It is not our love that is primary, but God’s (10), free, uncaused and spontaneous, and all our love is but a reflection of his and a response to it. The coming of Christ is, therefore, a concrete, historical revelation of God’s love, for love (agapē) is self-sacrifice, the seeking of another’s positive good at one’s own cost, and a greater self-giving than God’s gift of his Son there has never been, nor could be.” (John R. W. Stott, The Letters of John: An Introduction and Commentary, vol. 19, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1988), 162.)
First, God’s love is seen in the sending of His Son into the world. This is a reference to the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, and a strong proof of the doctrine of the deity of Christ. Some say that doctrine is not important — what is important is practice. Both doctrine and practice are important, and it is best when they work hand in hand with one another. The truth is that out of obedience to the Father, the Son left the glories of heaven to become a man and live on earth as a man. He was encumbered with all the aspects of humanity, yet without sin.
Second, God’s love is seen in that He sent His Son into the world so that we might live through Him. Jesus Christ is the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but by Him. Jesus, not Mohammad, not Buda, not Hare Krishna, nor any other so-called religious figure is the way to God. Jesus is the way to God, first because He is God incarnate — God in the flesh. He is also the way to God because it is only through His sacrificial death, and His resurrection from the dead that we can be saved. Jesus is the truth in that He is truth incarnate. And Jesus is life in that in Him was life, and that life was the light of men.
Third, God’s love is seen in that He sent His Son into the world to be our sin-bearer. In His death Jesus absorbed God’s wrath which was intended for us. That’s what the term “propitiation” means.
So far, we have looked at the commandment and the manifestation of love. Let’s now turn to
The First Implication of Love
The First Implication of Love
Note that,
Believers Have an Inward Constraint to Love One Another
Look at verses 11
11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
“F.F. Bruce (p. 109) has shown: “If the children of God must be holy because He is holy (Lev 11:44f; 1 Pet 1:15f and merciful because He is merciful (Lk 6:36), so they must be loving because He is loving—not with the ‘must’ of external compulsion but with the ‘must’ of inward constraint: God’s love is poured into their hearts by the Holy Spirit whom they have received (Rom 5:5).” (Glenn W. Barker, “1 John,” in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Hebrews through Revelation, ed. Frank E. Gaebelein, vol. 12 (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1981), 343.)
If we do not experience this inward constraint to love then there should be paused to consider if our profession of faith is authentic. This would be one of those times which Paul’s admonition should be followed.
5 Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!
Look at verse 12.
12 No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.
Some commentators think that the false teachers were teaching that they had in fact seen God in some type of mystical vision. And that is why they had this special knowledge of God which even the apostles did not have. But John squashes that idea by reinforcing the biblical truth that no man has ever seen God. God is invisible. He is perceivable but not visible. We perceive Him by His work in nature since the heavens declare the glory of God. We also perceive Him in His written Word which He has given to us as a way of revealing Himself to us. God is also perceived in His children when they demonstrate the same kind of sacrificial love which God has.
How is it that God’s love is perfected in us? Does that mean that God needs us to complete or perfect His love? In other words God’s love is not complete without us? Absolutely not. God does not need us — we need Him, but He doesn’t need us. Though God does not need us, He certain desires for us to have an intimate relationship with Him.
Note that,
God’s Love is Visibly Display in the World Through the Loving Acts of Believers
MacArthur wrote, “In verse 12 John makes the simple point that if no one has seen God the Father at any time (cf. John 4:24; 1 Tim. 1:17; 6:16), and Jesus is no longer visibly present to manifest Him, people will not see God’s love unless believers love one another.” (John MacArthur, 1, 2, 3 John, MacArthur New Testament Commentary (Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers, 2007), 168–169.)
Let’s move on from the first implication to
The Proof of Abiding in Christ
The Proof of Abiding in Christ
Note that,
The Indwelling Presence of the Holy Spirit is the Proof that We Belong to Jesus
Look at verse 13.
13 By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.
Boice noted, “To believe in Christ and to love the brethren are not conditions by which we may dwell in God but rather are evidences of the fact that God has already taken possession of our lives to make this possible.” (James Montgomery Boice, The Epistles of John: An Expositional Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2004), 117.)
