“See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him. 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. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure. Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. You know that he appeared in order to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him. Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous. Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him; and he cannot keep on sinning, because he has been born of God.  By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.”

Despite being blind to God to the point of being hostile to Him, the world is obsessed with His attributes. Romans 1:18–20, which I’ve become fond of quoting, tells us,

“For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.”

The world is in darkness, but even in its blindness, even in its lies, it has this knowledge of God’s existence grafted into it. It is blighted, and stained by sin, but the universe bears the marks – from the bones of men, to the bones of the earth, to the moon, and sun, and distant stars – all creation attests to its creator. But if something is made, and you deny its true maker, then you have to attribute its existence to something else. Some knowledge of peace and joy and holiness is woven into our very being. We claim peace in nature – misty mountains, the open sea – we worship the creation instead of the creator. We seek joy in pride, authority, and material possessions. We attempt to apply a misconstrued and blasphemous holiness to whatever we think worthy – other people, works of stone, clay, and canvas, we deify the sense of autonomy we hold within ourselves. We take what we have been given, and forsake the giver. Despite denying God, the world is obsessed with the wicked act of taking what is His, and applying it to other things. We’re addicted to taking His qualities, ignoring Him and what He has revealed to us about Himself, and waxing poetically and philosophically on these great mysteries. The most prevalent of all these is likely love. Look at our art – painting, poetry, books, movies, music, and see what they teach. Love is that feeling you get when you’re with that special someone, love is that little twinkle in her eye, love is holding a newborn baby, love is a sense of patriotism and duty – love is laughter, love is tears, love is warmth, it’s depth, it’s pleasure, it’s pain. It’s grandpa’s old guitar, it’s a pretty girl in a rusted Chevy on a hot summer night. Van Halen asks, “Why Can’t this be Love?” John Mayer says, “Love is a Verb,” and Nazareth cries, “Love Hurts.” If the commercials are to be believed, love is somehow what makes a Subaru, a Subaru. Popular media asserts that love is a matter of tolerance, acceptance, and inclusion. There’s the line of logic that, if it feels good, and it’s not hurting anyone, then there’s no harm, and any condemnation is unloving. We, humanity, the world are making great efforts to suggest at, point to, insinuate, theorize, and allude to something we do not understand. We say so much, and it’s the incoherent babel of a little child, so intent upon the noises they’re making despite the lack of meaning. We deal in counterfeit gold, and then prize it as if it were the real thing. But the world can only guess at love, because it does not know God, and as 1 John 4:7–8 clearly states,

“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.”

God is Love. It’s that simple, and it’s that deep. Every movie, poem, song, and car commercial that attested to anything other than that got it wrong. But what does it mean, in general and for us as individuals to know that God is Love – to be given this Love, filled with it, and to share it with others? What does it mean to live as one loved by God?

The Work of True Love

1. Love Transforms

“See what kind of love the Father has given to us,”

As we’ve moved through 1 John, we’ve seen lessons and themes that were relayed in John’s gospel given in more direct terms. John’s gospel, while written from a place of authority, was fully focused on seeing and understanding the reality of the deity of Christ, and the implications of the life, death, and resurrection of the Son of the Living God. 1 John takes us back to these points, but from the stance of a church elder, giving a condensed breakdown, and practical application of who we are in and through Jesus. This takes the recurring theme of contrasting division that is so prevalent in John’s gospel – the Light against the dark, the Truth against the lies, wine against water, the Good Shepherd against the thief, the One who willingly gives up His life, as opposed to being taken and killed without the power to stop events from proceeding – and condenses it, highlighting the extreme divide in the natures of those who are changed as children of God, and those who are in a state of rebellion against Him. Coming from discussing the working spirit of the antichrists in the world and their desire to deceive, we transition into chapter three, and this matter of love. We finished last week with 1 John 2:29,

“If you know that he is righteous, you may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness has been born of him.”

Remembering that the original letter was written without chapters and verses, this flows right into the opening of today’s section,

“See what kind of love the Father has given to us.”

