How is Your Love Life?
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This mornings main point or idea that we will see the Apostle John make is this. Those who truly belong to God in Christ will live and love after the pattern of Jesus rather than the pattern of the world.
1 John 3:11-15
One of the most effective ways of teaching is using contrasts and comparisons. For example, I might contrast what it means to be a male with what it means to be a female.
Regardless of what the cancel culture is trying to teach and push today in their WOKE narrative there is difference from being male or female.
I might highlight the attributes and the differences between night and day, darkness or light.
Big/small.
Fast/slow.
Up/down.
North/South.
East/West.
Winner/loser.
The apostle John also illustrated truth by comparisons and contrasts because they are an effective means of teaching theology and spiritual truth.
Throughout 1 John, the apostle draws our attention to various contrasts:
Walk in darkness/Walk in light - 1:6–7
Say we have no sin/Confess our sins -1:8–9
Keep God’s commands/Do not keep God’s commands -2:3–5
Those who love the world/Those who love the Father -2:15
They/Us -2:19
Antichrist/Christ -2:22
Deny Christ/Confess Christ -2:23
Confident at Christ’s coming/Ashamed at Christ’s coming -2:28
Those who commit sin/Those who do what is right -3:4–7
Children of the Devil/Children of God -3:10
Hates his brother/Loves his brother -3:10ff
Today we are going to see how John contrasts between hate/love as he moves us into the second major section of this letter.
In 1:5–3:10 the message was “God is Light.” Now in 3:11–5:12 the message is “God is Love.” And because God is love, Christians are to love one another.
The importance of Christians loving one another cannot be overstated. In fact, to hate your brother is equal to murdering your brother, just like Cain murdered Abel in Genesis 4.
Jesus teaches us that loving one another provides a witness to a watching world. Remember what He said in John 13:35
35 By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
So lets read what God has to say to us through the Apostle John in 1 John 3:11-15
11 For this is the message that you heard from the beginning, that we should love one another,
12 not as Cain who was of the wicked one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his works were evil and his brother’s righteous.
13 Do not marvel, my brethren, if the world hates you.
14 We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love the brethren. He who does not love his brother abides in death.
15 Whoever hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.
The main idea in today's text is this:
Love One Another and Do Not Follow the Example of Cain
Love One Another and Do Not Follow the Example of Cain
Verse 11 flows naturally out of verse 10. The child of God, having been born of God, does what is right, which includes loving his brother.
In contrast, the child of the Devil does not do what is right, and he hates (even murders!) his brother.
There is a crystal clear contrast between children of God and children of the Devil, between lovers and haters.
To make this plain, John goes back in time, all the way back to the beginning. There, he draws our attention to the first murder in human history, the murder of Abel by his brother Cain.
Just as God delights in giving life, the Devil equally delights in producing death by murder.
Here is what we know,
Love Is at the Heart of Godliness (1 John 3:11–13)
Love Is at the Heart of Godliness (1 John 3:11–13)
In language reminiscent of 1 John 1:5, John says he has a message, which his readers had heard at the beginning of their new life in Christ.
And what is that message that they had received at conversion? It is simply this: “We should love [continually] one another” (v. 11).
Jesus proclaimed this message over and over and over again.
34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another.
12 This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.
17 These things I command you, that you love one another.
10 Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another;
13 For you, brethren, have been called to liberty; only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.
1 I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called,
2 with all lowliness and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love,
9 But concerning brotherly love you have no need that I should write to you, for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another;
22 Since you have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit in sincere love of the brethren, love one another fervently with a pure heart,
8 And above all things have fervent love for one another, for “love will cover a multitude of sins.”
And in this letter of 1 John, we will see this command to love given again in 3:23 and 4:7, 11, 12. It also appears in 2 John 5. Obviously, God thinks our loving one another is extremely important.
John, following Jesus, says we are to love consistently and comprehensively, continually and individually.
Play no favorites. Show no biases. Practice no discrimination among your brothers and sisters. After all, we are family! Love for others flows out of God’s love for us. It is at the heart of the gospel this is the heart of Godliness.
To love our brothers and sisters is to stand in stark contrast to the first murderer in the Bible, the man named Cain. This tragic and well-known story, recorded in Genesis 4:1–6, is the only direct Old Testament reference in 1 John. Cain’s actions revealed his true spiritual father, the Devil (cf. 1 John 3:10). As Jesus taught in John 8:44
44 You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it.
The word “murder” means to butcher, slay, or slaughter. It speaks of a violent and brutal killing.
And what were Cain’s motives? Moved by his spiritual father, “the evil one,” his heart was filled with jealously, envy, and resentment.
Abel brought a sacrifice to God that was acceptable and “righteous.”
Cain brought one that was evil and unacceptable (v. 12).
Cain hated Abel over this and murdered his own flesh and blood.
To all of this John says, “Do not be surprised” (v. 13).
It could be translated, “stop being surprised.” It is natural for the world (represented by Cain) to hate you because its father hates you (cf. v. 1).
Do not be surprised or caught off guard when people of this world, people like Cain, hate you. It is their nature.
You must ask yourself this morning, do you hate the way the world hates. A person who is truly changed by the power of God’s gospel will love instead of hate.
Where the gospel has taken root, love will be the natural fruit.
Loving One Another Provides Assurance of Eternal Life (1 John 3:14–15)
Loving One Another Provides Assurance of Eternal Life (1 John 3:14–15)
John says we have an abiding and settled knowledge “that we have passed from [spiritual] death to [eternal] life because we love [continually] our brothers.”
In contrast, “The one who does not love remains in death” (v. 14).
Now, let’s be clear on what John is saying and what he is not saying.
John is saying that continually loving others out of “gospel gratitude” (cf. v. 16) for all that Jesus has done is evidence, a proof, that we have definitely and decisively moved from the realm of spiritual death into the realm of spiritual life.
What he is not saying is that eternal life is earned by loving others, but rather that loving others is evidence that we already have eternal life. It therefore becomes another avenue of assurance of eternal life.
Interestingly, the word for “brother” occurs 15 times in this letter and almost always has in view the family of God.
John, no doubt, would affirm our love for all men and women in general, but here he calls for us to love our brothers and sisters in Christ in particular.
Paul says something similar to this in Galatians 6:10 when he writes,
10 Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all, especially to those who are of the household of faith.
Those whose lives are characterized by hatred give evidence that they have never been born again, that they “remain in death” (v. 14; cf. Eph 2:1–3).
John is clear: an attitude of hate in your heart is equivalent to having murder in your heart. John again is drawing from words he had heard from Jesus. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said in Matthew 5:21–22,
21 “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder, and whoever murders will be in danger of the judgment.’
22 But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment. And whoever says to his brother, ‘Raca!’ shall be in danger of the council. But whoever says, ‘You fool!’ shall be in danger of hell fire.
Translation: But I tell you, everyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment. And whoever says to his brother, “Fool!” will be subject to the Sanhedrin. But whoever says, “You moron!” will be subject to hellfire.
John says it is really quite simple: no love, no life.
Love and hate are moral, spiritual opposites. Both cannot reside at the same time in the same heart.
It has been said,
“Our love for one another is the flower and fruit that indicates eternal life is at the root”
So, how is your love life?