Three times in verses 13-16 something is said about what one commentator referred to as “Reciprocal Abiding;” — we abide in Him and He is us. This is the first mention. Glen Barker wrote, “Reciprocal abiding (2:24; 4:13, 15—God in us, we in God) is the final expression of fellowship with God. It is possible only through the gift of his Spirit, by whom the relationship with the Father and with the Son is sealed eternally. Reciprocal abiding makes possible God’s love for us and our love for him. It is also the reason we can love one another.” (Glenn W. Barker, “1 John,” in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Hebrews through Revelation, ed. Frank E. Gaebelein, vol. 12 (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1981), 344–345.)
Elsewhere Paul wrote to the Romans
16 The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God,
17 and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.
The presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives assures us that we truly belong to Jesus.
Let’s move on to consider once again
The Apostolic Message
The Apostolic Message
Note that,
The Apostolic Message is the Foundation of Our Faith
Look at verse 14.
14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world.
In His first advent, Jesus had a mission to accomplish. He was to willingly lay down His life for the sake of all who would embrace Him as their Lord and Savior. As He hung on the cross He cried out in a loud voice “It is finished.” Mission accomplished.
There is a two-fold witness to the truth that God sent His Son to save His people. First, the apostles were eyewitnesses of this truth. And they documented what they witnessed in the writings of the NT. Second, the Holy Spirit is also a witness to it, as we looked at in our previous point.
Let’s consider now
The Confession
The Confession
Note that,
The Believers Confession of Christ is Evidence of the Reciprocal Abiding of God in Them, and They in God
Look at verse 15.
15 Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.
This is the second reference to mutual abiding. Barker wrote,
The Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Volume 12: Hebrews through Revelation B. Living in God and Living in Love (4:13–16)
Initially John connected the fellowship with obedience to the command to love one another (3:24). Then he showed its dependence on the gift of the Spirit (4:13). Here he shows that the fellowship is built on Jesus, who must be acknowledged as being one with the Father (2:23), as the one who came in the flesh (4:2), and as the Son of God who was sent to be the Savior of the world (4:14–15).
Stott noted that, “The aorist tense of the term translated ‘confesses’(homologēsē) cannot be rendered precisely in English. John is referring neither to a future confession (‘shall confess’, av, rv), nor to a present and continuing confession (‘confesses’, esv; ‘acknowledges’, niv), but to a single and decisive public confession, the time of which is unspecified.”(John R. W. Stott, The Letters of John: An Introduction and Commentary, vol. 19, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1988), 167–168.)
Can you remember the exact time when you confessed Jesus is the Son of God? Some can, some can’t. My dad, while being a dynamic believer in my mind, was never really certain if he was saved when he was a teen or if it was when he was 25. As a teen he felt the Lord moving in his life; and I believe he made a private confession of faith. But my dad was a real introvert, and there was no one in his family who was a Christian at the time. And he was worried that by becoming a Christian he would have to become a preacher — and he didn’t think he could handle speaking in front of a group of people. A few years later his older brother, Arvle, came to faith in Christ, and he was an extrovert, which made it easier for my dad to make a public profession. And when dad was 25 he totally surrendered to the Lord, and then was baptized as a public statement about his faith. And best of all the Lord didn’t force him to become a preacher — He caused his older brother to become the preacher (not to mention his youngest son).
Let’s move from confession to
The Experience of Love
The Experience of Love
Note that,
To Live in God is to Live in Love
Look at verse 16.
16 So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.
First we see that as believers we both experience the love of God, and embrace it. The term for “know” implies knowing by experience, or knowing intimately. We have experienced God’s love because it has been poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit. But before we experienced it we embraced the message of the gospel. We believed that the demonstration of God’s love in sending His Son to die on our behalf was the only way by which we can be saved. And we embraced Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. Since that time we have continually experienced the love of God since His mercies are new every morning. And the more we grow in Christ the more we become cognizant or aware of His love.
John defends his statement by noting once again that God is love. Further, he stated that whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.
This is the third and final reference in our text to reciprocal abiding. Barker again wrote, The fellowship we have with the Father and with the Son (1:3), the fellowship in which he lives in us and we live in him, is perceived as nothing other than a fellowship of love.” (Glenn W. Barker, “1 John,” in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Hebrews through Revelation, ed. Frank E. Gaebelein, vol. 12 (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1981), 345.)
Let’s look now at
The Perfection of Love
The Perfection of Love
Note that,
Fear and Love are Incompatible with One Another
Look at verse 17.
