“A Dangerous Love” Pt 2
(Fatal Attraction)
1 John 2:15-17
Review/Introduction
John wrote as a loving father to the believers of his day so that they might better understand the glory of relationship with the God who is light and love. He wanted them to honestly evaluate the quality of their relationship. He wrote to inspire the deepest level of intimacy with God.
He exposed those who claimed to have a relationship that never existed. He exhorted those who, because of sin, were not experiencing the level of intimacy with God possible or preferred.
John used a number of words to express the desired level of relationship with God.
“fellowship” “know” “abide” “be in”
I. GOD IS LIGHT
A. THE MESSAGE: God is Light 1:5
B. THE IMPLICATIONS 1:6-4:6
1. Continually walk (live) in the Light 1:6-7 (Embrace His ways)
2. Continually confess sin 1:8-10 (Admit when you don’t)
3. Rely on your advocate 2:1-2 (Realize you need Jesus to intercede)
4. Give attention to His instructions 2:3-6 (Find out and do what He wants)
5. Love one another (don’t hate) 2:7-11 (Relate well to His kids)
6. Grow in your relationship with Him 2:12-14 (Keep growing deeper)
Last week we introduced a seventh issue affecting our relationship.
7. Stop loving the World and the things in it
a) The command “Do not love the world!”
John addressed this command to all believers at all levels of relationship. The object of the command is “the world and the things in the world”. John used a term that describes a number of different spheres of reality. The base meaning relates to order, adornment, and beauty
When John commanded the believers to stop loving the world and its things…
He did not mean to stop loving the world of matter created by God.
He did not mean to stop loving the world of angelic beings created by God.
He did not mean to stop loving the world of people created by God.
He commanded them to stop loving the world of systems, philosophies and products designed by Satan to fulfill God-designed desires apart from devotion to God. This divinely hostile “world”, otherwise known as Satan’s kingdom, represents the system of values, priorities, and beliefs that demons and the unbelievers hold that purposely excludes and/or opposes God.
It is a “world” that embraces self or Satan and his way of life.
It is this world that John warns us to stop preferring over God’s ways and purposes.
Stop preferring the devil-directed way of life and its stuff designed to keep us from being fully devoted to God. Listen to Paul’s concern for the Corinthian believers.
But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ. 2 Corinthians 11:3
Satan seeks to encourage us to seek to fulfill our God-designed desires for pleasure, possessions and prominence apart from His direction, enablement, involvement or purpose.
The action or prohibition of the command? Stop loving the world and its things!
The Greek negative prohibition “me” with the present active imperative verb means either stop doing something or do not have the habit of doing it.
Stop doing an action you are currently doing. “Stop loving the world or the things in it!”
Don’t get in the habit of a particular action. “Don’t get in the habit of loving the world!”
John used the particular word for love that indicates a committed devotion, allegiance, attachment, willful connection and devotion to someone or something. It is the 1 Corinthians 13 kind of devoted love that accepts someone for who they are and treats them with sacrificial care and commits to do what is in their best interest. One use of the word brings a clearer understanding in this context.
Nevertheless many even of the rulers believed in Him, but because of the Pharisees they were not confessing Him, for fear that they would be put out of the synagogue; for they loved the approval of men rather than the approval of God. John 12:42-43
The use of the word “love” in this context communicates the idea of strong preference. They preferred the approval of men over the approval of God. They valued the approval of men over the approval of God. It was a love that dictated certain actions. Their desire for approval, prominence, power and prestige on earth by men overshadowed their longing for God’s approval. John told the readers of his day to stop preferring the ways of Satan’s kingdom (seeks meaning in life apart from God) over the ways of God’s kingdom (seeks God’s the kingdom and his righteousness first). The Holy Spirit tells we who hear today to stop preferring the world and its stuff over intimate fellowship with the God who is light and love.
John presented four reasons why we should take this command to heart.
b) The logic
1 – The world is incompatible with God’s nature and will, so you can’t love it and God at the same time.
“love of the Father”
Our love for the Father.