Scripture provides countless pictures of the Love of God, but to offer some examples to help us understand what we’re talking about here, John 3:16 may be the simplest and most prevalent offering,

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”

In this we can see that the kind of love that God has offered us is deeply sacrificial. His love for us was so great that He offers His own Son, the One who is of the same essence, who is one with Him. God loves us to such a degree that He who is mighty and holy beyond our comprehension, took on flesh and became His own Lamb of sacrifice so that we might have a path of reconciliation to Him. Romans 5:6–8 gives us another perspective on this sacrifice, saying,

“For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die—but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

The One who is holy died for those who lacked righteousness so that we might be made holy as He is. There is a degree of responsibility to the individual – we have to answer the call, open the door, respond to the Truth. But what we can’t do is any of the work. We cannot get ourselves to Christ – His love is a love that comes to us, seeks us out, and heals us of our mortal wounds where we’re found. 1 Corinthians 13:1–3 helps us see the singular importance of this love, saying,

“If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.”

The kind of Love that God has for us is not what we may understand as simple human affection or fondness, but is eternally vast. Any wisdom, any power, any gift or blessing that is somehow lacking love is rendered worthless. We imitate love in our flesh, like children playing house. It may hold some similarity in appearance, but it’s an act that produces nothing tangible. If you go into a play kitchen set, flip a few plastic burgers, give the imaginary soup a stir and then tell your family that dinner’s ready, everyone’s going hungry. This love of God is not a love based on appearances, though it is there to be seen. Rather it is a love of sacrifice, a love of evidence, and a love that transforms – and what it transforms us into attests to its legitimacy.

“… that we should be called children of God; and so we are.”

God loves us to the extent that He makes us His own, He brings us so near that we know Him as Father. Matthew 5:9, one of the beatitudes that starts the Sermon on the Mount puts this simply, saying,

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.”

It’s simple, but it makes a tremendous amount of sense – we don’t know Love apart from God. We also don’t know Truth, or holiness, or Justice, or peace. If we are “peacemakers,” it can only be because we know the Prince of Peace, that His Spirit is within us, guiding and teaching us. So if we truly know peace and are doing the work of peace, then we must know the transformative Love of God to be called His children. John 1:12–13 speaks further on this transformation, saying,

“But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.”

This birth by the will of God speaks to the rebirth that Jesus discusses with Nicodemus in John 3. In knowing the Love of God, in being transformed, and redeemed, and called His children, we are freed from the stain of sin, liberated from our flesh. Romans 8:12–17 says,

“So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’ The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.”

That is the gravity of God’s Love, that we would be made fellow heirs in glory with Christ, that we would truly be made His children.

“The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him.”

Romans 1:21–25 tells us,

“For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things. Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.”

Having already cited this passage previously, this continues what I spoke to before – that world knows of love, but it doesn’t know Love itself. It knows that it exists, just as it knows that God exists. But if I insist upon denying something that is self-evident, then I have to devise some alternative explanation or interpretation. And so, as the world makes everything into a kind of god, it makes everything into a kind of love. Love becomes some vague, hazy thing, it’s founded in emotions, in physical attraction, in warm regards. We’ve seemingly spent the whole of our existence coming up with a billion different angles and interpretations of what love might be, but Scripture tells us quite plainly that Love is found in God alone. But then of course a world that denies God can’t understand Love, because they seek to understand the very One that they deny. And of course they can’t understand or know us because we are changed, conformed to His image and made new as His children. Jesus tells the disciples in John 15:18–21,

“If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. 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. Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. But all these things they will do to you on account of my name, because they do not know him who sent me.”

So we will either walk in step with the world, and find acceptance in the rebellion of humanity, or we become children of God, and are misunderstood and despised by the world. As James 4:4 says,

“You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.”

You either know the Love of God and are called His child, or you aren’t, and there’s no mixing of the two sides.

