Grace, mercy, and peace will be with you from God the
Father and from Jesus Christ, the Father's Son, in truth and love. Amen.
1 John 4:16-21 16 We also have come to know and trust the love that God
has for us. God is love. Whoever remains in love remains in God and
God in him. 17 In
this way his love has been brought to its goal among us, so that we may have
confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are just like
Jesus. 18 There
is no fear in love, but complete love drives out fear, because fear has to do
with punishment. The one who continues
to be afraid has not been brought to the goal in love. 19 We love because he
first loved us. 20 If
anyone says, “I love God,” but hates his brother, he is a liar. For how can anyone who does not love his
brother, whom he has seen, love God, whom he has not seen? 21 This then is the
command we have from him: The one who loves God should also love his brother. (EHV)
Remain
in the power of God’s perfect love.
Dearly beloved of God,
The
primary command given to us says, “Love the Lord your God with all your
heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind; and,
love your neighbor as yourself.” (Luke 10:27) The young man who gave this answer to Jesus
soon realized that he didn’t measure up to even the first part of the
command. You and I, likewise, will go
away ashamed if we assume we naturally possess the perfect love these commands
require.
When we examine our hearts, and our histories,
honestly, it isn’t hard to find times we fail to love as we should. Perhaps, we took advantage of a situation
that hurt someone else while seeking our own gain. Perhaps, anger caused us to treat someone in
a less than ideal way. Certainly, our
love for God has been tested again and again when we didn’t really want to obey
His commandments.
Our personal love for God also fails us when we
begin to fear about our future, as when we worry that our bank accounts will shrink
instead of grow. Currently, inflation is
rearing its ugly head in our economy, and so much fear is being broadcast on
the news and social media. What will we
do if times get hard? What will we do if
the Lord in His great wisdom allows us to suffer loss, or even hunger, as rare
as that might be in our experience? Will
we still love God if our lives are on the line?
The people to whom John wrote experienced much
trouble and hardship. Furthermore, they
were under attack from false teachers spouting misguided ideas about God and
His love. For the benefit of those early
Christians, and for ours, the Holy Spirit caused John to record these words to
encourage us to Remain in the power of God’s perfect love.
Our lesson begins with the bold statement, “We
also have come to know and trust the love that God has for us. God is love.
Whoever remains in love remains in God and God in him.” First, this is what the Holy Spirit granting
faith to us does. It allows us to know
God and His love. Prior to the Holy
Spirit working in us through Word and Sacrament, we knew nothing about God,
nothing about what He does and did for us, nothing that would enable us to love
anyone properly, even ourselves.
Now, many might argue against that
statement. People of all faiths and
backgrounds, including atheists and agnostics might claim to love
fervently. However, apart from the love
of God, we have no concept of the complete love John speaks of here. This love is self-sacrificing, doing only
what is best for the other without regard for reward or recompense. This is the love the Bible says God
demonstrates for us. In fact, this is
God.
Completely without our help, God created this
world for our good. Whether people
believe in Him or not, God continues to provide for the daily needs of
everything on earth. Furthermore, God
promises, “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat,
summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.” (Genesis 8:22) Jesus also assures us that God “makes his
sun to rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the righteous and the
unrighteous.” (Matthew 5:45)
Yet, God’s providence in material things is the
littlest part of the love He shows, for when man rebelled against God, God
remained faithful to His plans for man.
The main part of that plan was to have a loving relationship with the
human race. Therefore, even though we
had rebelled against God’s will and lost the loving ability with which our
first parents were created, God continued to love us—so much so, in fact, that
He sent His Son to atone for all our sins, to live the love we should live and
to die in our place for the lack of love and other sins that so infect us.
This portion of God’s Word tells us to love our
brothers. Certainly, that applies to our
blood relatives and to our church family, but it also applies to the rest of
the human population for we are all descended from the same original
parents. Still, we know how hard we find
it to love those who maybe don’t show great love to us. It is hard for sinners to love the unlovables,
which we all are because of sin.
Lately, we are bombarded by the idea that so
many people are racists and haters. The
truth is we all have a very narrow group we feel love for, and even those we
love the most often suffer from our lack of love. Yet, there is a way that changes this, and
there is historical proof that Christ working in people changes them to love
others. John wrote, “In this way his
love has been brought to its goal among us, so that we may have confidence on
the day of judgment, because in this world we are just like Jesus.” In this way, we are all perfect and perfectly
loving, right? You feel that way, correct? Oh, if only I could! Yet, we will.
And we are.