The Father’s love for us.
Your behavior; your way of life will either be controlled by a love for the world or a love for God.
“in Him” refers to our love for the Father and the love of the Father for us as a life controlling influence.
You cannot be controlled by an influence that directly opposes God and promotes life divorced from God and a love for God at the same time. You cannot be friends with a world hostile to God and friends with God at the same time.
You cannot engage in activities or entertain thoughts intended to keep God out of your life or distract you from intimate relationship with God and expect your love for God to deepen.
John says love for God doesn’t even exist.
Let’s say I am a high government official in a country who persecutes and kills Christians.
I become a Christian. I am in an impossible position. I cannot be devoted to two diametrically opposed worlds. I must choose on or the other.
We cannot embrace, be entertained by, invest in, spend time with, be connected to, and practice a way of life that vigorously promotes the idea that meaning in life should be pursued apart from God. Jesus declared the impossibility of serving two masters; two controlling forces.
You will “love” one and hate the other.
2 – The world and everything in it is not from God but from Satan
Consider the source. There are God given desires and fulfillment of those desires leading to life.
There are Satan generated desires and fulfillment of those desires leading to destruction.
Satan continually tries to turn a God-given soul-developing desire into a Satan-suggested soul-destroying desire. All of us enter life programmed with certain characteristics installed by our Creator. He created all of us with bodies that generate sensations based on physical or mental processes. These could all be lumped into the category of pleasure.
God created us with the capacity to feel pleasure.
Sensations of physical touch from the hug of a friend to the passionate embrace of a spouse
Sensations of food, smell, adrenalin rush.
Sensation of peace and contentment generated from a healthy perception of reality
Sensation of loving and being loved and accepted by others
The experience of pleasures from God’s hand is the result of seeking Him first. Through Him, earthly pleasures find their ultimate meaning. He created us with a desire to interact with a material world. (Visually & physically interact). These could be lumped into the category of possessions. God put us in a material world. He gave Adam and Eve a place, a home. He gifted them to create, own, and build. Only when we dedicate everything we own and everything we do to His purpose do things find their ultimate meaning.
He also ingrained a desire to aspire, to be something, to rule and reign, organize administrate, order and express individual worth. These could be assigned the category of prominence, power, prestige, significance. Only when we draw our worth from God and dedicate ourselves to serving God and others will we enjoy and experience a sense of worth beyond what the world can offer. Satan designed, directs and energizes a world, environment, culture that encourages pursuit of these desires without limits and most importantly WITHOUT GOD!
Pleasure without self-control, suffering or divine direction
Possessions without sacrifice or divine purpose
Prominence without service or divine proclamation
Living to please God rather than self.
Working to have something to give to others than to acquire for self.
Achieving to serve rather than to be served.
Selfish ambition drives Satan’s world. Reestablish Paradise void of God or restrictions.
Our desires turn destructive when we seek to fulfill them apart from God and in place of God.
Satan urges us to pursue these desires to fill the emptiness left by failure to pursue God.
James clearly described the devil-directed world.
But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your heart, do not be arrogant and so lie against the truth. This wisdom is not that which comes down from above, but is earthly, natural, demonic. For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there is disorder and every evil thing. James 3:14-16
What is the source of quarrels and conflicts among you? Is not the source your pleasures that wage war in your members? You lust and do not have; so you commit murder. You are envious and cannot obtain; so you fight and quarrel. You do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures. You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. James 4:1-4
God wants priority interaction with His creation.
Or do you think that the Scripture speaks to no purpose: "He jealously desires the Spirit which He has made to dwell in us"? But He gives a greater grace. Therefore it says, "GOD IS OPPOSED TO THE PROUD, BUT GIVES GRACE TO THE HUMBLE." Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. James 4:5-10
God is our ultimate source of pleasure.
God is our ultimate source of possessions.
God is our ultimate source of prominence.
John commanded all believers to stop loving the devil-designed and devil-directed world.
John identified the base “things” or issues that drive Satan’s world that are not from God.
