In This Is, Love. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us... (1 John 4:10).

Transcription

1 SERMONS FOR THE HEART In This Is, Love In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us... (1 John 4:10). When my youngest daughter, Angi, was a child, she asked challenging questions. Many of these were asked after she was in bed and should have been asleep. I spent hours seated on the edge of her bed as we struggled with questions that concerned her. I feel fairly good about most of those sessions, but once she asked, Daddy, how do you know when you re in love? 1 How can a parent answer a question like that? It is tempting to respond, Don t worry about it. You ll just know with a vague reference to bells ringing and rockets bursting. 2 Unfortunately, those bells and rockets can be misleading. The subject might be approached on a higher level, with an explanation like You re really in love when you feel strongly enough about another to be willing to give up all others and commit your life to that one. However, even that answer can be misunderstood by an immature individual who might say, I m willing to make that commitment without realizing all that is involved. Through the years, people have wrestled with questions about love: What is it? ; How can you define it? ; How can you tell if you really love someone? In this connection, it is interesting to note that even the apostle Paul, 1 This sermon was adapted from a lecture presented at the 1986 Fort Worth Lectures, Brown Trail church of Christ, Bedford (Greater Fort Worth), Texas. 2 The society in which I live uses a variety of images to convey the feeling of being in love. Substitute imagery that is used where you live. with his inspired intellect, made no attempt to define love, but rather listed its qualities in 1 Corinthians 13. My challenge in this presentation is to do what cannot be done: analyze love. My text is from the love chapter of the Bible. No, I do not mean 1 Corinthians 13. I am speaking of the chapter of the Bible that refers to love more than any other: 1 John 4. More than fifty references to love appear in the five short chapters of 1 John (including the word beloved, which is translated from a form of agape). Thirty of those references are in chapter 4. In this context of love, we find our text: In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins (1 John 4:10). The verse begins with the words In this is love. In what follows, love will be explained, defined, or exemplified. We want to look at this text, in the light of its context, to see what we can learn regarding love. We will not learn everything about love, but we will learn some things and that should make our time worthwhile. LOVE IS PERSONAL First, love is personal. The Greek word translated love in our text is the word used for love throughout 1 John: agape. Agape was a rather colorless word in secular literature, but Jesus and the inspired men who wrote the New Testament transformed it into the watchword of Christianity (John 13:34, 35). We cannot spend time on the different Greek 1

2 words for love, but a brief contrast between two of them, agape and philia, is in order. Philia is centered in the emotions, while agape is centered in the will. Again, philia is sometimes defined as friendship love, while agape has been defined as active good-will. My personal preference regarding a definition of agape love 3 is that it seeks the best for the object of that love. Remember that love is personal. Sometimes, by the time we finish analyzing and dissecting agape love, all that is left is a dry and unappetizing skeleton. Active good-will can sound impersonal but agape love, properly directed, is very personal. It can be misdirected to a love of the things in the world (1 John 2:15) but properly directed, its object is generally an individual or individuals. Notice our text: God... loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. As I read those words and apply them to myself, I say, Thank God that His love is personal. LOVE IS PASSIONATE Second, love is passionate. You may think I have gone too far here since the word under consideration is agape. Certainly, many definitions of agape have more the flavor of computer analysis than they do of passion. Nevertheless, it is my contention that New Testament speakers and writers never intended that we should consider agape love as dispassionate. Look again at our text and imagine John speaking these lines: In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Can you imagine the apostle delivering those words without emotion like a chemistry professor giving the table of elements 4? Can you conceive of John implying that God s decision to send His Son was made without emotion? Let us go to the context to show that John included feeling in his concept of agape love: We know love by this, that He [Christ] laid down His life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But whoever has the 3 The phrases agape love and philia love are redundant; but since there are several Greek words for love in the New Testament, this seems a permissible way to express the kind of love under discussion at a given time. 4 The table of elements lists all the chemical elements that have been found on earth. Currently, there are 115. world s goods, and sees his brother in need and closes his heart against him, how does the love of God abide in him? Little children, let us not love with word or with tongue, but in deed and truth (1 John 3:16 18). John said that if one closes his heart when others have need, that individual does not have agape love in him. The words closes his heart are translated from a phrase that literally means shuts his bowels. The KJV has shutteth up his bowels of compassion. That sounds strange to many of us since the word bowels is primarily used today to refer to certain internal organs. In New Testament times, however, the word was used to convey depth of feeling. We use similar terminology today. If a boy tells a girl, I love you with all my heart, she does not ask, Right ventricle and left ventricle? 5 In the first place, that would kill the moonlight and roses; 6 and, in the second place, she knows what he means. 7 Today, we use the word heart to refer to passion and compassion; long ago, people used the word bowels. John was saying that unless we have compassion, a depth of feeling, we do not really have agape love. 8 This brings up a question: If agape love is passionate, why do we bother to make a distinction between agape love and philia love? Consider this carefully, for I believe it to be of vital importance. When it is stressed that philia love is centered in the emotions and agape love is centered in the will, the purpose is not to squeeze all the emotion out of agape. 9 We are not saying that agape love is devoid of feeling. Rather, we are emphasizing that agape love is not dependent upon feeling. That is worth repeating: Agape love is not dependent upon feeling. Thus I can agapao my enemies though I may have a hard time feeling good toward them. For the same reason, a husband and wife are not 5 The right ventricle and left ventricle are two compartments of the physical human heart. 6 Moonlight and roses is US imagery associated with romance. Substitute imagery that has meaning to your listeners. 7 This illustration was adapted from Avon Malone. 8 An illustration of this is in The Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:30 37). Jesus said that the Samaritan was an illustration of what it means to agapao one s neighbor but the Samaritan felt compassion for the wounded man (v. 33). Agapao is the verb form of agape. 9 In truth, the decision and commitment of the will may have been prompted by strong emotions. 2

