The Christian Life (3)

Introduction

Series Recap

Jesus was asked, “What is the greatest commandment?

"Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and all your strength.”

this is the Shema, something that the people of Israel would pray every morning and evening.

a reminder to put God before all else every morning and night

this is what John has been writing about thus far…

Jesus said, “the second is like it, love your neighbor as yourself.”

John is moving us there today

we have been hearing about who God is, and knowing we are his

now, we are going to transition to loving others

The Christian Life

we are to live in this world separate from it, our hearts longing for our eternal home

in doing so, we are not to allow the world to influence us

I am afraid that we are seeing it

we are living in a time that people are so divided

regardless of why you think that is, really doesn’t matter

we are not to be adding to the divisiveness

1 John 3:11-18 For this is the message you have heard from the beginning: We should love one another, 12 unlike Cain, who was of the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his deeds were evil, and his brother’s were righteous. 13 Do not be surprised, brothers and sisters, if the world hates you. 14 We know that we have passed from death to life because we love our brothers and sisters. The one who does not love remains in death. 15 Everyone who hates his brother or sister is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life residing in him. 16 This is how we have come to know love: He laid down his life for us. We should also lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. 17 If anyone has this world’s goods and sees a fellow believer in need but withholds compassion from him—how does God’s love reside in him? 18 Little children, let us not love in word or speech, but in action and in truth.

PRAY!

Love One Another

This is where we are struggling as a country

we can argue as to why, I personally think that it is a selfishness, or a lack of care for humanity itself

this is why abortion is such a profitable hard fought thing in our country

it is not a baby, it is just a fetus

the mother would be inconvenienced, they wouldn’t be a good mom, the family cannot afford it, the dad is gone,

1 John 3:11-15 For this is the message you have heard from the beginning: We should love one another, 12 unlike Cain, who was of the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his deeds were evil, and his brother’s were righteous. 13 Do not be surprised, brothers and sisters, if the world hates you. 14 We know that we have passed from death to life because we love our brothers and sisters. The one who does not love remains in death. 15 Everyone who hates his brother or sister is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life residing in him.

How do we love one another

Not like Cain

retell Cain and Abel found in Genesis 4

Cain was the son of Adam and Eve… they had been kicked out of the Garden

assuming that they would have told their kids about God

that they would continue making sacrifices to him

Cain decides that he does not want to give God a sacrifice of an animal, he is a farmer

Cain gives a sacrifice of the field, the best work of his hands

Abel gave the first born, the best parts

God tells him that he sacrifice is not accepted, but if you did what is right, will I not accept you

Cain was only worried about being accepted by God the way that he wanted to be accepted

he wanted to worship his way, and as such, being the one who makes the decisions

putting himself in the place of God

in doing so, he ends up murdering his brother, who had the acceptable sacrifice

can we see that in ourselves

What is our faith like when it is all about us

Religion is an emotional event only,

we end up chasing an emotional high

we love the feeling, not Jesus himself

this puts how we feel above everyone and everything

when we are supposed to be here

we make scripture fit what we believe, not believing based on scripture

our image of God

politics, believing or wanting to believe things about politicians that we do not believe about those of the other party

we believe so that we don’t go to hell

hell is real, there should be no desire to go

but we should desire Jesus, not just “not hell”

we use religion to lift ourselves up and push others down

What do we get for this love

the world will hate us

why - the darkness hates to be exposed by the light

Satan hates God, it is only natural that those of Satan would hate God’s children

John calls Cain child of Satan

v10 - it would be obvious if you are a child of God or a child of Satan

I am not trying to intentionally be provocative

the bible tells us that you are on one side or the other

what do we do in response

the temptation is to return evil with evil, an eye for an eye

God says that vengeance belongs to him alone

we are to repay evil with good, love and pray for our enemies

we must learn to hate evil and the evil one and continue to love those that are blinded by him

do we not see that this is how the world treated Jesus

he, as John stated, was without sin, yet the world crucified him

why do we, who are supposed to be like him, think that we would be treated any different

I pray our church is like that of Acts 5, praising God that we are found worthy of being persecuted and praying for the boldness to continue to live that way

This life will be our evidence that we have passed from death to life

that we are in fact saved

that we are God’s children

our love for others is the evidence that we are saved, not the product by which we are saved

Serve One Another

To love each other sounds easy enough

I can say that I love others,

isn’t that enough

stand before Jesus and have him ask, did you love others and you reply of course I did

the truth is, God knows what is in your heart

it isn’t just answering yes to the question, Jesus knows if you actually do

so John tells us how we can be sure that we are truly loving others

and that is by serving others

1 John 3:16-18 This is how we have come to know love: He laid down his life for us. We should also lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. 17 If anyone has this world’s goods and sees a fellow believer in need but withholds compassion from him—how does God’s love reside in him? 18 Little children, let us not love in word or speech, but in action and in truth.

“Until Jesus came, the world did not know this kind of love.” David Jeremiah

Jesus laid down his life for you

meaning he left heaven

that should leave us in amazement, look around at the world today, do we see a whole lot that is worth dying for

more than that, he left heaven… he was being worshipped, he is God

Romans 5:6-8 For while we were still helpless, at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For rarely will someone die for a just person—though for a good person perhaps someone might even dare to die. 8 But God proves his own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

rarely we will see a sacrifice for some that we have some value, we say it to loved ones,

but we were neither just or good, we were helpless, we were sinners

He took the form of a man, meaning he denied himself

he did not come as God saying worship me, but as a servant

read the book of Mark, notice in that book how Mark illustrates Jesus as a servant

compassionate enough to heal the sick and lame, to feed the five thousand, washing the feet of the apostles to dying on the cross for you and I

this is how we are to love

Paul tells husbands to love their wives like Christ loved the church

that we would deny ourselves, serve with compassion to fill her needs and present her to the father

but we, the church are supposed to serve everyone this way

not just the one that you are married to… please understand that the love chapter, 1 Corinthians 13 is not for married people but for believers and their love for others

1 Corinthians 13:1-7 If I speak human or angelic tongues but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so that I can move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 And if I give away all my possessions, and if I give over my body in order to boast but do not have love, I gain nothing. 4 Love is patient, love is kind. Love does not envy, is not boastful, is not arrogant, 5 is not rude, is not self-seeking, is not irritable, and does not keep a record of wrongs. 6 Love finds no joy in unrighteousness but rejoices in the truth. 7 It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

not only is this not just for marriage, this is for our enemy

our country does not need a certain party in power to fix everything, we need Christians that know what it means to love like Jesus

This love will cost you

“ Because love not about what we feel for others, it is about what we do for others.” David Jeremiah

words are simply not enough

James 2:15-16 If a brother or sister is without clothes and lacks daily food 16 and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, stay warm, and be well fed,” but you don’t give them what the body needs, what good is it?

this is how the world loves you…

isn’t this how the politicians love you, every four years making promises to you about how they will love you only to do nothing and then come back again in four years

the world loves based on what you can offer it

this is why we have so many abortions in our nation

that little baby doesn’t give them anything, it is inconvenient, costly, and disposable

this is why killings in our nation isn’t important to us until it is somebody close to us

May we leave here today, having served and encouraged one another, and take that love to the rest of the world

I am not preaching this because I am perfect in this

but I am asking you to join me, the world needs us