1 John 4.

7-21 “God is Love” Dennis Mock

Sunday, April 25, 2010

Perhaps the least understood concept concerning God is His love. This may seem strange but what do we
really mean when we say, “God is love.”. The problem is we try to understand it against the feeble
backdrop of our human concept of “love”. We love our family, we love movies, we love our pets, we love
to travel, etc. My goal is simply this, to help us get, for the first time perhaps, an accurate handle on the
concept of God’s love. We are not even going to look at 1 Cor. 13. But reflect on the prayer Paul made in
Ephesians 3 – “That you may grasp how long and wide and deep is the love of Christ . . . “. He suggests it is
incomprehensible, and he is correct. John in his writings kept talking about love over and over again.

Our challenge is to define the concept of “love”. Many of us perhaps never even try to understand what it
means for God to be love. We stop at experiencing it on a human level. We think at that point we have
experienced God’s love but we have not even come close! John makes the case that the intrinsic
characteristic of God is love. God is, however, not limited by or defined by love. His base characteristic is
holiness from which his love and other characteristics flow. God is love but love is not God.

Read 1 John 4:7-21

- John mentions love in this letter more than in the Gospel of John.

Then Overview:
- Series of truth statements John makes with regard to love.
- Define Love
- Describe God’s love with adjectives we can only apply to Him.

Truth Statements:
1. All true love is sourced in God and those who really know God understand and practice love. (7-8)
2. God proved his love once and for all by sending Christ as our sacrifice for sins (9)
a. The expression of love is driven by
b. In Christ God clearly showed us what He meant by love. Not out of obligation but freely and
willingly providing salvation.
3. God initiated love, not us. (10)
a. Absent God drawing us we would not go to Him.
4. God’s love in its purest form is only expressed in a personal relationship.
i. ILL: God allows tornadoes in a sin cursed world yet He still loves the world.
ii. God made us co-heirs with Christ.
5. Love makes the invisible God visible. (12)
6. The love God has for us is trustworthy. (16)
a. I know those who are loving by nature but there is no one else who has ever walked the
earth who is completely trustworthy in terms of their love for us.
b. Romans 8 – nothing can separate us from the love of Christ!
7. Our confident hope to avoid future judgment is based in the Love of God. (17-18)
a. What allows us to no longer fear the grave and judgment? It is only the love of God in
Christ.
b. Love and fear are mutually exclusive
c. If we are fearful at any time then God’s love is not being made perfect in us.

Defining Love from a Biblical Perspective:

- An attribute is something about God that makes Him God.
- It is any inherent characteristic that is true of His nature.
 - God does not change or lack anything so it is what is perfectly true of Him and who He always has
been.
- It is something that belongs to Him and Him alone.
- They are all infinite and inexhaustible.
- They are all held in perfect tension and exercised in perfect harmony at all times. He can be
righteous and loving at the same time.
- No single attribute describes God exhaustively.
o Only collectively can all His attributes approach describing Him.
o Don’t get hung up one attribute! He is so much more holy, righteous , loving than we could
ever imagine.
- In English we use one word “love” for every type of affection or preference. In Greek there were
many words for love.
- A Definition of Love as an attribute of God:
o It is the characteristic, which moves Him to voluntarily commit himself to relate communicate
with and ultimately seek the highest good of others.
o All human love has some aspect of mutuality. God gave knowing they would reject and kill
His Son! He knows even today that most people do not believe in the love of God expressed
in Christ Jesus.
o God wants a heart of grateful service from us but He does not require or force it.
o The book of Job –
o God is love because He chooses to express love for all of us in Christ Jesus despite the fact
that most of us reject it.
o This level of selfless love is not expressed at this level anywhere by man.
o God chose to make Israel a nation and loved them despite the fact that they would
stubbornly reject His love over many generations.
o God’s love involves:
 Affection, allegiance, action,
 It leads to a covenant relationship.
 It involves divine choice, commitment and loyalty.
o Described briefly:
 It flows naturally out of His grace and goodness.
 Two most consistent word in the OT about love are “loving kindness” or “loyal
covenant love” – Hessed
 It flows out of His strength and steadfastness.
 Jesus came to serve and give His life as a ransom for many.
 It is always personal, selective and voluntary.
 It always creates worth in its object.
 We are worthy because God loves us.
 If we don’t’ feel worth it is because we really don’t understand God’s love.
o Romans 5:5 – Love of God shed abroad in our hearts –
 This talks about Him giving us the H.S. so that we can grasp how great the Love of
God is!
 His love is always underserved, unconditional, unending, unfathomable, and
unstoppable.
 It forms the basis of our relationship to God. It is established in the person and
sacrifice of Jesus Christ. It is only “in Christ” that we experience this love.

Coming to the end of this message I feel woefully inadequate in my attempts to describe the love of God.
- We must put aside our woefully inadequate human understanding of love.
- Jeremiah 31:3 - The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying: “I have loved you with an
everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving-kindness.