1 John 4:13-21 : God is Love - Part 2
Notes
Transcript
Handout
Introduction:
Does anyone here struggle with fear? I think we all can relate to at least a season in our lives where fear became a big problem for us. Fear can be paralyzing. It can consume you. It can be fear of a job loss, fear of losing a loved one, fear of persecution because of your faith, fear of losing your retirement, fear of abandonment, or fear of death. Some are even bothered almost daily by some phobias such as fear of snakes, or spiders, or germs.
What is our response to such fears? How do we combat such giants in our lives. They do seem so large don’t they. It sometimes feels like we are David fighting Goliath.
I was talking about fear with one of my children in the past and I had them lay flat on the ground and look at an action figure. Then I had them stand up and look at it. I discussed how our perspective changes what we perceive. When laying face down - this action figure seemed very imposing. Yet, when we stood up, it seemed so much smaller.
Our minds, as well as Satan, each have a strong ability to deceive us and make us think that our problems are bigger than they are. But we need not see them as so big of problems. We have a sovereign God who loves us and cares for us. There is nothing too big for our God to handle.
Today we are going to talk about this amazing love and how our fear melts away in the Presence of God and how our hearts are filled with confidence from Him.
Please turn in your Bibles to 1 John 4:13-21
Read Full Scripture:
13 By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.
14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world.
15 Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.
16 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.
17 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.
18 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.
19 We love because he first loved us.
20 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.
21 And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother.
Prayer
There are six different points in this two-part sermon.
We covered the first three points last week and covered
1) Perspective of Love in which we learned that we cannot love on our own. True agape love comes from God.
2) The Person of Love. Namely Jesus Christ. We discussed the beauty of the Gospel and how wonderful the love of Jesus is.
3) The Persistence of Love - where we learned about the power that God gives us to continue loving our brothers.
This week we will hit the last three points starting with:
I. The Presence of Love Gives Confidence (13-16)
I. The Presence of Love Gives Confidence (13-16)
13 By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. 14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15 Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. 16 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 we know. By what? If we love one another. If we remember from last week, we discussed how loving one another is a confirmation of salvation. And by this we know that we abide in Him and He in us. Next we see this word know which is a personal knowledge. This knowing is an intimate knowledge. There are many different things that we can know but not intimately know. We might know how we are supposed to hit a ball in baseball. We might have watched some videos and know exactly where your feet should be, how we should grip the bat, how we should swing. Yet, we don’t really personally know what it is like to swing a bat at a ball that has been pitched to us until we actually experience it.
In the same way, we can know that we abide in Him and He in us because He has given us of his Spirit. We have experienced salvation. We have seen the old go away and the new come. We see the workings of the Holy Spirit. We see the objective signs in our lives of a heart that has been regenerated. We see that love overflows from our hearts to others because of the indwelling Holy Spirit living inside of us.
When we tell others about Christ, we should be able to tell others in a confident way because we personally know Jesus Christ.
If you talk to someone who has been to a play or show - they will share the details with you with passion and fervor. They will tell you about the climax of the story with much enthusiasm and energy. They will make you feel like you were there!
When we share the Gospel, people should feel that way with us when we get to the cross. We should have such passion and appreciation for our salvation that people feel as if they were there with us when we were saved. No, we are not to be salesmen peddling a product. We should never perform when sharing the Gospel. But we should reflect on the Gospel regularly, be in prayer and thanksgiving with the Lord, and as we walk humbly with our God - He will ignite a fire and light within you that will shine and burn for others to see.
One way to develop that zeal for sharing the Gospel is to reflect on verse 14. The Apostles and those who walked with Jesus saw and testified about Jesus. Some may say - well I can’t see Jesus physically so this doesn’t apply to me. However, this verse does not limit us today. Even though we may not physically see Jesus, we still see Him at work. We can testify on what He has done in our lives and the lives of others. We can testify that He truly is the Savior of the World.
This phrase, Savior of the World, only occurs here and one other place.
39 Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me all that I ever did.” 40 So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. 41 And many more believed because of his word. 42 They said to the woman, “It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world.”
This was right after Jesus’ encounter with the woman at the well from Samaria. She has quite an encounter with Jesus. Jesus knows her well. He knows her sins and her concerns. And after a long discourse with her she is humbled by His statement that He is the Messiah. This lowly woman who had been married five times and divorced and was living with a man who was not her husband was given such a great knowledge - that the Messiah had come. So she told everyone and the Samaritans of that town believed that he indeed was the Savior of the World.
