Sermon Tone Analysis

Q. What is love?

A feeling, an emotion - or perhaps, an act of the will?

Q.

When the church is commanded to love one another, how can we be commanded to feel a particular way about a person, if love is primarily an emotion?

- If we are honest, we would admit that the church is made up of many different personalities that may or may not agree with our own

- We have rubbed each other up the wrong way.

Said things we shouldn’t have said; Done things we shouldn’t have done

Q.

If we are commanded to feel love toward someone we’ve had conflict with, how on earth can that happen?

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- Can I suggest to you that we have, in modern western culture, turned love on its head

- In this diagram, we see that the feeling of love is set over the actions of love.

- I want to suggest that we have this upside down

- But I don’t want to give you the impression that feelings are unimportant, but I do want to challenge the conventional way we have primarily conceived love as mostly, that loving feeling

- Here in this slide, I believe the biblical definition has this diagram the other way around where love as an act of the will is set over love as a feeling

- Love as an act of the will means that you can be commanded to love - you can act in love without having to insist that the feeling of love must accompany it

- That makes much sense when feelings come and go with love.

It also releases you from the great burden of being unable to feel love for a fellow believer who happens to grate on your personality

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- But lest I am misunderstood, when it comes to marriage, it is not strictly, “I will marry anyone and with the act of my will, I will make it work”

- Yes, love as an act of your will is absolutely necessary in marriage, but there are many more factors that go into marriage & I don’t want to leave you with the impression that it is simply an act of your will & feelings and other factors don’t count

- There are other things to consider like: Is the person a genuine Christian; Is the person respectable and shows respect; Is the person of good character etc..

- This passage is speaking about love within the community of believers

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- Love as an act of the will over love as merely a feeling is reinforced in 1st Corinthians

1. Abiding in Life

- Here is that phrase again - “from the beginning”

- The opening statement of Luke probably gives us the best insight into what “from the beginning” means

- The beginning has to do with the ministry of Jesus & the particular requirement for an apostle was to be a witness of His life, death and resurrection

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- The apostles know that Jesus gave them a primary command: to love one another!

- Again, I wouldn’t want you to think of love primarily as “that lovin feeling”

- Love involves many aspects: Counsel (straight talk), rebuke, protection, comfort, care & service - to name but some

- But did you notice that love is not just about keeping peace - sometimes love requires doing right & what is best

- In Israel, love was firstly something that was best for the community & the individual came after that

- Which is why we see in 1st John, that John acts strongly against those who are causing danger to the church - we’ll see this in next week’s message as well

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- Acting in love is the goal of this message today & I’d like to highlight this verse for special mention

- Now when it comes to church relationships, if we don’t hate someone, we think we are doing ok

- That person or persons, who happen to grate on you we think, that provided we don’t hate them then, we get a pass

- It’s not that simple as this verse makes clear - “the one who does not love abides in death”, John says

- You just can’t avoid those thorny people in the church & not act in love towards them - notice I didn’t say that you had to feel love for them, but to act in love towards them

- If you do act in love towards them, the strangest thing happens - the feelings get in line

- As I have said in the past: “Feelings are great servants, but terrible masters”

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- You don’t want to let yourself be led by your feelings - act in faith, act in obedience to the Lord’s command & see what happens with those unruly feelings - they start to get in line

- It won’t be easy if you have let feelings & emotions rule you one too many times, as they will kick up a stink whenever you call them to order

- But if you do, they will start to come into line bringing positive feelings, positive emotions

- This is what John is saying: we love one another in obedience to the command of Christ & if we are faithful to that, good or positive feelings should be a corollary

- I will love is the solution to the dilemma of the lack of feeling love

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- Furthermore, John seems to grant no middle ground (no neutrality) - to not act in love is to hate

- I draw that conclusion from the black & white nature of biblical contrasts, but also from here in this passage

- “He who does not love his brother abides in death…Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer”

- If you don’t love as in the actions of love towards a brother or sister in Christ, then that lack of love is akin to hate

