2010 – “The Year of the Family”
1 John 4:7-12, 19-21
January 3, 2010
Me: Just a warning here: the introductory portion of the message today is going to be longer than normal, because I want to lay a bit of a foundation for what I want us to look at today from God’s Word.
But I also want to assure you that the whole message isn’t going to be longer than normal, okay?
I want to tell you a story of something that happened shortly after Dani was born.
We lived in Colorado Springs, CO at the time, and the elevation of Colorado Springs is actually higher than Denver, the mile-high city.
Because of the altitude, many babies born in that area are born with jaundice, which is basically a condition where you have too many red blood cells, and if you don’t take care of it, it can have some rather major medical consequences.
Well, Dani had jaundice, and they sent us home from the hospital with an incubator-looking thing with fluorescent lights on it.
The lights were designed to help draw out the extra red blood cells and bring them down to a normal level.
The doctor who took care of Dani had one explicit instruction: leave her in there at all times except when changing her diaper or feeding her. Leave her in there so the lights can do their work. They can’t do their work if you’re taking her out all the time.
So we did. I stayed up with her, as she laid under those lights and she had these nifty eye-shade things.
And the poor little girl cried most of the night. Even after just being fed and changed. She cried and cried and cried. It broke my heart because I couldn’t hold her and comfort her, because the doctor said to leave her in there unless she was being fed or changed.
The next day a nurse came to do a blood test on Dani to see if her levels were down. During her visit, Debra mentioned that I had stayed up and that Dani cried most of the night – and that I couldn’t hold her.
Then the nurse said, “Well, I don’t know your philosophy of child-rearing, but crying is the only way babies communicate and if she was crying, then you should have taken her out to hold her.” (or words to that effect.)
I have never come so close to punching a woman, either before or after that day.
I was following the instructions of the doctor, and now I was being criticized for it. This lady thought I was being a poor father. And that hurt.
I don’t think any dad wants to be considered a bad dad. The health of my child reflected on me as a dad.
We: And it’s not just the health of our child that reflects on our job as parents.
It’s also how they get along, isn’t it?
When we come across a family filled with kids who yell and kick and hit each other, we don’t just think that those kids are naughty, we wonder why mom and dad let this stuff happen.
And I don’t mean just the occasional stuff that all siblings go through once in a while. I mean when it’s a constant characteristic of that family, that’s when it’s a problem.
If someone had to break up a fight between you and your sibling, they didn’t just give you a talking to. They took you to your parents. Why? Because it’s the parents’ job to help you get along.
Bickering children reflect badly on the parents.
And you know what else? I think that fighting children hurt their parents’ hearts. Because no parent wants to see their children hating and hurting each other.
On the other hand, healthy children and healthy relationships within the family reflect well on Mom and Dad, don’t they?
We think that the parents have done a good job when the kids get along.
And this blesses the parents’ hearts.
Let me tell you another story involving Dani.
A couple summers ago we went to pick up Dani from her service at Rainbow Bible Ranch.
They had a rodeo that showcases what the kids learned about riding horses and such during the week, then a meal, and then a service that showcases what the kids learned about Jesus and living for Him during the week.
During the service, the director, Larry Reinhold, the director, asked me to pray. But he didn’t just ask me to pray.
He talked about how great of a counselor Dani is, and how she loves Jesus, and all sorts of other whatnot, and then he said, “You can tell a lot about the parents by looking at their kids.”
Well, you’d better just believe that had I been wearing a shirt with buttons on it they would have been popping all over the place and maybe causing damage to people sitting near me.
Dani’s love for Jesus and her love for her girls at camp was a reflection on her father.
God: Folks, I know that it should be obvious to us who call ourselves Christians, but I’m going to say it anyway: we belong to a family, and we have a Heavenly Father.
We also have a Brother. That’s how Scripture describes Jesus in the book of Hebrews.
And just like in an earthly family, our spiritual family needs to get along, and our Heavenly Father wants His children to get along and love each other, and to reflect well on Him.
And this is what I believe God wants us to focus on this year.
Over this last year I’ve asked God what He wanted us to cover after we finished working through the gospel according to Matthew, and this kept coming up: strengthening the family. The family of God and individual families.
I believe that God wants us become a fellowship that demonstrates the love of God to each other and to those who don’t yet know Christ.
I believe God wants us to strengthen the bonds of love for each other, so we can be the church to each other and to those who don’t yet know Christ.
And so throughout this coming year, we’re going to be spending most of our time looking at what the Scriptures say about loving each other and treating each other the way God wants us to and commands us to.
There is some really incredibly practical and down to earth stuff about how to treat people.
It’s awesome.
And today we’re going to lay the base for that, and I want to do that by looking at 1 John 4:7-12 (p. 863-864) –
7 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
Then look down at verses 19-21 –
19 We love because he first loved us. 20 If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. 21 And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.
Here is the message I want you to take home with you today and to understand as the basis for this coming year:
Our love for each other reflects the love of God in us.
Do you hear this, folks?
You cannot say you love God and reject God’s people. It’s simply not possible.
Let me get even more basic, and even more personal.
If you do not love your brothers and sisters in Christ, you are not a believer. How can I say that?
Because of verses 7-8 –
Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.
Now before I go further, let me say something else, and this was very freeing for me a number of years ago when I first heard it:
You don’t have to like someone in order to love them.
Did you catch that? You don’t have to like someone in order to love them.