Here is the deal, as long as we are in this
world, we are afflicted with the sinful nature of our birth. We couldn’t shake it on our own, and it still
troubles us. That is why we so often
don’t love as we should. However, there
is another side to the Christian believer, and sometimes, we are barely aware
of that strong love flickering in our hearts, but it is there, and it moves us
to do things we wouldn’t do on our own.
When the Holy Spirit through the Gospel and through Baptism connected us
with Jesus, we became connected to God who is love. In Baptism, we died with Christ, but we were
also raised to live a new life. (Romans 6:4 & Galatians 3:27) That new life with Christ gives us confidence
on Judgment Day, because we are counted as righteous and holy for Jesus’
sake.
At the same time, the new life in us empowers
us to love as no unbeliever ever could.
The non-Christian may well do things that look like love, but they are
always done seeking some reward whether that be affection, honor, fame,
material return, or a heavenly payback.
Yet, that is not the way of love.
Jesus told His disciples, “No one has greater love than this: that
someone lays down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13) True love puts the needs of the loved ones
ahead of his own, and that is what Jesus did for us. We needed perfect holiness restored to us so
that we could live with God and live like God.
Therefore, Jesus, the Son of God from all eternity, entered this world
taking human flesh into the divine, so that He could live with perfect love in
our place. Jesus’ perfect obedience and
the love He lived is now credited to all of us who live connected with Him.
Furthermore, there was a punishment due us for
the lovelessness in which we were born, and which we lived until connected with
Christ. Even the lovelessness that
sometimes traps us still today needed to be paid for with death. Thus, apart from Christ Jesus, we would still
be destined to the darkness of hell, but Jesus laid down His life in our
place. On a cross of bitter shame and
horrible pain, the Son of God bore all the guilt of the world, yours and mine
included. There, Jesus counted us all as
His dear friends. He still does today. Then, because God is love, Jesus was raised
to life again, triumphant over everything that should have made us unlovable.
“We love because he first loved us.” God loved us in the
beginning when He created this world for our home. God loved us after we rebelled as He promised
a Savior for sinners deserving of death.
God loved us as He turned against His own dear Son on the cross, so that
He wouldn’t have to turn us away forever.
God then loved us by raising Jesus from the dead to live forever, and
God loved us when His Holy Spirit brought saving faith to us, washing away our
guilt in the waters of Baptism, drowning our sinful nature and raising up a new
life of loving faith.
God continues to love us, and He will never
change. He loves us by providing His
Word to strengthen us, His body and blood in the bread and wine to heal our
guilt, to assure us of His sacrificial love, and empower our love. All of this is God working in us, so that we
could be His own beloved ones again, and so that we could reflect God’s love in
our lives as originally intended when God created man and woman.
Now, how will the world know we love, and more
important, what evidence will there be when we stand before the righteous Judge
of all on Judgment Day? John tells us, “If
anyone says, ‘I love God,’ but hates his brother, he is a liar. For how can anyone who does not love his
brother, whom he has seen, love God, whom he has not seen? This then is the command we have from him:
The one who loves God should also love his brother.” The love of God is demonstrated in the lives
of His children. Though we struggle with
our sinful nature, God’s love often shines through as we live our lives of
willing service, as we honor the authorities placed over us, as we sacrifice
selfish goals for the good of those God puts in our care such as spouse and
children, friends and neighbors.
It even becomes evident in the way Christians
step up to help those we never meet, and how foreign enemies are treated in
times of war. The world has known that
the place to go for help is America, not just because of the riches God has
given us, but because of the Christian faith that has so guided our nation for much
of its history. This generosity doesn’t
earn us merit before God. Instead, it
demonstrates to the world, and to our Lord, that Jesus is working in us to love
and to do.
Our sermon theme tells us, Remain in the
power of God’s perfect love. How do
we remain in this love, not just to stay on God’s good side, but also to keep
loving as God wills? We remain in the
power of God’s love through faith—faith that is nurtured and grown by the power
of the Spirit in Word and Sacrament. We
remain in this power as we trust the love God has for us, as we trust that God
works all things for our everlasting good. (Romans 8:28) We remain in this power of love when we
continue to rely on the forgiveness Jesus won for us all with His atoning life
and death, for it is in Jesus that we are counted holy. In Jesus, the love of God lives on in our
connection with His Son.
Dear friends, cling firmly to the love God has
shown you both in Scripture and in the everyday providence He bestows on your
life. God promised Jeremiah, “I have
loved you with an everlasting love. I
have drawn you with mercy.” (Jeremiah 31:3)
That promise is just as valid for you and me. Therefore, forgiven of all sin, Remain in
the power of God’s perfect love.
Amen.
To him who loves us
and has freed us from our sins by his own blood and made us a kingdom and
priests to God his Father—to him be the glory and the power forever. Amen.
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