3 dependent upon moonlight, candles, and soft music for motivation to make their marriage what it should be. All of us need to understand this truth! Feelings fluctuate, but agape love is consistent because agape love is an act of the will, not dependent upon feeling. Let me go a step farther: If I have agape love in my heart, I will work to get my feelings right. If I agapao my enemies, I will not despise them or hold grudges. If I agapao my wife, I will not just mechanically fulfill my duties as a husband. If I agapao, I will strive to have right attitudes. In the fullest sense of the word, then, agape love is passionate. LOVE IS PENETRATING Third, love is penetrating. True love cannot be confined to one area of life. When one loves, all of life looks different. Love penetrates into the whole of one s existence. This truth is aptly illustrated by our text and its context. One aspect of love is emphasized in 1 John 4:10: In this is love,... that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins (emphasis mine). As far as John was concerned, if we understand God s love for us, we will understand love itself. The source of all love is God. Twice in this chapter, John said simply, God is love (1 John 4:8, 16) not love is God, but God is love. He did not claim that love defines God, but that God defines love. Love is not merely a characteristic of God; rather, it is an essential part of the character of God. As we come to understand the nature of God, we will understand more about love. Specifically, the more we appreciate the gift of Jesus, the more real the quality of love will become to us. In our text, John spoke only of one side of love God s love for us. However, we must not conclude that the apostle thought this greatest expression of love should be isolated. Nine verses later, he said, We love, because He first loved us (1 John 4:19). The KJV has We love him, because he first loved us ; but many of the earlier manuscripts do not have the word him. The passage simply says, We love, because he first loved us (emphasis mine). When God s love penetrates our hearts, it affects our very being and we cannot help but love. To begin with, we cannot help but love God. John further contended that we cannot help but love one another. If we study 1 John 4:10 without reading the next verse, we do John an injustice, for he proclaimed the truth of verse 10 to reach the conclusion of verse 11: Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. John dealt with a variety of false doctrines in his letter, many of these related to Gnostic ideas regarding the relationship of flesh and spirit. 10 John was concerned about these errors because they affected how his readers felt about Jesus. He was also concerned because these false concepts affected how his readers felt about each other. John s conclusion was that if the love of God penetrates our being, we cannot help but love our brethren. 11 After John said, We love, because He first loved us (4:19), he continued, If someone says, I love God, and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one 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, that the one who loves God should love his brother also. Whoever... loves the Father loves the child born of Him (4:20 5:1). God s love triangle places God at the apex, with brother and brother at each end of the base line. This illustration depicts God loving each brother, each brother loving God, and each brother loving the other brother. BROTHER GOD LOVE BROTHER This does not mean that we will never disagree with a brother. Paul disagreed with Barnabas (Acts 15:36 39). Neither does it mean that I will refuse to correct my brother if he is in error. 10 For a brief discussion of Gnosticism, see the article Colossians: The All-Sufficiency of Christ. 11 John used the word brother to refer to all Christians, whether male or female. I am using it in the same sense. 3

