Loving With Actions And In Truth: Who We Are
1 John 3:16-22 Oct 16, 2005
Intro:
What is love?
I’m married to a scientist; some of her colleagues would describe love simply as a biochemical reaction in the brain that produces a variety of emotional stimuli and motivation for behavior. Is that love? I’m part of the culture of the late 20th century Canada; my culture says that love and sex are the same thing. Is that love? I’ve read some of the poets; for them love is an overwhelming feeling that consumes us – it is romance that sweeps me off my feet and causes me to behave irrationally. Is that love?
I don’t want the love described clinically by the scientists. I certainly don’t want the love that is inseparable from a physical act. And I don’t want a love that is intertwined with a fading feeling.
1 John 3:16-22
“This is how we know what love is:” – those are the first words of the passage of Scripture found in 1 John 3:16-22
What is Love?
John gives us as clear and simple an explanation to my opening question as is possible. 8 words: “Jesus Christ laid down his life for us.”
There you have it. What is love? “This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us.” If you want to truly know what love is you need look no further than the cross. If you want to truly know what love is you need look no further than the Son of God. If you want to truly know what love is you need look no further than the nail scars in the wrists of Jesus Christ God’s only Son WHO, for YOU, endured the pain and the shame and took upon Himself your sin and my sin so that you and I could be restored to right relationship with God. That is the Gospel – Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. He gave up his life so that we could have new life. He took the punishment for everything we have done that is wrong and opened the way for us to live in proper and holy relationship with the God of the Universe.
We all ache to be loved. We all have an emptiness inside of us that longs to be known and accepted for just exactly who we are. It is in Jesus that the love we need and the love we crave so desperately is available, completely free, for us simply to receive.
“This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us.”
Have you accepted that love? Have you said “Jesus I believe that you gave your life for me, I want to give my life back to you. Please forgive me for all of my sins; take control of my life, and make me your precious child.” If the Holy Spirit is nudging your heart right now to accept the love that Jesus offers than I encourage you to respond to Him, and begin the journey.
The starting point is always Jesus’ love for us. That is always the beginning. And the way it works is this: God’s love impacts us and changes us and recreates us, and then we respond to Him.
Sometimes we miss this starting point – we jump right ahead into what we should be doing and we get all legalistic and full of rules and regiments and end up focused on the things that we think we should be doing and leave Jesus out of it all together. That is wrong – our actions need to flow out of our knowledge and experience of Jesus’ love for us. Our behavior is our response, it is the outworking of the inward change.
If That Is Love, how should we respond?
How then should we respond? Look at the last half of verse 16 – “we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.” Jesus laid down his life, we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. Pretty simple. We should be like Jesus. Could you do that – lay down your life? That is the Biblical standard.
I don’t know if any of you have ever thought about what you would do if someone put a gun to your head and told you to deny your faith in Christ or die. On April 20, 1999, Cassie Bernall was in the library of Columbine High School studying the Bible. Two students started opening fire on students in the library. The killers asked, "Does anyone here have a faith in Christ?" Cassie stood up. When one of them got to her he said, "Do you believe in God?’’ Cassie did not deny the Lord, but rather boldly said, "Yes, I believe in Jesus." He then asked her, "Why?" and did not give her a chance to answer before he shot her. Would you face the gunman, affirm Jesus as your Lord and Savior, and pay the price of your life. Maybe you have decided that you would. Maybe you are prepared to give your life completely if faced with that choice.
But do you notice that is not what the text says? It doesn’t say “Jesus laid down his life for us, we ought to lay down our lives for him.” It says we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. That takes it to another level – How important is the family of God!! How important are our brothers and sisters in Christ! We are called to lay down our lives for each other!! Would you take someone’s place, and die for him or her?
What About In Life?
I’ve been talking about the phrase “laying down our lives” in terms of dying for each other. And if that is asked of you, 1 John says we ought to be willing. But for the vast majority of us, we will never be called upon to die for anything. And in fact, this phrase means far more than simply dying for something we believe in.
It means laying aside our desires and needs for each other. (repeat)
I am really tired of the message that our culture screams as loudly as it possibly can – the message is “me me me me me”. It is “my needs must come first”. It is “take care of yourself.” It is “You deserve a break today”, and following that “Have you had your break today?” It is “Treat yourself.” “Pamper yourself.” “Indulge yourself.” It is me me me me me me me. And that message is wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong.
Yes people are busy. Yes we are all working hard. We are tired. But by and large we are busy pursuing our own goals. We are working hard to make money for ourselves, to make a good career for ourselves, to further ourselves. We are tired not because we have spent ourselves in pursuing good in and for others but because we have been pursuing the things we want so viciously and endlessly that we have exhausted ourselves. And we have nothing left for those around us. It is almost never about others.