“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 are saved, redeemed, made righteous before God – but we still exist in flesh that is stained and limited by sin. What John writes here attests to the hope we know at present, but also calls us forward to who we will be in eternity. 1 Corinthians 13:12 says,

“For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.”

The world may not know Love at all, but even we who are God’s children don’t know Him fully in our present condition. We are born again in spirit, but we remain hampered in our flesh. Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5:1–5,

“For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this tent we groan, longing to put on our heavenly dwelling, if indeed by putting it on we may not be found naked. For while we are still in this tent, we groan, being burdened—not that we would be unclothed, but that we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.”

This gives us some indication as to what we can expect when Jesus returns for us. There can sometimes be a general fear of heaven and eternity, because these things are incomprehensible for our mortal minds, and what cannot be comprehended can be easily feared. But this assures us of what we cannot fully understand – that we become more, not less. When we see God as He truly is, with open eyes, we are blessed to become like Him – we become like that which fills our eyes entirely. In regard to us being like Christ, I turn to John’s writing in Revelation 1:12–16 as he describes witnessing the glorified Jesus,

“Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. The hairs of his head were white, like white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. In his right hand he held seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength.”

Jesus appears as a man, and yet He’s clearly, visibly far more than a man. This is the promise of the transformative Love of God – that we may be called His children now, and that in eternity we only move closer to our Father in heaven.

2. Love Purifies

“And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure. Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness.”

In understanding the Love of God (as best we can on this side of the eternity), we are called from what is wicked to what is righteous. We aim at what is righteous, and we walk in the footsteps of Christ as we seek the will of the Father. Colossians 3:5–10 tells us,

“Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.”

I love lists, reference points, touchstones – and this is an excellent example of what the righteous person intent upon God seeks to purge from their lives. If we go on practicing these things, indulging in sin, then we’re not doing the works of God, but are operating with lawlessness. 2 Thessalonians 2:9–12 tells us,

“The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders, and with all wicked deception for those who are perishing, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe what is false, in order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.”

This spirit of lawlessness is one in the same with the spirit of the antichrists that we discussed last week. It is the spirit working in the sons of rebellion and disobedience. This lawlessness is what we are purified from by the Love of God.

“You know that he appeared in order to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him. Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous.”

In the world, in our very flesh, there is sin. In Christ there is redemption, the forgiveness and erasure of this sin. 2 Corinthians 5:17–21 says,

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

It’s fascinating that as we work through 1 John, John is repeating much of the same principles, but as they relate to Christ in different ways. He wrote in, 1 John 2:1,

“My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.”

Giving us hope to resist what is wicked, but also hope for when we stumble. However he says in the same passage, in 1 John 2:4–5,

“Whoever says ‘I know him’ but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may know that we are in him.”

These teachings stack onto one another – so that you may understand that if you don’t know and practice righteousness then you don’t know Light, or Truth, or Love, nor are you a child of God. This again is not to say that you won’t struggle or stumble in your flesh – but if you delight in what is evil, if you can’t even identify sin as sin, then you cannot claim God as your Father, because you are not doing His work – you cannot claim to know the purifying Love of God. The world likes to make things as messy as possible. In a previous outline I delved into the Daoist symbolism of the yin-yang, which contains a little light in its darkness, and a little darkness in its light. In our flesh, we love to blend right and wrong, to muddle the lines. It’s comforting to think of yourself as “mostly” good, and deeply disconcerting to read that God has said, “You shall be holy for I am holy.” But regardless of what feels comforting in our flesh, the matter really couldn’t be more straightforward. Jesus says, regarding false teachers in Matthew 7:16–18,

“You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit.”

There is no blending, there is no middle ground – the one who has been made righteous seeks the face of God and delights in His work. The one who is still mired in sin seeks what is worldly and delights in what is wicked.

 “Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.”

Jesus says to the ruling Jews in John 8:42–45,

“… If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God and I am here. I came not of my own accord, but he sent me. Why do you not understand what I say? It is because you cannot bear to hear my word. You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies. But because I tell the truth, you do not believe me.”