15 Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. 16 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.
Getting back to 1 John 4, we see in verse 15 that one must confess that Jesus is the Son of God in order to be saved. As we preach every week - salvation is in Christ alone. We must believe that Jesus is the Son of God - that he died on the cross some 2,000 years ago taking on our sins and bore our punishment - that he rose from the dead three days later - and that by repenting or turning away from our sins and placing our faith and trust in Jesus Christ alone - we may be saved. Saved from eternal punishment in Hell and saved unto eternal life in Heaven. Praise God for His wondrous blessing!
Through this presence of love in our lives - as we are filled with the Holy Spirit who is God Himself - after salvation - We are able to experience and understand the love that God has for us as verse 16 states. Not only are we to believe with our head - but we are able to experience and know it in our heart and soul because we have an intimate relationship with our Savior.
Do you have the Presence of God in you? Have you encountered Jesus through salvation? I pray that you have. It is with the indwelling Presence of God that we may have confidence. This indwelling Presence will strengthen us as we face:
Scripture References: John 4:39-42
The Persecution of Love Requires Confidence (17-18)
The Persecution of Love Requires Confidence (17-18)
17 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. 18 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.
So far we have seen that by our love for others, we can be assured that we are in Christ. Then we saw that by confessing Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior we can be assured that we are in Christ. Then verse 17 moves forward as well that through this salvation in Christ alone, Christ’s love is perfected in us. Again this word perfected could also be completed. But in relation to God - who is omnipresent and transcendent - meaning He is not only everywhere at once - but is also at every time at once - We have been eternally perfected through Jesus Christ’s imputed righteousness to us.
God sees believers as perfected or completed already. This blows our mind as we look at how sinful we still are currently. We blow it daily. But at the end of verse 17, we come to an amazing statement. Because as He is - so also are we in this world. I’m sure some of you are scratching your head thinking - did John just say we are like Christ?
John is saying here that God sees believers like He sees Christ. This is the foundational doctrine of imputed righteousness. When God looks at us, He sees the righteousness of His Son covering us.
Obviously we realize that we fall very short of being Jesus! We are far from perfect. Yet - eternally speaking - we will be perfected through Jesus. We are given the righteousness of Christ. Paul speaks of this imputed righteousness in:
21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
We see here that through Christ we are given righteousness.
Through Christ’s righteousness we can be confident that we will be perfected in Christ. We saw this a chapter ago in our study:
2 Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.
We will be like Him! How incredible is that?
After the encouragement in verse 17 we get to an admonishment in verse 18:
18 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.
What is the opposite of confidence? Fear. In these two pivotal verses in this section we see the two sides in which we may fall. We may be fearful or we may be confident before the Lord. As fearful as snakes, spiders, the dark, and other things can be to people - there is no fear that can rival the wrath and judgment of God. The fear that will fall upon unbelievers before the Great White Throne of Judgment mentioned in Revelation will far surpass any fear that been seen before.
11 Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. From his presence earth and sky fled away, and no place was found for them.
12 And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Then another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books, according to what they had done.
13 And the sea gave up the dead who were in it, Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them, and they were judged, each one of them, according to what they had done.
14 Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire.
15 And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.
The terror of the Lord’s judgment is something to fear my friends. God will judge all evil. Those who are not His will be cast into the lake of fire - which Jesus Christ taught time and time again as a literal place. This is something that is not preached much in our modern churches. Yet, it is of utmost importance to know what we are saved from! We are saved from an eternity apart from our Creator. We are saved from a place of eternal torment. And we are saved unto a perfected life with Christ.
18 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.
Verse 18 lets us know that perfect love casts out fear. Perfect love comes from Christ and Christ alone. We do not have to fear punishment as believers. We stand uncondemned through the righteousness of Christ that clothes us. We can speak like Isaiah did:
10 I will greatly rejoice in the Lord; my soul shall exult in my God, for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation; he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.
We can stand confidently in a world of fear. We don’t have to fear what we may lose in this world. We don’t have to fear sickness or pain. We don’t have to fear job loss or poverty. Because all of these things are temporal. God will provide for us. It may be tough and we may be persecuted. Our love for Christ may be persecuted. But we may remain confident because of the Presence of Love - namely Jesus Christ - in our lives. And through the power of the Presence of God we may pursue:
Scripture References: 2 Cor 5:21, 1 John 3:2, Rev 20:11-15, Isaiah 61:10
The Practice of Love Gives Confidence (19-21)
The Practice of Love Gives Confidence (19-21)
19 We love because he first loved us. 20 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. 21 And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother.