And so we get to a text that says “we ought to give our lives for our brothers” and think “well it’s a good thing I live in Canada where people don’t actually have to die for each other… I guess I can ignore this part (thank goodness!)” And we get lulled back into the cultural lie that says my life must be focussed on me.
“Laying down our lives for our brothers” means more than being willing to give up our lives, it means being willing to lay aside our needs and put others first. John is talking about an “others-centered” lifestyle, where we put others ahead of ourselves. Which says that others’ needs take precedence over our own.
I think that in our culture, “laying down our lives” does not so much mean dying, but rather putting other’s needs ahead of our own. Giving up our “rights”, our “wants”, our “preferences”, our “criticisms”, our “pet peeves”, and putting others first.
Vs 17
The next verse takes it one step further. “If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him?”
“Pity” doesn’t mean feeling bad – the verse doesn’t mean I should see someone with a need and just feel bad about it. James 2:15-16 says “Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, ‘Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,’ but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it?”
Read verse 17 again. OUCH! Scary verse!!! Do you see what it is questioning? It is questioning my internal state of salvation! If I do not respond with generosity to the need of my brother, How can the love of God be in me?
I don’t know about you, but that kind of verse makes me uncomfortable. It makes me squirm, makes me want to do some fancy theological tricks to manipulate the meaning and soften the impact. But this is about as plain as it gets – if we see a need, have material possessions but don’t share, the love of God is not in us. This verse suggests that if I see a need and do not respond, my actions reveal a heart that is not full of the love of God. If I am not growing in compassion and generosity, if in fact I remain callous and don’t share, there is reason to doubt my salvation. That is what John says.
However, when we obey this verse the results are inspirational. One year in youth ministry I met to plan out the year with a group of senior high kids from our church. I expected to get some ideas of fun things to do, lets go bowling and to laserquest and whitewater rafting yadda yadda yadda… You know what they decided? They asked me to find two Friday night events each month – half of all the things we would do – where they could go and do volunteer things for others, like preparing and serving meals at the Mustard Seed Street Church. So we did – at the very beginning we did a meal at the Mustard Seed, and a grade 10 student came with us, and asked me how we were going to pay for these meals. I wasn’t really sure at the time, but I had a few ideas, said we’d do some fundraisers etc… That Sunday he handed me an envelope, and said it was to help pay for some of the meals we were doing for these street people. I thanked him, tossed it on my desk, expecting $20-$40. I opened it the next day to deal with it – there was $250. From a grade 10 student. I talked to them later – I said “that’s an awful lot of money – are you sure?” “Yes, absolutely.” “Where did you get that much money?” Do you know what the response was? He said, “I’ve been saving up for a snowboard, but those people need to eat way more than I need a snowboard.” What is love? It’s a fifteen year-old teen giving up his snowboard money so that street people can eat.
Vs 18-20
John continues, and as I read it his tone changes drastically. It changes from an in-your-face confrontational question, to a plea from a father: look at verses 18-20: “Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence whenever our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.”
Dear children. Dear children, let us. He pleads. He exhorts. He says, let’s prove it. Let’s put our love into action, not just say it but demonstrate it by our actions. It is not enough for us to think fond thoughts, or to be moved by compassion at a situation that we hear of or a difficult time in someone’s life, we must put that love into action. We must reach out and do something to help, we can’t just say “I care” with our mouths, we need to show that. We need to listen, we need to meet needs, we need to serve, we need to act on the care and compassion we feel. That is loving “with actions and in truth”.
And the result of this love in action, he says, is personal assurance: “This is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest whenever our hearts condemn us.”
Has that ever happened to you – you blow it somehow, and your conscience and your heart wells up and you feel condemned – not just for your sin but in regards to your salvation? Its like your heart says “Wow, if you did that then you certainly can’t be a Christian – the love of God certainly is not in you. God couldn’t love someone like you…” That is a common experience – that crippling feeling of guilt and shame that threatens to undermine our very assurance of God’s work of salvation in our lives. That is common. John offers hope. He says, in effect, are those thoughts, those doubts, are they in line with your actions over all? Does the way you live demonstrate your love for God, and for your neighbor, over all? Sometimes our hearts condemn us because we are genuinely wrong, and need to change; but sometimes the devil sneaks in and tries to undermine our confidence in God’s act of salvation in our lives, and that is when John says we can “set our hearts at rest in His presence” because we take an honest look at our actions and see ourselves growing in becoming more like Christ – we see ourselves loving in action and in truth and not merely in word or deed.
Vs 21-22
The result of living an enacted life of love is that we are so transformed, that we stand in the presence of God with great confidence, and our hearts are so in line with God’s that all the things we ask for are the things that move His heart as well, and we “receive from Him”.
Who Are We?
Looking back at the whole passage, I see this: We are a people who put others first, who freely share, and who love in truth and action.
