LIVING TOGETHER IN GOD’S LOVE
LOVE VALUES THE OTHERS
1 John 2:9-11, John 13:34
Text has 2 parts:
1. Vv.7-8 tell us what specific commandment John thinks we should
use in testing the reality of our new birth.
2. Vv. 9-11 described the way that test would be carried out in 2 cases:
A. One case amounts to be a warning professions
Christians who hate are doomed in the dark.
B. Other case amounts to promised who live in the light
that is, they are truly born again.
2 cases are: “APERSON WHO LOVES AND A PERSON WHO HATES”
Hate is the evidence of blindness to the light of God.
Love is the evidence that the sight has been given to the blind.
The key for the spiritual growth is to love our brother.
True knowledge of the light will always humble us.
Light means a moral absoluteness and revealed truth.
If we are closer to God than others, then we are even more responsible to
love others.
THE GREATEST PROOF OF WALKING IN THE LIGHT IS THAT YOU LOVE ONE
ANOTHER.
HATING A BROTHER IS A PROOF THAT GOD’S LOVE HAS NOT YET IMPACTED
YOUR LIFE.
WALK IN THE DARKNESS:
1. Too prideful to forgive
2. Too greedy to care for others
3. Too angry to be sensitive
4. Too selfish to love.
DEMONSTRATES THE VIRTUE OF LOVE
How do we demonstrate the distinctiveness of Christian love?
Virtue is moral action we practice. How can we practice the glorious virtue
of Love.
1.
Christian love with its modern counterfeits: lust, sentimentality,
gratification.
But the bible: Love is primarily an active interests in the well- being of
another person.
LOVE ACTS FOR THE BENEFITS OF OTHERS.
WILLIAM BARCLAY: Love is the spirit in the heart that will never seek
anything but that highest good of its fellow men.
God loved us so much not because we had something to offer tHim, but
rather because he had something to offer: Jn. 3:16
GOD LOVED US SO THAT HE COULD DEMONSTRATE HIS MERCY TO US
IN THE PERSON OF HIS SON.
JOHN 13:34- LOVE AS I HAVE LOVED YOU.
2. LOVE IS VULNERABLE TO THE OTHERS.
Love opens up its life to another person.
It goes beyond feelings, it breaks down barriers, it EXPOSED THE HEART.
THINKS!- Jesus left the glory in heaven to come to earth, he veiled his
divinity and took on humanity. And what did he get Him?
John 1:11- THEY DID NOT RECOGNIZE HIM..Jesus experienced when he
came to earth surely that must have hurt.- then as Jesus hung on the cross
dying for these people that He loved, they hurled abuses scorn and ridicule.-
HIS HEART E=WAS BROKEN, AND YET HE FORGIVE THEM.
Christian love is the most costly investment You will ever make.
To Love is to be vulnerable.
3. LOVE ENTAILS A COST
Its gets its hand dirty. It goes out on a limb, it takes gamble.
Love makes a statement and leaves a legacy.
It’s performs act that steal the heart and leaves an impression on the soul.
LOVE ACTS ARE NEVER FORGOTTEN.
I recently read a moving story about the founder of World Vision, the
international Christian relief agency. Bob Pierce had advanced
leukemia, but he chose to visit a colleague in Indonesia before he
died. As he and others walked together through a small village, they
came upon a young girl lying on a bamboo mat next to a river. She
was dying of cancer and had only a short time to live.
Bob was indignant. He demanded to know why she wasn't in a clinic.
But his friend explained that she was from the jungle and wished to
spend her last days next to the river, where it was cool and familiar.
As Bob gazed at her, he felt such compassion that he got down on his
knees in the mud, took her hand, and began stroking it. Although she
didn't understand him, he prayed for her. Afterwards she looked up
and said something, "What did she say? Bob asked his friend.
His friend replied, "She said, 'If I could only sleep again, if I could only
sleep again.'" It seemed that her pain was too great to allow her the
relief of rest.
Bob began to weep. Then he reached into his pocket and took out his
own sleeping pills, the ones his doctor had given him because the
pain from his leukemia was too great for him to sleep at night.
He handed the bottle to his friend. "You make sure this young lady
gets a good night's sleep," he said, "as long as these pills last."
Bob was ten days away from where he could get his prescription
refilled. That meant ten painful and restless nights. That day his love
cost him greatly. But even in the midst of his suffering, God infused
him with a supernatural sense of satisfaction that he had done the
right thing.
I'm not saying that we should constantly abuse ourselves or become
passive doormats. But Christian love inevitably carries costs. Even
when the cost is high, we can nevertheless count on God to bring
fulfillment to His followers. True love always costs. If there is no cost
there is no love.