We all do the work of our father – it matters less what we say, and far more how we behave, we will give evidence to whom we belong. The reason – the mission of Christ in the world is put on display in John 1:5,

“The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

As well as in the proclamation of John the Baptist, in John 1:29,

“… Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”

Jesus is the divine Light that drives back and destroys the darkness, He is the sacrificial Lamb of God whose blood purifies the sins of man. When we seek Him, when we are kept in His Love then we are saved – but if we have embraced and aligned ourselves with what is dark and wicked and in rebellion against God, then we carry out works that are destined for destruction.

3. Love Divides

 “No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him; and he cannot keep on sinning, because he has been born of God. 

If we have been transformed, then there will be those who remain untransformed. If we have been purified, then there will be those who remain impure. If we’ve received salvation, there will be those who drink the cup of the wrath of God, and receive destruction. This is the division of the Love of God. I cited Matthew 7:16 before, that the fruit gives evidence to the plant that bears it. We as Christians cannot continue on in sin as we once did when God has placed the seed of His Spirit within us, when the roots of the Love of God have been fixed within our hearts. 2 Timothy 2:19 tells us,

“But God’s firm foundation stands, bearing this seal: ‘The Lord knows those who are his,’ and, ‘Let everyone who names the name of the Lord depart from iniquity.’”

We are marked, sealed, baptized in the blood of the Lamb. If we know the Love of God, if we claim His name, and stand on His foundation, then we cannot have the same relationship with sin as one who remains in darkness. In Matthew 25:31–34, 41, Jesus says,

“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left. Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.’”…“Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.’”

There is no acceptable amount of sin before the righteousness of God, and so either we know the transformation and purification of His Love, or we deny Him, and face division from Him for eternity.

“By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.”

2 Peter 1:5–7, another passage I’m fond of referencing, says,

“For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.”

I’m fascinated by this section, because this is a step-by-step building process of supplementing faith. You’re given attributes, layer by layer – this is the construction of the shield of faith that is part of the armor of God. A shield isn’t made of a single element – solid wood, or solid metal. Its construction is layered, and in its layering it has its strength. I’m always struck by the fact that in the midst of this supplemental list is “godliness,” and I remember thinking to myself that this seemed too lofty a calling, that this idea of behaving in a godly way seemed too vast and too grand to me. But the simple answer to godly conduct is brotherly affection, which is supported and enabled by love… God is Love. And so we are godly when God makes us so, and the mark of this is that we love our brothers. The beginning of the book of Amos shows us as God passes judgement on the neighbors of Israel. Amos 1:11 says,

“… For three transgressions of Edom, and for four, I will not revoke the punishment, because he pursued his brother with the sword and cast off all pity, and his anger tore perpetually, and he kept his wrath forever.”

This is the opposite side of the spectrum. If godliness is found exemplified in love for our brothers, then we see the opposite when we are merciless and wrathful, persecuting our brothers with no trace of love. Romans 14:7–12 reminds us,

“For none of us lives to himself, and none of us dies to himself. For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s. For to this end Christ died and lived again, that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living. Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God; for it is written, ‘As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God.’ So then each of us will give an account of himself to God.”

While the implications and ramifications are vast – literally eternal, this is actually quite simple. We know God, or we don’t. We live for Him, or we live for ourselves. We are transformed and purified, or we’re not. People get nervous sometimes when we think of the dividing line of salvation, but this isn’t a cause for confusion, distress, or doubt. Do you love your brother? Do the fruits of the Spirit, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control come out in your conduct with others, or do these things feel buried, or maybe missing altogether? If you see these fruits coming to bear in your life then rejoice, and pray that God will bring them all the more to the forefront, to His glory. But if these things sound foreign, don’t despair – you know what to seek. Repent of the darkness, seek the face of God. Seek His path, His way, His Truth and His Light – seek His unfailing, transformational, purifying Love, and know what it means to be free indeed.

Pastor Chris’ sermon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bU6qvwUH7I