Knowing God – #1b
The Love of God – Applied
Various Scriptures
Introduction (1 John 3:18)
Last week as I was greeting people leaving the service, someone asked me, “Okay, so we know more about the love of God, now how do we apply it?”
And I was hit with the realization that I had broken one of my own principles when it comes to my sermons.
I want my messages to be not only relevant, but applicable. So I ask for your forgiveness.
This morning I want to spend time talking about how we apply the love of God as we interact in our different relationships, and my purpose is to help us get a handle on some ideas that will help us reflect God’s love.
1 John 3:18 says this: Dear friends let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.
The idea of this morning is to get past giving lip service to the idea of love, and put some feet on our words.
I don’t want us to be a church that talks the talk but doesn’t walk the walk.
Before we get into that, however, I would like to take just a few minutes to review what we looked at last week as the basis of our time this morning.
I. Review – The Love of God (1 Jn.4:7-21)
A. God is Love.
We are not going to re-read the passage from last week, but I want to point out a couple things about the fact that God is love.
You may want to turn to that passage as we review this section, so if you want to turn to 1 John 4:7-21, you can have that handy. If you are using one of the Bibles on the seats, this passage can be found on page 863.
Verses 8 and 16 tell us that God is love. We saw last week that the love of God is not the shallow type of love we see portrayed by society and the media, which is really nothing more than affection or even sexual attraction.
Did any of you catch “Temptation Island” on TV? Don’t raise your hand – I don’t think I could stand it. I didn’t see it, either, but it’s all over the news.
The premise of this show is to put “committed” unmarried couples in a situation where they are tempted to be unfaithful to their lovers.
Here’s the idea: your love is only as strong as your ability to control your hormones.
How would you like to have people betting on your inability to be faithful to someone you profess to love?
Real love is nothing like that.
And the love of God is nothing like that.
The love of God is deep – it is the very fabric of His nature.
It is constant – it doesn’t change or go away. Scripture says that nothing can separate us from the love of God.
The love of God is not showered on those who deserve it. It is showered only on those who don’t deserve it. That’s you and me, by the way.
God is love. Second, …
B. God is Loving.
The love of God is not static. It is active. It drove the Father to act to redeem us sinners from an eternity in hell.
This last Friday as I was in my office, a radio program was taking questions from listeners, and one guy had written to ask how to answer his friends who could not believe that a loving God would send anyone to hell.
The answer given by the host is the correct answer. He said that God does not send anyone to hell – people choose to go there by rejecting the salvation offered in Christ.
Hell was not created for people, it was created for Satan and his angels. But the Bible is clear that those who choose to follow him by not following Christ will share Satan’s fate.
What people need to understand, and what quite frankly, the church has not done a good job of explaining, is that God did not work to put us in hell, he worked to help us escape it.
And it took the blood of His only Son. His love for us dictated His action to bring us to Him.
And not only did He secure salvation for sinners like you and me, He gave us His Word and His Holy Spirit to understand it and live for Him.
God is loving.
Third, we looked at…
C. Reflecting His love.
We reflect the love of God by showing love back toward Him and other people.
We reflect God’s love back toward God by obeying God’s commands.
We reflect God’s love to others by obeying God’s commands.
This is because the commands of God deal with the two areas of our relationship with Him and our relationships with others.
Let’s move on now to how we can show God’s love practically in our everyday lives, shall we?
II. Showing His Love.
We are going to focus our time this morning on showing love to others, although let me remind you that we show love to God by obeying His commands and making time for Him.
The starting point of this time is the first verse I mentioned this morning, 1 John 3:18 – Dear friends, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.
The first way to show love is…
A. In Word.
“Now just a minute, Pastor. You just read a verse that said not to love with words or tongue. And now you say we should love with words. What’s going on here?”
Here’s the scoop. The context of the verse is to put our money where our mouth is, so to speak. Love goes beyond just talking about it.
Look back at verse 16, and read along through verse 17.
This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. 17 If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him?
But back to the idea of loving with words.
It is important that what we say reflects the love of Christ.