17 By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is so also are we in this world.
In verse 12 John had stated that when we love one another, God’s love is perfected in us. Now he circles back to this idea of God’s love being perfected. Because God’s love is perfected in us we then will have great boldness on the day of judgment. Believers in Jesus Christ will have a different judgment than unbelievers. We will appear before the Bema seat of Christ where we will be adjudicated regarding our works. The outcome of this judgment will not result in damnation for any who appear before this court. That judgment was settled at the cross when Jesus Paid it All! The Bema seat judgment will determine who receives which reward.
When I was in junior high and high school I played French Horn in the band. Added to that, in high school I sang bass in the choir as well. Each year I would go with both groups to band and choir festivals, as well as solo and ensemble festivals. We would perform two or three pieces before a judge who would then adjudicate us. Sometimes the judges would talk to us about our performance along with providing a written report. Other times we would just see a written report at the end. This is the kind of things which will happen at judgment seat of Christ. There will be no condemnation since we are in Christ Jesus. There will be rewards and loss of rewards.
Look at verse 18.
18 There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.
Zane Hodges pointed out that “The words fear has to do with punishment are literally, “fear has punishment.” Fear carries with it a kind of torment that is its own punishment. Ironically, an unloving believer experiences punishment precisely because he feels guilty and is afraid to meet his Judge. Such fear prohibits a completed love (one who fears is not made perfect in love). But a Christian who loves has nothing to fear and thus escapes the inner torment which a failure to love can bring.” (Zane C. Hodges, “1 John,” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures, ed. J. F. Walvoord and R. B. Zuck, vol. 2 (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1985), 900.)
Let’s consider now
The Motivation for our Love for God
The Motivation for our Love for God
Note that,
All True Humans Examples of Sacrificial Love are a Response to God’s Love
Look at verse 19.
19 We love because he first loved us.
This love that John wrote about originated with the Father. It was lived out in the Son. And it is perceived in the loving actions of God’s children. God doesn’t love us because we loved Him first, and so He decided to reciprocate our love. It is the other way around. God loved us, and so we seek to reciprocate His love for us.
So far, we have looked at the commandment, manifestation, implication, proof, confession, perfection, and motivation regarding love. As we finish, let’s look at
The Second Implication of Love
The Second Implication of Love
Note that,
The Perfect Love Which Drives out Fear Also Drives out Hatred
Look at verse 20.
20 If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.
When we understand that God’s love for us can never be taken away it gives us great confidence before Him. While this confidence delivers us from fear, it does not deliver us from the need to put our love into action. Remember, that hatred of our brothers and sister in not necessarily having a malevolent feeling towards them. Turning a blind eye to their needs which we are able to meet is also an expression of hatred. Being indifferent toward a brother or sister in Christ is hatred. And if we say that we love God, and yet remain indifferent to the plight of those within our faith community, God calls us liars. If we cannot tangibly love a person whom we see, how can we think that we love a spirit-being whom we cannot see.
Look at John’s closing statement in verse 21.
21 And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother.
When Jesus was asked what was the greatest commandment He immediately stated that loving God was the greatest commandment, and that the second was like it, loving our neighbor as ourselves. They are, in a sense, one command; you cannot have one without having the other.
MacArthur wrote, “[The type of love we are to have for our brothers and sisters in Christ] seeks nothing in return; instead it unconditionally forgives (cf. Matt. 18:21–22), bears others’ burdens (Gal. 6:2), and sacrifices to meet their needs (Acts 20:35; Phil. 2:3–4). Yet it is also a righteous love that tolerates neither false doctrine nor habitual sin (1 Tim. 5:20; cf. 2 Thess. 3:15).” (John MacArthur, 1, 2, 3 John, MacArthur New Testament Commentary (Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers, 2007), 171.)
That is a high standard for love. May we all pray that the Holy Spirit help us to live up to this love to which we have been called.
Let’s pray.
Father,
We have seen in Your Word the importance of loving one another. We have even seen that based on our new nature in Christ, that it is natural for us to do so. But we also fight with our flesh when it comes to demonstrating such love. Help us, Lord to overcome our fleshly tendencies, and live in accordance with our new nature. Help us to truly love one another.
Father, I pray for any here who are not believers in Jesus. Perhaps they are not believers because they have witnessed unloving things that so-called believers have done. Help them, Father, to look to what You have done in Christ as the standard of love. Open the eyes of their hearts so that they can perceive the truth of Your glorious gospel and be saved. I pray this in Jesus name. Amen.
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Ephesians 6:23–24 “23 Peace be to the brothers, and love with faith, from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. 24 Grace be with all who love our Lord Jesus Christ with love incorruptible.”