By understanding the function of these three things in Satan’s system and God’s system, we will discover an essential key to actually living victorious over the lure of Satan’s way of life.
Our entire world revolves around these three things. Everything in our world in some way relates to the pursuit of or failure to realize those misdirected desires. I often evaluate my life by how I feel – good or bad, comfortable or uncomfortable. I spend my life trying to acquire things or experiences that make me feel good and protect me from feeling bad. I expend energy trying to become somebody and get the respect and recognition that makes me feel good or worthy.
The world promotes the illegitimate and futile pursuit of God-designed desires without God.
The pursuit of these desires at the flesh level that brings destruction.
But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death. Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren. Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow. James 1:14-17
For we also once were foolish ourselves, disobedient, deceived, enslaved to various lusts and pleasures, spending our life in malice and envy, hateful, hating one another. Titus 3:3
Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. Ephesians 2:3
Life cannot be found in the attempt to fulfill the desire for pleasure, possession or prominence.
Life is found through vital relationship with Christ who promises pleasure, possessions and prominence through Him. Satan’s world encourages the pursuit of desires apart from God.
Everything in His world focuses on fulfilling God-given desires through devil-directed means.
Desire of the flesh (Desire for Pleasure)
John describes desires generated out of the fleshly residue left over from the old way of doing things not the renewed spirit.
God’s longings spring from the spirit and not the flesh. God’s longings direct us to deeper relationship to Him self-control, sacrifice, service.
Paul describes a brutal war between these two opposing sets of desires. The world system urges us to do something or feel something apart from connection to God. He appeals to selfish pleasure. Paul affirmed that the fleshly desires left over from the old nature are still present and powerful.
For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. Romans 7:18
Satan’s world reinforces the lie that real meaning comes from pleasurable feelings and sensations whether it be sex, food, extreme sports, adrenaline rush, drugs, alcohol.
He uses the educational system, media, companies, internet, music, art, literature, entertainment to disseminate the lies. If it feels good, it is good. I am most alive when I feel good.
Real living centers in my feelings. Spend your life seeking the things that produce pleasurable feelings without restriction. Such indulgence only stimulates a greater craving for more but such fleshly stimulation outside of God’s direction never satisfies.
For many walk, of whom I often told you, and now tell you even weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite, and whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things. Philippians 3:18-19
Now flee from youthful lusts and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart. 2 Timothy 2:22
By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to endure ill-treatment with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin, considering the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt; for he was looking to the reward. Hebrews 11:24-26
Moses realized that ultimate, lasting pleasure was through self-control and suffering the Egyptian world offered only temporary “passing” pleasures. He held out for the eternal reward and the pleasures evermore from God’s right hand. Our culture continually promotes the pursuit of pleasure above all. It incessantly asserts that your sense of emptiness can be satisfied through pleasure. This generation has managed to even devastate the ability to experience pleasure by over stimulation through drugs and lack of self-control. The very thing that promised fulfillment became the thing that damaged the very capacity to feel. Any denial or blockage or interference of our quest for pleasure by God or anything breeds anger, strife, jealousy, dissention, depression, despair.
For I am afraid that perhaps when I come I may find…strife, jealousy, angry tempers, disputes, slanders, gossip, arrogance, disturbances…from those who have sinned in the past and not repented of the impurity, immorality and sensuality which they have practiced. 2 Corinthians 12:20-21
When God doesn’t comply on my terms – I reject Him. When I can’t fill it, I am frustrated with myself. When you can’t or won’t fill it, I reject you.
When Christ becomes the ultimate object of our desire and affection, in His right hand are pleasures evermore.
