Love One Another
1 John: The Light Already Shines • Sermon • Submitted
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Introduction
Introduction
<<LUKE 10>> - Good Samaritan
Distinction between those born of God - those who are saved by grace - and those who are still in the power of the evil one
Last week, said that Jesus came to destroy the works of the evil one; His mission is to make us like Himself, and He is going to keep on working till He’s done.
Q. How should our life in Christ be demonstrated?
I. The Gospel Message summed up in our lives (3:10-11, 14)
I. The Gospel Message summed up in our lives (3:10-11, 14)
EXPLAIN:
Look at v10 - “by this it is evident” - note last wk, the fruit demonstrates our nature, doesn’t determine it.
cf. John 13:35, 15:8, 1 Cor 3:13, John 3:21, 1 John 3:19
The distinction between the children of God and the children of the devil made even more clear
“whoever does not practice righteousness” - last wk, “practice righteousness” = to yield righteousness as the fruit that Jesus our root and vine produces in us through the eternal life coursing through our veins.
“nor is the one who does not love his brother” - the way structured, explains the former. Righteousness defined as the character of God as entirely and perfectly upright - God always does what is right, and He is the standard for what is right.
“Righteousness” contrasted with “sin” and “lawlessness” in vv4-10. And as Jesus tells us in Matt 22:38-39, the entirety of God’s Law hangs on the two great commandments: To love the LORD your God with all your heart, and mind, and soul, and strength; and to love your neighbor as yourself.
Jesus then gave us the new commandment in John 13:34-35 - to love one another in a specific way - as He loved us.
No one can love others as Christ has loved them unless they’ve already been redeemed and have His eternal life flowing through their veins. And so, John says, you can distinguish between the children of God and the children of the devil in a simple way:
They can’t have the fruit if they don’t have the root.
Why? v11 - Just like we can sum up the Gospel message with a few words, we can also sum it up in a life.
In words: 1 Cor 15:3-4; John 3:16; John 5:24
But those few sentences say a lot about how the Gospel will look when you see it in a life.
Illust: Most people don’t see very many dead bodies in their lifetimes. In fact, most people avoid seeing them. One of the many strange realities of being a pastor is that I’ve been up close to a lot of dead people, not just in funerals, but also in people’s homes.
Without getting too morbid, the dead and the living are eventually pretty easy to tell apart.
Here in verse 11, we’re told that the Gospel message has always included the call to love one another. He clarifies in v14 <<READ v14>>
The spiritually dead don’t love like Jesus, end of story. For the antichrists and liars who were trying to deceive John’s original readers, it had eventually become pretty clear that they were dead, because they had abandoned Jesus Christ, His Word, and His people.
But he says “we know” that we’ve “passed out of death into life because we love the brothers.” This is how the Gospel can be summarized in a life.
APPLY:
Recognizing false teaching re: love, righteousness
Recognizing children of the devil - refusal to love as defined by Jesus
Look at verses 12-15, and John presses the point home with a negative example and a call:
II. Brothers and sisters, do not hate, like Cain did (3:12-15)
II. Brothers and sisters, do not hate, like Cain did (3:12-15)
<<READ vv12-15>>
EXPLAIN:
Here, John references an Old Testament story. If you’re not familiar with the story of Cain, the book of Genesis begins with the creation of all things, including humanity, and God proclaims that all He had made was very good. In Genesis 3, however, humanity falls into sin - rebellion against God - when Adam and Eve are tempted by Satan to disobey God’s command. The result of their disobedience - their lawlessness - is that death came into the world, both physical and spiritual.
Adam and Eve, who were created to live in the life-giving presence of God, instead become alienated from Him, alienated from life Himself, and all the sorrows that we experience, including sickness and death and the sorrows we inflict on one another, stem from this alienation from God the life-giver.
The entire rest of the Bible relates how God, out of love, rescues His undeserving creatures from sin and death by destroying both in Jesus Christ, the Way, the Truth, and the Life.