If someone is always criticizing, gossiping, backbiting, etc., would you consider that person to be very loving?
I don’t think so.
What about someone spewing out foul language? Especially misusing the Lord’s name?
Matthew 12:34 says that out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks.
If your speech is filled with words that are not godly and loving, then it’s time to question where your love is.
If you are truly concerned about showing love to others in your speech, ask God to purge your heart of hateful, ungodly attitudes.
Ask Him to show you when you are rude to the waiter or waitress, or if you communicate a haughty attitude to someone you think is “beneath” you.
Ask Him to show you how your words communicate love to your spouse or children.
Speech is important.
Secondly, we show love…
B. In Actions.
As I mentioned a few moments ago, our passage this morning talks about doing more than talking about love.
Last week we talked a bit about the fact that the love of God acted. He sent His Son to die for us, and He gave us His Word and the Holy Spirit so we wouldn’t be on our own trying to love and live for Him.
We reflect that love by acting in love to toward others.
There are lots of ways to do this, but I would suggest that you look at some specific areas and ask God to show you how you can act in very specific ways.
But let’s look at a few just to get the minds going, shall we?
Take your family relationships, for instance. How do you treat them?
Do you show the love you profess? Does what you DO reflect what you SAY?
Showing love may be as simple as putting your laundry in the basket, helping with a meal, or washing dishes.
It may be hold your spouse’s hand, especially in the presence of important people. Giving him or her a peck on the cheek around others. This shows others you value her as well.
It may involve something less fun like administering discipline. Remember one of the ways God shows His love – by disciplining His children.
This isn’t a parenting lesson, so we won’t dwell on the “how’s” of discipline, but it is not loving to withhold discipline when needed.
Another way might be to arrange your schedule so you can attend your kids’ ball games or school plays.
There is a radio commercial put out by the Mormon church that has a bunch of fathers trapped in an elevator.
They are all just kind of hanging out, commenting that about all they are missing is another boring night in front of the TV, so none are too concerned about getting out of the elevator any time soon.
When they ask one guy what he had planned that night, he mentioned that he had a son’s little league game he hoped to be at.
All of a sudden everybody in the elevator starts screaming.
“Help! We need help! Get us out of here! This guy needs to get to his kid’s ball game! Don’t worry buddy, we’ll get help!”
Make time for your family. And pray for them by name – all the time – everywhere.
At work, are you loving to your co-workers? Or do you go out of your way to avoid or make life no easier on certain persons?
Do you give your employers an honest day’s work for a day’s pay?
Do you work to be a blessing to your employers – an asset rather than a liability?
Do you pray for your co-workers and employers? This is showing love.
Other things might include such things as offering your place in line to an elderly person. By the way, Lowell does not qualify.
Or offering someone your seat if you are able-bodied. I try to train my boys that it is polite to offer their seat if a lady is standing.
Here’s one – parking farther away from the store. Believe it or not, there is more to life than getting the closest parking space.
Love helps us be courteous to others.
We show love helping others less fortunate than ourselves. That may mean sharing food, clothing, shelter, or money without hope of repayment.
It may mean visiting shut-ins or prisoners, or helping out regularly at a rescue mission or something.
The bottom line here is that we want to show the love of God to people, who are made in the image of God.
Let’s move on to the third area, loving…
C. In Truth.
You would think that it goes without saying that love would bring out truth, but unfortunately that is not always the case.
Let me ask you a few questions that you need to deal with honestly before God and man.
Do you deal truthfully with your family? Can they come to you for an honest answer about how things are going? Can you be frank with your spouse about the financial or spiritual condition of your family?
At work, do you deal honestly with customers and clients? Do you hide the truth, or stretch it a bit to make the sale?
Speaking from experience, it is hard to tell someone your product or service may not meet the need they have.
I can also tell you from experience that your stock goes up in the eyes of someone who knows you are truthful with them at all costs, and it pays off in the end.
And let me strike while the iron is hot here at the beginning of the year. Are you honest when it comes to taxes?
Can you be counted on to obey the law without “adjusting” or hiding certain forms of income in order to avoid paying taxes?