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- Now you might strenuously object saying that that is ridiculous & I would agree based on the way the western world thinks - but this is biblical material & the teaching frames contrasts in black & white - not giving anyone the opportunity to wiggle out of the commandment

- It’s so easy for us to say that I don’t hate so & so, I just don’t act in love towards him or her

- So John, like Jesus, is not allowing us to find excuses for not obeying the Lord’s command

- The one who loves is the one who abides or remains in life

2. Jesus as Our Model for Love

- I may be sounding harsh today because I’m particularly emphasising the contrasts that appear here in this passage

- I’m afraid that I must do it again since v.16-18 warrants it

- This contrast is between an emotional/sentimental posture with an I’m here to help my brother or sister in Christ in anyway I can type action

- You have a person in serious need - they are short of food/clothing or even a roof over their head

- The right response of love, if you have the means yourself, is to help them out where you can

- Now we should define need as the apostles would call it

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- They are not suggesting that if a person needs cigarettes, that you should supply them with smokes

- Or if they are in need of a 2 storey walk up that you upgrade their home for them

- Or if they are in need of a speed boat & the like, that you supply them with their felt needs

- Rather, this is speaking about essential needs for living

- If we are going to judge what needs are, then we should look at some counsel from the apostle Paul

- Here, Paul, is addressing the church regarding Christians who do not seek to fend for themselves - this person is not to be considered a “needy” person

- Again, addressing the families of widows who may be placed on the church’s support list, Paul counsels her family members

- In other words, it is not the job of the church community to support widows when they have capable family members who should take care of them

- We live in a world of needs obsession where it is really not a need but dare I say it, greed

- It’s more to the advantage of advertisers and businesses for people to think they need something because, you know, you’re worth it!

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- There is nothing here to say that you can’t help a fellow Christian who has a want - maybe lend them a hand shifting house or needing a lift in a car or a myriad of other things

- This is dealing with the attitude that Cain displayed when he said to God, “Am I my brothers keeper”, meaning that he didn’t have to have any responsibility for his brother

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- Our love to a brother or sister in need is akin to the life and especially the death of Jesus

- His self-giving life fulfilled our most desperate need - to be put right with God; to be reconciled to God which was accomplished by His sacrifice for sin on the cross of Calvary

- Jesus gives us the example of what true love is all about - self-giving

3. Knowing We Are of the Truth

Q. Have you ever felt guilt or shame?

- If you haven’t, then either you aren’t human or you’re the perfect person

- When we have done wrong or failed to do right, we get that burning feeling of shame in the gut

- Our stomach churns & we wish we could undo or have the time over again because we would have done it differently

- God has built into us a mechanism that brings affirmation & even celebration when we do right or good (more blessed to give than receive said Jesus)

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- But also it can bring shame & guilt to bear upon us when we do wrong or fail to do right

- Guilt & shame is a corrective to waywardness so it should be welcome even though its unpleasant

- Who said pain was pleasant?

If you put your hand on a hot stove & felt no pain, what would happen?

- You would be thankful for pain because without it, you may not have that precious hand left to use

- Likewise, our relationship with God is precious & if we don’t have guilt & shame, then we may not have a relationship with God left

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- The heart in biblical terms is not the place of feelings

- Your heart, understood in biblical terms, is the place where your most intimate & deep seated thoughts take place

- As a nick name, I like to call it, the mission control centre of your life, like in Houston, Texas there is the mission control centre for the space flights

- It’s where those crucial decisions are made; it’s where grudges are held, along with all those deep seated hurts; it’s where faith resides & the positive actions from faith & obedience stem

- The heart is where the you, that only you & God know about, reside

- The heart contains what you really think & what you really care about

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- The heart becomes a mechanism to either confirm what we do as good or as neglectful

- Either affirmation or condemnation

- He knows our inner most thoughts & there is not a darn thing that we can hide from Him

- Let’s run with a few thoughts here...

We rest assured when our heart does not condemn us

- Too often, we give the devil credit for this sense of condemnation - where does the Bible says he does that?

Q.

Why would he do that, since this mechanism is a call for us to bring correction into our lives?