But after Adam and Eve are cast out of the Garden, Genesis 4 tells us that they begat two sons - Cain and Abel. These two brothers each bring an offering to the LORD, but God accepts Abel’s and not Cain’s. Genesis 4:5 tells us that
5 but for Cain and his offering he had no regard. So Cain was very angry, and his face fell. 6 The Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? 7 If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it.”
1 John 3 tells us the rest - Cain murdered his brother and demonstrated that he was of the evil one, a child of the devil, spiritually dead. Here at the beginning of history, we already see what sin produces in full flower.
Illust: Corpse Flower - On our anniversary in 2017, I took Heather on a very, very special date, to the Chicago Botanic Garden. There was a gigantic flower, five or six feet tall, that blooms very rarely, and for only 24-36 hours.
The flower was named Sunshine. And it was going to bloom on our anniversary. The same day, total eclipse of the sun.
So, we went. I forgot to mention that Sunshine was what is called a corpse flower. When it blooms, it smells like a rotting corpse.
So, there we were, on our anniversary, in the middle of the day, in the strange mid-day-dark, looking at and smelling this strange plant.
It occurs to me that sin often takes years to manifest in its full, awful stench. But just like the Corpse Flower, Cain produced death because it was already in him.
In verse 13, John reminds us that this is what we should expect of the world, too.
Remember from our study of 2:15-17 that most of the time, John uses the word “world” to refer to the realm that remains in the darkness, where sin, death, and the devil put their feet up on the coffee table as though they owned the place. And the whole world is in that darkness, except for those who have been born again, according to 1 John 5:19.
So, John says, don’t be surprised if “the world” hates you, because like Cain, the world abides or remains in death.
Anyone who has been born of God has become a stranger to the world, and even worse. When Jesus’s brothers didn’t believe in Him, He told them in
7 The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify about it that its works are evil.
But to His believing disciples, Jesus said in
18 “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. 19 If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.
So Cain and the world stand as the negative example, which the Christian must expect and reject. But John goes even further, so we can see that the division between love and hate is a matter of life and death. And this is why he tells us that we must not hate like Cain. <<READ 14-15>>
John ties up hate, murder, and the failure to love all together, just as Jesus did in the Sermon on the Mount, in Matthew 5.
The words in verse 15 are a difficult but necessary corrective to the false message of those who would deceive you and me. The message that we heard from the beginning in 1 John 1:5 is that God is light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. And anyone who claims to have fellowship with God while walking in darkness is a liar.
Anyone who claims to be born again, but hates his brother, is still in death.
APPLY:
So what does this hatred look like, practically?
The first thing to remember is that John already showed us an example of this hatred in chapter 2:18-27. In 2:19, he says that the antichrists trying to deceive will eventually abandon God’s people. Take no spiritual advice from a so-called Christian who has abandoned Christ’s Body.
Second, he says in verse 22 that they deny that Jesus is the Christ - they abandon the truth about Jesus and about salvation. But Jesus is eternal life. He is the only way for us to be reconciled to God. There is no more hateful thing than to oppose the only message that can give life. We should expect those who tell us they hate the message of Christ to try to stop it being proclaimed.
But John says, brothers and sisters, YOU don’t be like Cain. Instead, he says, and this is our third point,
III. Children of God, love one another like Jesus did (3:16-18)
III. Children of God, love one another like Jesus did (3:16-18)
EXPLAIN:
Look how verses 16-18 build on what John says in verses 11 and 14. <<READ 11>> <<READ 14>> <<READ 16-18>>
John’s identification of LOVE in 1 John 3:16 is going to be his controlling definition for the rest of the letter. The world in its benighted folly wants call all sorts of things “love,” but just as God’s own character is the standard of righteousness, His love is what defines real love.
It’s not just a feeling, not just attachment, not just a survival trait. <<READ v16>>
First, love is something that must be known by example. We know love by Christ’s love for us. Second, love is active. It’s by His love, according to chapter 3:1, that we are rescued and called children of God. And
8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Third, love goes hand-in-hand with life. Cain and the world hate, because they are dead in sin. But v14 says, <<READ v14>>
And in v16, he says, we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. Christian love should look like Christ’s love. The Good Shepherd laid down His life for the sheep, because He loved us, and He told us
34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. 35 By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
But then, in verse 17, John gives us an alternative.