4 If I seek his best, I cannot do otherwise (see Galatians 6:1; James 5:19, 20). It does mean that, in all our relationships, love should prevail. It has been said that we must learn to disagree without being disagreeable. In my part of the world, we have related sayings: Do not bury the issues, but do bury the hatchet ; Turn down the heat and turn up the light. I like John s way of saying it best: We need to love each other. Commenting on 1 John 4:21, someone said, One of the finest things one can do for God is love one of His children. That struck a chord in my heart. I appreciate the nice things people do for me but if you really want to please me, help one of my three daughters! John wrote of the penetrating nature of love: It will affect all of our lives, including how we treat one another. LOVE IS PERCEPTIVE Fourth, love is perceptive. I have emphasized that agape love seeks the best for the one loved. This implies action: taking care of needs. However, back of that is the ability to recognize those needs. I am calling this perception. Our text declares that, because of His love for us, God took care of our spiritual need. This did not happen by chance. Implicit in the teaching of 1 John 4:10 is that God first saw our need. What need? First John 1:8 declares, If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. The problem all mankind faced was the problem of sin; the urgent need was to erase the guilt of that sin. First John 3:4 tells us that sin is lawlessness, while verses 14 and 15 of the same chapter let us know that lawlessness results in spiritual death and the loss of eternal life. Thank God, He saw our need and our inability to save ourselves and loved us enough to send His Son! Why is perception so prominent in my analysis of love? Because regarding our love for each other, one of our shortcomings is insensitivity whether in our homes, in the church, or in our neighborhoods. It can hurt to love because love opens us up to the hurts of others but love is willing to take that risk. True love is perceptive; true love makes us aware of other s needs. LOVE IS PRACTICAL Fifth, love is practical. Not only does love see needs, but love also takes care of those needs. In a moment, I will go to our text to demonstrate this. First, however, I want to return to a passage used earlier: 1 John 3: Verse 16 begins, We know love by this. How do we know love? Here is John s answer: He laid down His life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. We know love by the way it acts. Verse 17 informs us that if we have the means to supply a brother s need but fail to be moved by his plight, there is no love in us. Verse 18 then urges, Little children, let us not love with word or with tongue, but in deed and truth. Verse 18 uses an ellipsis; that is, words must be supplied to get the full impact of the passage. The meaning is Let us not love in word [only], neither in tongue [only]; but [also let us love] in deed and in truth. I stress that an ellipsis is involved because sometimes words are the very thing needed. Many affection-starved souls need desperately to hear words like these: I love you ; I care for you ; You are special to me. John was saying, however, that we should not stop with words. Love is not merely talk; love is practical. First John 3:16 18 applies the practicality of love to the relationship of brother to brother, but now let us turn to our text. There is no greater example of the practicality of love than that given in 1 John 4:10. It is in studying the action of God s love that we come closest to appreciating what agape love is. Our emphasis now is on the last part of the verse: In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. (Emphasis mine.) To help us appreciate these words fully, a brief study of the word propitiation is in order. What does propitiation mean? If a poll were taken to determine the top-forty favorite Bible words, propitiation would not be on the list. It is a little-known Bible word that proclaims one of the greatest spiritual truths. The word propitiation comes from Latin and basically means appeasement. 12 It translates the Greek word hilasmos, which also means appeasement. Hilasmos was used by the Greeks 12 The material in this paragraph comes from a wide range of sources: Greek lexicons, word study books, dictionaries, translations, and the like. To present a complete study of the word propitiation would take much more space than is available here. 4

5 to refer to the efforts they made to appease the wrath of their pagan gods. It is not used in that sense in the Bible, for the Scriptures emphasize that there was nothing people could do to appease the wrath of God. It is taught that God s wrath had to be appeased, but it is also taught that God had to take the initiative to see that this was accomplished. This He did by sending Jesus to take the punishment for our sins (1 Corinthians 15:3; 2 Corinthians 5:21; Isaiah 53:6). Thus the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross is called the propitiation : the appeasing of God s wrath. The NIV uses the words atoning sacrifice in 1 John 4:10. The LB paraphrase of this verse states that Jesus was sent to satisfy God s anger against our sins. Probably, one reason the word propitiation has fallen into disuse is that it declares a truth about God that makes some uncomfortable. Many are familiar with John s words God is love (1 John 4:8, 16) but are unaware that this is not John s only God is statement. In the first chapter of 1 John, John said, God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all (v. 5; emphasis mine). The words God is Light declare among other things that God is sinless, that God is holy, and that God therefore cannot countenance sin. Sin is a violation of the nature of God. Sin must be punished, or God cannot be God. The word propitiation declares that there is a justice side to God and that His justice must be appeased. Love is what prompted God s action a practical love that supplied our need. 13 He loved us and sent His Son. I once heard Hugo McCord make a startling statement: He said that God loved us more than He did Jesus! He then explained that he had in mind the cross. God loved us so much that He allowed His only Son to die! Let us move on to the context of 1 John 4:10. John built on the foundation of that text to declare that, even as God s love for us was a practical love, our love for God should be a practical love. Some want to talk about their love for God without that love affecting their lives. John had to deal with a similar attitude in his day especially on the part of individuals who taught 13 John declared that God s love continues to supply our needs: for instance, the need for continuing forgiveness (1 John 1:7 2:1), the need for identity (3:1), and the need for freedom from fear (4:17, 18). that it made no difference whether or not one kept God s commands. Thus John emphasized the matter of obedience, doing the will of God. In 2:5 he said, But whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected. In 5:2, 3, this truth is again emphasized: By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and observe His commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome. Some have suggested that the only law is the law of love and that, if we teach men to love, it is unnecessary to insist on commandmentkeeping. Unfortunately, many sins have been perpetuated in the name of love. For instance, fornication and other sexual sins have been committed by those waving banners that declare God is love. John was more down-to-earth than many today, more in touch with the realities of life. He said, in effect, Love is practical. Love acts in a certain way. If you do not do what God tells you to do, then you do not love God! LOVE IS POWERFUL Sixth, love is powerful. The power of love can be seen everywhere; we have all seen demonstrations of its power. There is the power of love to change the life of the one who loves. There is also the power of love to change the life of one who knows he is loved. One illustration of this is the power of Christ s love on the author of our text. I want you to see a contrast: On the one hand, I want you to see a disciple of Jesus ready to call fire from heaven on those who opposed the Lord (Luke 9:54). This disciple had the destructive fury of a violent storm; Jesus called him and his brother sons of thunder (see Mark 3:17). On the other hand, I would like for you to see an old man, grown too old to preach, sitting before the church at Ephesus and repeating over and over, My little children, love one another. My little children, love one another. 14 The two men I have described were the same man: the apostle John, changed over the years by the power of divine love. Love is powerful. There are many ramifications to this truth, but we will focus on one: Love is powerful enough 14 This contrast was adapted from a lecture by Hugo McCord. The last part of the contrast is an ancient tradition. 5