By the way, don’t give me any talk about how the tax laws are unjust and how the government has no business taking your money and all that.
Take that up with our congressman and senators. In the meantime, give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.
Those are just a few suggestions, but now let’s look at the results of your showing love.
III. The Results.
First,…
A. “WWJD” will not be a fad, it will be a lifestyle.
Here’s what I mean:
I have mentioned before that I am troubled by the fact that you can buy “WWJD” stuff from any vending machine anywhere.
It started from a very well-meaning desire to impact our society with the thought that we should act as Jesus would.
But now it even being made fun of. I don’t know if I shared this story with you before, but it bears repeating.
On our family vacation to Nebraska last year, we stopped at a hotel in Sioux Falls so we could rest and let the kids play in the pool area.
When we were checking into our room, the people at the counter gave us some comic books to give to the kids, as some promotional deal. We even got a Batman phone card and camera.
Anyway, one of the comics was a Superman comic. I grew up with comics, and so I was pumped.
But Debra started flipping through one of them, and in one of the pictures was a kid wearing his “WWSD” bracelet. The “S” was the Superman symbol. The point was that this kid was more concerned with what Superman would do than what Jesus would do.
People where crosses all the time, but that does not mean they love Jesus. It is just jewelry to them.
If you want to really live a lifestyle that reflects the life and love of Christ, it takes effort.
But the world will see the difference, and take notice. I promise.
Secondly, and related to this first point,…
B. Hypocrisy will not be a part of your life.
Because people will see an authentic love for God. This comes only by making time for Him and His Word, allowing His Holy Spirit to have His way in your life.
Part of this love is shown in exercising faith that as we obey, God will hold up His end of the deal in providing for all your needs.
We all know Matt. 6:33 – “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well.”
But let me go back a few verses. If you want to follow along, we are reading from verse 31, which is on page 685 of the Bibles in the seats.
So do not worry, saying, `What shall we eat?’ or `What shall we drink?’ or `What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
Obedience is an act of faith and an outpouring of our love for God. That is authentic Christianity that spills out on the lives of other people.
And those who call you hypocrite will be showing their ignorance.
This only comes by making time to develop that love for God.
Thirdly,…
C. People will see the truth of the gospel lived out in real life.
This point is related to the first two, obviously.
You can’t be truthful and be a hypocrite, and vice versa.
But here’s what is communicated when we strive to live the gospel:
People see that Jesus loves the down-trodden and oppressed, as well as the rich and famous.
They see that Jesus really does love the little children, red and yellow, black and white.
They see that God is concerned for the direction of society, and wants to move for its betterment.
They see that God cares about the physical and spiritual needs of people.
They see that God values the individual person, not just the Church or society or the world as a whole – that He cares about what is going on deep inside your individual person.
That He cares about the crying of your soul asking “why, God.” Or “what, God?”
They see that the Bible really is relevant for the world today, and that it is the Word of God, living and active.
They see Jesus living today in and through the lives of His people.
And they see hope in the claims of Christ to save them for heaven.
Conclusion
Well, it’s one thing to know about the love of God. It’s quite another to experience the love of God. And yet quite another thing altogether to share the love of God.
But you see, you can’t share something you don’t have.
If you haven’t experienced the love of God, you have none to share.
There are three types of people here this morning – those who don’t yet know the love of God by having Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, those who know Jesus as Savior, but have not let others see the love God showed them by showing it to others as much as they should, and others who would tell you they do show the love of God to others all the time.
The last group of people are called “liars.” Because the truth of the matter is, no one here has it all together when it comes to demonstrating God’s love to a lost and dying world.
We all need help with help with that, don’t we?
For those of you who may not have the personal experience of taking Christ into your life to bring you to heaven, let me invite you to take that step today.
God loves you so much that He sent His Son to die for you, to give you an escape from the penalty we all deserve, to give you a home in heaven.
For the rest, I meant it when I said that you need to ask God to show you specifically how you can show love to others.
We are going to pray. We will begin silently, each of us asking God how we can specifically show love to those around us.
Then I will close with prayer.
Let’s pray.