Do you remember in chapter 2, verses 15-17, “Do not love the world or the things in the world”? Look at those verses with me. <<READ 2:15-17>>
These verses showed us that there is a good kind of love and an evil kind of love. It is evil to love what is evil. And in chapter 2 v16, the phrase “the pride of life” refers to arrogance and misplaced confidence in material things.
Here, in chapter 3 v17, John says, “If anyone has the world’s goods,” and he’s using the same word translated “life” in “pride of life.” The stuff, the material possessions of life.
The eternal life laid down His life for us, and we should lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone is so in love with the world’s life that when he sees a brother in Christ without even the basic necessities of living, and shuts his heart like a bank vault, John asks, is that a person born of God, anointed by the Holy Spirit, abiding in Christ?
Illust: “heart” - to slam the door of compassion.
33 But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion.
“Compassion” - “heart” - innards
and
14 When he went ashore he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion on them and healed their sick.
And in Luke 7, when Christ saw the widow outside the village of Nain, and her only son being carried out of town to be buried
13 And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her and said to her, “Do not weep.”
Notice the pattern that Jesus demonstrates: When he saw one in need, he had compassion.
So, question: When you see a brother in need, what does your heart do?
John’s concluding exhortation to us is a fitting contrast to the warning against being like Cain: <<READ v18>>
APPLY:
LOVE THE BRETHREN - Start with your household, and then the Church, and then the world. Can’t resolve every need, but together we can love one another well
Love - all the way up to laying down your physical life, and all the way down to giving up the world’s goods - money, food, clothing, water, hospitality, time, compassion
Verses 16-18 point to a fellow believer who has been reduced to poverty. Give to Benevolence - if able.
A godly family looks out for one another. Bethel has done this well. So, as Heb 13:1 says, “Let brotherly love continue.”
TURN TO LUKE 10:25-37 - <<READ>> and comment re: the Good Sam gave of “the world’s goods” - donkey, oil, bandages, coin
Love - with the message and our deeds working together, see Matt 5:14-16
14 “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.
This is the heart and soul of Christian love: That our brothers and sisters in Christ would increase in their love for our Savior, and that the light of the Gospel would penetrate the darkness of the world, so that
No one can love in deed and in truth if they don’t know the love of Jesus. So let’s close by looking once more at verse 14:
IV. Conclusion: Knowing eternal life (3:14)
IV. Conclusion: Knowing eternal life (3:14)
<<READ v14>>
Why does John say that we know that we have passed out of death into life?
Assurance of salvation - Jesus’s words in
24 Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.
Look carefully at John’s words. He does not say, “we have passed out of death into life because we love the brothers.” He says “we know we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brothers.”
Christian love provides assurance to the believer, but it does not save. Only Christ’s love - shown in the cross - can save a sinner.
Let me say that again, because this gets to the very heart of the Gospel: It is Jesus Christ who saves. <<RECITE John 3:16>>
Or again, <<RECITE Eph 2:8-10>>
8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
Any deed of Christian love that you perform is a fruit of God’s saving work in you.
If you look at 1 John 3:14 and say to yourself, “I do not love my brothers and sisters in Christ,” then Jesus calls you first and foremost to repent and believe the Good News that He died for your sins and rose again the third day, and be saved. You cannot be saved by trying harder and harder to love. Your only hope is that Jesus Christ has promised that all who come to him shall be saved.
But if you look at verse 14 and say to yourself, “I believe in Jesus, but my heart toward others is not as open as I believe He wants it to be,” then look at verse 18 with me: <<READ 18>>
John wrote these words to you, little child. How many of you have little children at home, or memories of little children at home? How well did they love one another?
Can I tell you, the little children who fought and yelled were the same ones who ran just as fast as they could to get mom and dad when the other one fell off their bike and couldn’t walk home.
John chose his words very well. Little children are the ones who are learning how to love. And they learn best from their Father.
32 He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?
If you worry because your love still seems a bit childish, ask for your Father’s help. And look at that childish love that wants to be like Jesus and remind yourself: This imperfect love is proof that God’s perfect love is at work in me.