Gods Love

God’s Love

1 John 4:7-21

Introduction-

Good morning everyone; Rosedale last week had a great Easter presentation.

We peeked at the cross through the eyes of witnesses that were there. We saw the Lord do some amazing things in people’s life.

Now what? We have expressed the joy of the resurrection, the need to be a follower of Jesus and we have seen the length that God won’t go for each one of us to establish a relationship with Him.

What do we do with that? How do we grasp God’s love for ourselves?

Until we grasp God’s love for ourselves, we cannot even begin to think we can nurture a relationship with Him.

Our text is 1 John 4:7-21 but let’s first look at the way that John begins this letter to believers.

He is not writing to the unsaved, to the un-churched, he is writing to the people of the church.

1 John 1:1-3 Read from the Bible-

“That which is from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched- this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ.”

John just like the other witnesses to Christ expresses his experience with Jesus Christ.

We have seen, we have heard, we have touched the hand of Jesus and we proclaim this truth to you- the church of God present day and to us today as the future church that these truths of God are truth for our lives.

We acknowledge we know Him.

We have faith in- We rely on Him and what He has done.

We came to know and we continue to know Him. We came to believe in him and we continue to believe in Him.

God is love- you cannot separate the two.

God defines true love-

To live in God is to settle down in God’s love, for God to take up residency in our hearts and our lives.

John lets us know that Christian faith is not an occasional thing but is a constant thing. Our faith in Him does not rest only on big events but is lived out in our lives every moment of the day.

The world tells us there are not absolutes, that everyone s individual opinions matter most, but God says that His love for us is an absolute- it is unlimited.

One commentary I looked at said that John description of God’s love was not only referencing about God’s love for human beings or only that of humans love for God, but also the love of human beings for each other.

Let’s look at the text and see what God’s love operating in our lives looks like

1 John 4:7-21

Completeness and purpose begins when we accept God’s love for ourselves and we allow God’s love to be expressed back to God and expressed back to others that we come into contact with.

The end purpose and end goal is to have a relationship between God and man and man to share that love with those around them. To live on this earth and love others like God loves us.

Billy Graham

“The cross shows us the seriousness of our sin- but it also shows us the immeasurable love of God”

“I am convinced the greatest act of love we can ever perform for people is to tell them about God’s love for them in Christ.”

You did not come to Christ as if it was of your own holiness, you came to Christ because Christ reached out to you and you were smart enough to respond. That God loved you enough to make His presence known and you were drawn to Him and responded to His love. BECASUE HE FIRST LOVED US.

Illustration-

Sometimes people come back to me and say that I told them that illustration before or I referenced a scripture several times in a short period of time. I do that because we only remember about 5% of what is heard. So I have to remind you several times to get something deep down into your brain. If I asked most of you what the sermon was a while ago, you could not tell me.

Illustration-

Pastor Rick Warren tells a story of how he used to watch his kids sleep when they were little. He says that he would go in and spend several minutes just watching them sleep. I had thought that I was the only one that liked doing that. He said that he would watch them rise and lower when they breathed. I went into their room to check on them and then noticed one day how they would kick and squirm and make all kinds of funny noises. How one minute they looked peaceful and the next like they had lost a fight with Mike Tyson. We love our kids… all I want for everyone of them is to love God and be themselves. I had no ulterior motive. I did not want them to be something they weren’t. As much as I loved sports and my oldest son gave up sports as a teenager, I did not make him play sports because I did. I wanted them to be what God wanted and what they enjoyed and prayed that the two would be the same.