Love

Our vision from God is prayerfully connect and empower people of every age, culture and nationality in Colorado Springs and around the world, to the power of the one true, Living God (Father, Son and Holy Spirit) through Worship, Instruction of the Gospel, and Life Engagement.

Then we discussed our Culture

Then we began our lesson on personal identity and characteristics that we each should hold on Kindness and Nobility. Today we will continue our study on personal identity looking our identity in Love.

My family may grow tired of this message as it has been one of the most spoken messages that I have spoken on since moving to back to Colorado. All I can say is that it is a lesson that we need here over and over again because it is our greatest identification marker in Christ. Which is the jest of our lesson

We will be in 1 John Ch. 4 today. Today this will be where our lesson is based and if you wanted to turn there in your bible or on your phone app we will be in 1 John 4 starting in verse 7. Here we start with a familiar tone and one that I have said here before as we have all heard it before and I have mentioned it here before.

1 John 4:7–12 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. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.

The characteristic that we should display with each other is love for one another. But to do this we must understand Love and its origins. We must understand how we love one another.

As we look further into the text we find that love is from God. That if we are to know love we must love God because God is love. So the origin of love is from God because God is love. But what does that mean that God is love.

I watched an explanation of this recently by R.C. Sproul. When we read the word in the English language we might consider is as equal to. If we think about math we would say 2+2 is or equals 4. In this use of the word is we can flip the analogy. We then get 4 is or equals 2+2. When we use is with this understanding, we would get God is love or love is God. This is not a proper understanding of love or God, especially if we have a poor understanding of Love.

The other way to look at this is that the word “is” is a connecting word. Such as my car is a ford. It connects the subject and the predicate. In the instance it connects God to love. What this reveals is that there is a connection of God and love.

What this suggestion tells us is that God is the essence of love. Love is who God is. You cannot see God without seeing love. and as the text says You cannot know God without knowing Love. This leads us to our next set of scripture.

1 John 4:13–17 ESV

By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. 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. 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.

When we know God’s love we must abide in His love. How do we do this. How do we abide in God’s love. Notice that John turns to the testimony of the Holy Spirit and Salvation. What this tells me is that to abide in God and to Abide in His love we must trust in Salvation through Jesus.

If we do not trust in Salvation then we do not know the love of God. I want to be clear. A person might know love in the worldly since. They might understand love as a feeling or love as a bond. But they do not know love as God demonstrated to us on the cross that is the ultimate for us.

This is a love of mercy for us. This is a love that gives grace for our mistakes. This is a love that gives us confidence that God has forgiven us for our sins. This is a love that give us confidence on the day of Judgement that God will say well done good and faithful servant. In this love, there is no need for fear.

1 John 4:18–21 ESV

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. We love because he first loved us. 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. And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother.

When we have confidence that God has saved us we can trust we have received a love that removes all fear. We have no fear of judgment from God and that we will be welcomed into heaven. And we know this love because he first loved us.

A question that we might have hear is that of fear. Does this mean that we will have no fear of things in our lives. That if we are scared of heights or spiders or snakes that we will no longer have that fear because we have God’s love? Not entirely. We will still have some fears over these things. However, We will not fear God’s judgement.

But we do know that God will provide for us. We know that God helps us overcome our fears. In His love he will walk us through the most difficult times in our lives. We can trust in His Providence because He loves us.

Because of His love, we find that God’s love is an identifying mark as we love one another. We are to love people the way that God love’s us. Other people will see God’s people loving them. Some of those people will then come to know the love of God through our acts of love to them. In this, Love has been perfected. God’s love is most easily seen today through the actions of His Children.

So how do we love others the way that God loves us. I think the understand of how to demonstrate God’s love is to look back at how Jesus demonstrated God’s love to others. Let’s look to back at John 13:1-5

John 13:1–5 ESV

Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. During supper, when the devil had already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son, to betray him, Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going back to God, rose from supper. He laid aside his outer garments, and taking a towel, tied it around his waist. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was wrapped around him.

In this passage, Jesus is in his last moments before being arrested, tried and crucified. Judas was already determined to betray Jesus. And yet Jesus is serving the disciples by washing their feet. This is a task that is usually done by the lowest. It is a task that requires that the servant clean the dirtiest part of the body.

As Jesus is about to go to the cross for the remission of sins, he teaches his disciples one of the most important lessons of His ministry. He taught them that love is to humble yourself in service to others. It means we may have to do the dirtiest jobs. It means we have to do the things that others do not want to do. And this is done out of unconditional love.

I believe that John understood this message. I believe that John and the disciples pondered this moment years down the road. As they looked back at this lesson, they saw Judas the betrayer. John’s testimony reveals that Jesus knew that Judas would be the betrayer. He had to because Jesus is the all knowing God.

Yet in this moment Jesus still washed Judas’ feet. He brought over the bowl. Put Judas’ feet in it and poured water over to wash off all the dirt and muck from the day. He looked up and talked kindly to Him. Could you imagine being Judas? Knowing that you are going to betray Jesus. Seeing him wash your feet.

This moment teaches us that Jesus loves and served us in spite of our sin. Even though we have done this sin and that sin. Even though we have had lust, or cursed God or forsaken the Sabbath or Stolen or coveted. He still loves us. He loves us so much that he did not just wash our feet. Jesus cleansed our heart, our soul, our mind and our body. Jesus died on the cross so that we could be made perfect in His love.

To show this love to others, we must humble ourselves in servanthood of others. That is not to say that we are to wash someones feet. But it means we are to love others by serving them. It means that we are to love people, even if we do not think they deserve love. We are to love other regardless of how they treat us.

And I get that not everyone treats us in a way that is easy to love. People wound us. They hurt us. They betray us. It is easy to say, but Pastor they did this or that to me and I don’t want to love them. I will tell you I know. I have seen some of the deepest hurts happen to people. But if we love God, we have been commanded to love them anyway.

As we go into groups, I want you to think about where you are with love.

First and most importantly, Do you know, truly know the love of God. Is it personal. Is it real. Or is it just something that you think about on Sunday morning.

Second, when people see you, do they see the love of God. Do they walk away and go, man he loves God? Is this a reflection that you do. I’ll be honest here, and there are times when I walk away from a situation and people might say that they didn’t see love come forth. But I believe that there are fewer of those moments and more where people go man that guy really loves people.

Lastly, how can we show the people around us love. How can we humble ourselves in service of others? How can we be a servant this week to demonstrate the love that God has given us to others?

What does it mean that God is love?

How does Salvation reveal God’s Love?

What is the Connection between Love and Fear?

Why does fear mean that we do not understand God’s love

How did Jesus demonstrate love?

How can we replicate God’s love?