Delight yourself in the LORD; and He will give you the desires of your heart. Psalms 37:4
Desire of the eyes (Desire for possessions or things or experiences)
This is the appeal to possessions or visual stimulation in order to fill the emptiness that only God can fill. We live in a visually over stimulated culture just as sure as it is overly sexually and sensually stimulated. Without constant visual stimulation, people become agitated and bored. To live without the visual stimulation of the television or movies or internet or travel or shopping triggers excruciating frustration and agitation. We suffer de-habilitating withdrawal every bit as powerful as the addict. This world system promotes the lie that life is found through continual visual stimulation and the pursuit and acquisition of more stuff. Some new stimulation or acquisition will certainly satisfy that longing. Many times it doesn’t even matter if I can own it as long as I can look at it. “Window shopping”
Visual stimulation often becomes the gate to more sensual and sexual stimulation.
The rush of buying that new gadget. The expectation that some new “toy” will fill the emptiness or the frustration I feel or catapult me out of my depression caused by the shallowness of my relationship with God. The reality is, the emptiness only becomes more prominent.
Someone asked Rockefeller how much is enough. “I suppose just a little more.”
A recent survey indicated that the top pursuit of Americans is to live a comfortable life.
There was little difference between born again and pagans.
Sheol and Abaddon are never satisfied, nor are the eyes of man ever satisfied. Proverbs 27:20
But godliness actually is a means of great gain when accompanied by contentment. For we have brought nothing into the world, so we cannot take anything out of it either. If we have food and covering, with these we shall be content. But those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs. But flee from these things, you man of God, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, perseverance and gentleness. 1 Timothy 6:6-11
Jesus talked about the pursuit of things.
Then He said to them, "Beware, and be on your guard against every form of greed; for not even when one has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions." Luke 12:15
Only when we surrender everything to God…
Only when we are committed to let God control everything we have…
Only when God is IN it…
…will the natural desire to enjoy “things” find true fulfillment.
As for me, I shall behold Your face in righteousness; I will be satisfied with Your likeness when I awake. Ps 17:15
Until then, we forever function in pursuit and protect mode. We use people to pursue our own satisfaction, and abuse people in order to protect our stuff. Failure to acquire stuff or the blockage of my desperate pursuit to fill the void left by the absence of God in the center of my life leaves me again, agitated, angry, frustrated, jealous, bitter, hopeless.
Pride of Life (Desire for prominence)
Satan encourages the flesh’s desire to be something apart from God. He appeals to the desire for power or prestige. The spirit urges us to find our worth through out connection with Christ.
Satan drives us to succeed and achieve and become something apart from Christ. Everything in the devil’s world system tries to convince people that real satisfaction in life comes from success, power, achievement, self-centered pursuit, adoration, affirmation of others.
John used the word “vainglory” to boast about personal stuff that really has to eternal value.
God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble.
A man's pride will bring him low, but a humble spirit will obtain honor. Proverbs 29:23
As we mentioned last week, Satan appealed to these things from the beginning. He urged Eve to seek life from something other than God. He tried to get Jesus to gain notoriety and recognition by jumping down from the temple.
Solomon journaled his own empty pursuit of all these things in Ecclesiastes. He pursued mental, physical, social, visual stimulation to its extreme. (He could afford it!) He bragged about his exploits, his architecture, his wealth, and his various experimentations. In the end he offered theses conclusions.
All things are wearisome; man is not able to tell it. The eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor is the ear filled with hearing. Ecclesiastes 1:8
All a man's labor is for his mouth and yet the appetite is not satisfied. Ecclesiastes 6:7
"Vanity of vanities," says the Preacher, "all is vanity!" Ecclesiastes 12:8
The conclusion, when all has been heard, is: fear God and keep His commandments, because this applies to every person. For God will bring every act to judgment, everything which is hidden, whether it is good or evil. Ecc 12:13-14
God’s ways run opposite of the world. These desires are contrary to God’s design. We should not love the world because it contradicts God and its desires do not come from God but are stirred up in our sinful flesh by Satan. God designed us to experience life through committed relationship with Him by the pursuit of the new desires generated out of our renewed spirit and to keep our fleshly passions subordinate to the Spirit. The flesh’s desire for pleasure must be denied by the Spirit’s fruit of self-control. The flesh’s desire for possessions must be denied by embracing a life of contentment and sacrifice. The flesh’s desire for power must be denied by embracing a life of humility and service.