6 to do what needs to be done. Our text declares this: Our need was for a sinless Savior to die in our place. The only One qualified was the sinless Son of God. It must have broken the heart of God to send His Son to die but He loved us enough to do it. Love has the power to do what needs to be done. We need to understand this truth today. Some parents say, I love my child too much to correct him. They do not love their child too much; they love themselves too much. It would hurt the parents to do what is really needed by that child. In Hebrews 12:6 we read, For those whom the Lord loves He disciplines, and He scourges every son whom He receives. Again, some preachers say, I love people too much to tell them they are wrong. These preachers do not love people too much; they love themselves too much. They do not wish to lose the good-will of others. Paul asked the Galatians, So have I become your enemy by telling you the truth? (Galatians 4:16). If people are living in a way that will damn their souls and I fail to tell them God s truth on that matter, I do not love them; I have become their enemy. Elders may say, We love our members too much to discipline them. These elders do not love the members too much; they love themselves too much. They may be fearful of possible repercussions. However, discipline, properly administered, is an expression of love. Paul told the Corinthians to withdraw from a certain brother (1 Corinthians 5); but he also wrote, Let all that you do be done in love (1 Corinthians 16:14; emphasis mine). After the disciplined brother repented, 15 Paul said to the Corinthians, I urge you to reaffirm your love for him (2 Corinthians 2:8). Do not misunderstand me. I am not in favor of parents punishing their children as an act of anger. I am not in favor of preachers using pulpits to vent their frustration. I am not in favor of people being withdrawn from because of a personal vendetta. There is a right way to do all things and that is with love in our hearts; because this is best for the one loved; and because, eventually, it will build up that individual. If we 15 I believe that the brother mentioned in 2 Corinthians 2 is the same one referred to in 1 Corinthians 5; some do not. have agape love in our hearts, we will not be overly concerned about ourselves. Rather, we will be so concerned about the good of the other person that we will be able to do that which is needful and yet hard to do for true love is powerful. LOVE IS PERSISTENT As we strive to express our love, it is easy to become discouraged. People sometimes do not appreciate what we are trying to do. Our love may not be reciprocated. A final observation is that agape love is persistent; it does not quit. Since it is not dependent on feelings, it can continue to seek the best of another regardless of the circumstances. Paul said that love endures all things. Love never fails (1 Corinthians 13:7, 8). Our text expresses this truth in a meaningful way. John spoke of an act in the past, Jesus dying on the cross; but he used the present tense as he said, In this is love not was love, but is love. God s love in the past, in allowing Jesus to die for us, declares His undying love for His children through the ages. If you and I are to learn to love, we must learn to love regardless of the circumstances and consequences. Real love is persistent. CONCLUSION I have declared that love is personal, passionate, penetrating, perceptive, practical, powerful, and persistent. Learning this kind of love takes time and effort. We have no greater challenge as Christians; for agape love, if properly understood, touches every aspect of our relationship with the Lord and our relationships with others. May God help us to understand the love of which John spoke in 1 John 4:10. Then may He help us to grow in that love! NOTES This invitation could be used with the above sermon: If you need to come to be baptized for the remission of your sins (Acts 2:38) or to be restored as an erring child of God (Galatians 6:1; Acts 8:22), here is a practical test of your love for God. John said, For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome (1 John 5:3). If you need to respond, show your love for God right now. 6 Copyright, 2003, 2004 by Truth for Today ALL RIGHTS RESERVED