What do I mean by that? Let’s look at some facts about loving the family of God to help me communicate what I mean:
1. Love isn’t primarily a feeling, it’s an action.
1 John 3:18 –
Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.
We’ve been fed the lie that love is just a feeling.
There is no doubt that the feeling and emotion of love is real, and I believe that it is a gift from God.
But nowhere in Scripture do we find support for the idea that love is just a feeling or emotion.
This is why so many marriages fail nowadays. They fall out of “love.” And since the “love” is gone, they figure it’s time to bail.
I can guarantee you that there have been times when Debra has not liked me very much for one reason or another. The emotion of love isn’t always as strong as it was when we dated and were first married, mainly because I hadn’t treated her as a loving husband should.
In other ways, our emotional love for each other is actually stronger. But there have been times when that emotional aspect of love was low or maybe even missing.
And yet she chooses to love me. She chooses to honor our marriage covenant in spite of her feelings toward me at that given moment.
You may not like to do what you need to, you may not like the person you need to love, but you do it anyway.
Love is doing what you know is right and the best thing for that person in spite of how you feel about them.
And you do it because it’s a reflection of the fact that God did something He didn’t want to do because you needed Him to do it.
Huh?
Let me ask you: do you think the Father wanted to have to send Jesus to die for you? Do you think Jesus wanted to come down and suffer for you because your sins meant His death?
I don’t think they wanted to do it. But they did it because they love you. In spite of yourself, the Father and Jesus love you.
And it was that love that verses 9-10 talk about here in this passage.
Their love for you, as dirty and sinful as you are, drove them to take the initiative and make it possible for you to be forgiven and spend eternity with them in heaven.
Love isn’t primarily a feeling. It’s an action. And when you love people in the family of God, even when your emotions aren’t in sync with that, you reflect the fact that God’s love is living and active in you, because our love for each other reflects the love of God in us.
The second fact about love in the family of God is that…
2. Love is not just reserved for those you like.
Again, we have to understand that love is not just an emotion. “Like,” on the other hand, is an emotion.
And often, we will only show love toward those we actually like. I’m just as guilty of this as anybody here.
But Jesus said something that goes against the whole idea of reserving love for those you like.
Matthew 5:43-48 (p. 684) –
43 "You have heard that it was said, ’Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? 47 And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? 48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
I think I can safely guarantee that everyone in here over the age of 5 years old has someone they could categorize as an enemy.
Someone who has hurt you or someone you love and you can’t forget that hurt, and you certainly don’t want to be around them.
And most people don’t really like their enemies do they? Enemies are people we don’t like, and may even hate.
So let me ask you: does the idea of loving your enemy come naturally to you? Probably not, if you’re honest with yourself.
Well Jesus says that’s what we’re supposed to do. We’re supposed to love our enemies and even pray for them.
He says here that any ol’ sinner can be friendly and nice and loving to people who love them back.
But Jesus says we’re supposed to love and pray for those who don’t love you back. People you don’t like.
How is that possible? We’re going to look at that in just a moment, but before we do, I want to remind us again that our love for each other reflects the love of God in us.
Man, I hope you never forget that.
Here’s the third fact about loving people in the family of God, and that is that…
3. You can love the “unlovable” with the help of God.
This will be a key verse throughout the year: Philippians 2:13 –
For God is at work within you, helping you want to obey him, and then helping you do what he wants.
You’re going to hear that verse over and over and over and over throughout the year. Why? Because I believe God is going to confront every one of us with something that will be hard for us to do in relation to loving other members of God’s family.
And we will need help from God Himself to even want to do it, much less actually do it.
Loving the unlovable is hard. We need God working in us to do that.
Some of you are thinking of your brother-in-law right now. And you’re not so sure God’s big enough for that.
Take from me – He is. He’s helped me to really love people who I literally hated years before. And just for the record, I really do like my brothers-in-law…
God loves helping people reflect His love toward others, and so you can be sure He’ll answer that prayer for His help.
You can love the unlovable with the help of God. And remember: our love for each other reflects the love of God in us.
And so He wants to help you love others the way we should.
Here’s the last fact about love that I want to share with you today:
4. You love others best when you love God the most.
I’m not going to spend a lot of time on this point, because we’re going to be looking at this more in the next few weeks, but I do want to point something out.
In the book of Mark we find Jesus in the middle of a discussion, and one of the religious leaders who was listening to the conversation asked Jesus a great question: “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” And we find Jesus’ answer in Mark 12:30-31 –
"The most important one," is this: ’Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ 31 The second is this: ’Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these."
Over the next three weeks we’re going to look about how to love God like Jesus says we should. We’re going to look at some very practical ways to make that happen.
Because I think that if we can get a handle on loving God as we should, we won’t be able to help but love others as we should.
I think that loving God as we should enables us to love others as we should. And I think that’s the case because our love for each other reflects the love of God in us.
You: I want you to commit to a few things over the course of this year.
* Ask God to speak to your heart throughout this year.
* Keep your elbows to yourself.
Don’t look at the person you think needs to hear whatever the message is about that day.
Hold up a mirror to your soul and ask the Holy Spirit to show you where you need to step up in whatever area that is.
* Ask God to help you reflect His love in how you love others, especially those who belong to His family.
We: Folks, let’s show the world that this is a place where love isn’t just something we talk about. It’s something we do.
It’s something that we believe in so strongly we’re willing to let God change us to be more like Him so we can do it all the better.
And maybe, just maybe, they’ll see Jesus in you and want Him for themselves.
That’s my hope for all of us this year.
Let’s pray.