Then Jesus said to His disciples, "If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me. "For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it. "For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? Matthew 16:24-26
The world is contrary to God. The world and its stuff do not come from God.
3 – The world of Satan and its stuff is temporary
John used the passive voice meaning the world is being made to pass away; by God.
The world passes away, and the lust of it…The verb has durative aspect, referring to a continuing process that will be, but is not yet, completed. It may also be rendered, ‘is ending,’ ‘is coming to its end,’ ‘is on its way to perish,’ ‘will not exist much longer,’ is fading/disappearing.’
Any fulfillment of these desires apart from intimate connection to God is only temporary at best by divine declaration. Any satisfaction that comes from worldly pursuits cannot last. Everything from the world is passing away. All the vanity of this evil world with its devices is passing away. It has already begun to putrefy. It is a corpse, not yet buried.
The world and the desires for what it has to offer eventually pass away. Sexual appetites, appetites for food, pursuit of possessions, travel, experiences, eventually, its temporary rush is destined to diminish and fade.
Whoever marries the spirit of this age will find himself a widower in the next. W.R. Inge3
Love not the world, for it is a moth in a Christian’s life. John Bunyan 3
Once our first love for Christ; our simple devotion to Christ wanes, the glitter and flash and promise of this world grabs us. The desires of the soul are a powerful source. God made them a powerful drive. Either we will seek satisfaction through the Spirit or through the flesh.
Make every effort to come to me soon; for Demas, having loved this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica; Crescens has gone to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia. 2 Timothy 4:9-10
There is a way (way of life) which seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death. Proverbs 14:12
Jesus rebuked church at Ephesus because the deserted their first devotion; their first love.
He warned that the privilege of being his effective witness in a dark world would be revoked unless they repented and returned to the deeds associated with a fervent “first love”.
The fulfillment of our desire for pleasure, possession and prominence must be the result of pursuing God first. The pursuit of fulfillment first, will become the rival to our pursuit of God.
The things of this world will soon be past, only what’s done for Christ will last.
4 -- The one following God’s will, discovers lasting life experiences.
"Ho! Every one who thirsts, come to the waters; and you who have no money come, buy and eat. Come, buy wine and milk Without money and without cost. "Why do you spend money for what is not bread, And your wages for what does not satisfy? Listen carefully to Me, and eat what is good, and delight yourself in abundance. Isaiah 55:1-2
In contrast to the one loving the world, the one doing (not just loving) the will of God (thus God Himself) will find a lasting, satisfying experience.
You will make known to me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy; In Your right hand there are pleasures forever. Psalms 16:11
Instruct those who are rich in this present world not to be conceited or to fix their hope on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly supplies us with all things to enjoy. 1 Timothy 6:17
O God, You are my God; I shall seek You earnestly; My soul thirsts for You, my flesh yearns for You, In a dry and weary land where there is no water. Thus I have seen You in the sanctuary, To see Your power and Your glory. Because Your lovingkindness is better than life, My lips will praise You. So I will bless You as long as I live; I will lift up my hands in Your name. My soul is satisfied as with marrow and fatness, And my mouth offers praises with joyful lips. Psalms 63:1-5
Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. Hebrews 12:1-3
A.W. Tozer said: “A whole new generation of Christians has come up believing that it is possible to ‘accept’ Christ without forsaking the world.”
Elijah called the people of Israel to get off the fence.
Elijah came near to all the people and said, "How long will you hesitate between two opinions? If the LORD is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him." But the people did not answer him a word. 1 Kings 18:21
Joshua called the people to be done with the enticements of Egypt.
Now, therefore, fear the LORD and serve Him in sincerity and truth; and put away the gods which your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the LORD. If it is disagreeable in your sight to serve the LORD, choose for yourselves today whom you will serve: whether the gods which your fathers served which were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD. Josh 24:14-15
Who will we serve? We must make a choice.
Stop preferring the world and anything it offers.
RATHER…
Love the Lord your God with ALL your heart, with ALL your soul, and with ALL your strength.