I find it interesting to see John circle back to what he said in verse 10:
10 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.
Compare this to verse 19:
19 We love because he first loved us.
John reminds us that in order to get to the next two verses - we must understand the perspective and person of love that we have been talking about. True agape love originates from God not ourselves. This true love is manifested or revealed through us by the Holy Spirit who indwells us. And through the working of the Holy Spirit - we are able to practice this love in confidence.
20 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.
21 And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother.
John again moves on in verses 20-21 and has some harsh language for us. Those who claim to love God but do not love their brothers are liars. Those who truly love God also love their brothers. I know that you may feel I have beaten the proverbial dead horse here but be sure to not read this verse as something that you can do on your own. So many people take Scripture out of context. They take a verse like verse 21 and go out wanting to love others in their own strength. That is why John was so clear to go back to verse 10 in verse 19 right before this. We can only love because He first loved us. And he continues to love others through us.
Some may scoff at John’s statement in verse 20. He calls people liars. This seems unkind doesn’t it. In today’s world, John would have been cancelled! His social media accounts would have been censored for talking badly about a group of people.
Yet, true love of our brothers may need to be tough love at times. Sometimes an indirect or avoidant approach ends up causing more pain than a direct approach like John takes.
I used to watch orthopedic interns doing joint injections while I was an upper year resident in Family Medicine doing some extra orthopedic elective rotations. I remember how methodically they would stick the needle in and perform the injection. It was like watching someone torture someone. In an effort not to hurt the person - they would try to go slow at it. Yet, it is clearly understood that a quick puncture of the skin leads to less pain. As they matured with experience, their confidence started to develop and they would be much better at it. They knew where they were going and knew the right way to do it - and their confidence led to a quicker, direct, accurate, and less painful puncture.
Sometimes we like to beat around the bush per se. We don’t come right out with the truth. Maybe we even avoid it all together. I, personally, used to be very bad at this and my wife helped me grow in this early on in our marriage. Most of us don’t want to hurt someone’s feelings or be disagreeable. Yet, in an effort to soften the blow, oftentimes there is more pain and there are more issues because the truth doesn’t clearly come out. It is a tortuous puncture when we are not accurate and direct with our rebukes and admonishment.
Our practice of love must be Holy Spirit-led. We must be humble and selfless before God and our brothers and sisters. We must be willing to sacrifice everything for the Lord. Just like Jesus Christ came and was willing to give His life for us and to sacrifice His standing with sinful man by speaking the truth - we must also be willing to sacrifice our lives for others. We must be willing to stand on the truth even when it is difficult. We must be willing to love our enemies and love our friends.
By the power of Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit - we can have confidence through the practice of love.
Scripture References: 1 John 4:10
Conclusion
I pray that this mini-series has been a blessing to you. It has been a blessing to me to study through these wonderful verses and see the richness and the depth of the love of God.
I want us again to bow our heads and consider a few things before we leave today.
Are you a fearful person? What drives this fear? Are you truly in Christ? If not - then you should fear. There is judgment to come for you. There is a true and literal Hell that is awaiting your life. Repent today my friend! Forgiveness and salvation is freely offered through Jesus Christ. See me after the service or another leader here and we would be glad to help you learn more about salvation in Christ.
If you are a believer and are still struggling with fear - rest in the Presence of the Lord. Ask Him to increase your faith and give you a better perspective on your difficulties. Ask him to pick you up off of the floor so that your problems do not look so big. Ask Him to help you see your problems from His point of view and perspective.
Lastly - Are you an unloving person? Would people around you classify you as harsh or unkind? Or maybe you are unloving in a different way - indifferent and non-confrontational. These are both extremes on the unloving continuum. We must be willing to speak the truth in love. Yet we are to do so with a heart of humility in kindness. Pray that God helps you love like He loves. In the Spirit of Love and in Truth.
Prayer
If you would like to learn more about salvation through Jesus Christ or want to obey Jesus by obeying the first commandment of a believer in going through the waters of baptism - please see me after the service.
God bless and have a blessed week!