1 John chapter 4. And by the way, good morning.
I'm trying to get myself situated here. Let me read verse 14 through
21. and do testify that the Father
sent the Son to be the Savior of the world. Whosoever shall
confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him,
and he in God. And we have known and believed
the love that God hath to us. God is love, and he that dwelleth
in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. Herein is our love
made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment,
because as He is, so are we in this world. There is no fear
in love, but perfect love casteth out fear, because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect
in love. We love Him because He first
loved us. If a man say, I love God, and
hateth his brother, he is a liar. For he that loveth not his brother
whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?
And this commandment, this commandment to love one another, have we
from him, that he who loves God That word loveth, you see in
this ETH on these words, that's continue. To continue to love
God. He that continues to love Him.
That he who loveth God, love his brother also. Let us pray. Our Father, thank You for Your
Word that we have just read. Instruct us out of Your Word.
Forgive us our sins for Christ's sake. Lord, be with us. Be with us and enable us to worship
You in spirit and truth. Enable this to truly be a time
of worship and praise to our God. Thank You for all Your mercies. Thank You for all the temporal
mercies. Thank You for all the spiritual blessings that You
have given us in the Lord Jesus Christ. Father, thank You. In
His name we pray, and amen. The title of the lesson this
morning is, Love, An Evidence of God's Indwelling. An evidence of it. There are
evidences of God's indwelling. One is faith. You believe God. And you believe God because God
is in you. God dwells in you. And where God is, there will
be faith. Another evidence of God's indwelling is love. It's
love. The very first fruit of the Spirit
is what? Love. When Paul, in Galatians,
gives us the fruit of the Spirit, the very first, the first fruit,
the first fruit is love. Scripture says, he that loveth
not knoweth not God, for God is love. But he that's born of
God loves God, and this man loves the brethren. It comes out of
him. You can't help it. I was talking
to a pastor this past week, and we were talking about the love
of God and talking about faith. If it's in you, it's going to
come out. It's going to come out if it's there. And he's going
to love God, and he's going to love his brother, his brother
in Christ or his brother in Adam. He's going to love him. And John
says in verse 14, And we have seen... He's talking about the
apostles. We, the apostles, have witnessed
life. He said that in the first chapter.
We've seen Him. We've looked upon Him. We've
talked to Him. We have touched life. and we
have seen Him perform miracles." They watched Him. This is a witness.
We are reading from the writings of someone who was there. He
said, I saw it. We apostles have seen this. We've seen His miracles. They
watched Him raise the dead. They watched Him. They were part
of feeding 5,000. They watched him do that. They
watched him take a lad's lunch and feed 5,000 men plus, it says,
women and children. Who knows how many that was.
There might have been 10,000 people there that he fed with
a lunch. Don't let those little things
go by. Don't let those little things like that go by. If he
can feed 10,000 with a lunch, he had no problem taking care
of me. He has no problem taking care of me." And John says, we've
seen His resurrection. They saw Him after the resurrection.
They spoke to Him and He spoke to them. and we watched Him ascend
into heaven. We are witnesses to this. We
the apostles are witnesses to this. And this is also what we
are witness to, that the Father, we know this for a certainty,
that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world. Jesus Christ is the Messiah. We have a Savior. The Old Testament says, someone's
coming. That's what it says, someone's
coming. And John is saying, He's come. We are witnesses to the
Messiah, to the Savior, that the Father sent Him, the one
the Father promised from the beginning. This is Him. This is Him. We are witnesses
of God in the flesh. We have seen God in the flesh. That's what John is saying. We
are the Father sent the Son. We are witnesses to the incarnate
God. And he says this here, that He's
the Savior of the world. Let me give you an example of
something. God spoke to Noah. And he said to Noah, build an
ark. Build an ark, because I'm going to send a flood, and you
build an ark. And then after Noah built the ark, God brought
two of each kind into the ark. It says the male and his female.
Now the animal world was saved on the ark, wasn't it? But not
every animal in the world was saved. But the animal world we
have today, all of it was on that ark. But not every animal
in the world was saved. Christ is the Savior of the world,
but He's not going to save everyone in the world. Not everyone. Not
everyone. But here's the meaning, here's
the real meaning of this. Christ will save Jew and Gentile. The Jew did not think that you
and I had any part whatsoever in this. But John's saying that
the Lord Jesus Christ is the Savior of Jews and Gentiles,
people from every tribe, every kindred, every tongue, and nation
under heaven. He's the Savior of them. No one,
no one will ever enter heaven, will be saved that is not saved
by Jesus Christ. He's the only Savior. And He's
the Savior, it says here, of the Jew and the Gentile. Now
in verse 15, Whosoever shall confess, and that is a continual
confession. It's your life. It's your life. Whether he be Jew or Gentile,
that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwells in you. God dwells
in Him. And He in God. The very evidence
that God is in me is that I believe and I confess with all my heart
that Jesus is the Son of God. You know what that Ethiopian
eunuch said? I believe that Jesus is the Son
of God. He says, if that's so, that's
so, that's what you confess, it's evident God Almighty is
in you. That is just, I can't grasp that. You can't grasp the immenseness
of God. You look at the universe. You
look at all of creation. God created that. In His wisdom,
in His knowledge, God created that. And He dwells in me. David was going to build a house
and he said, How are you going to build me a house made with
hands? God doesn't dwell in a house
made with hands. You can't contain God in a house.
But yet God can dwell in me. You know, over in Ephesians,
it says that He is building us together for the habitation of
God. For God to dwell in, a place for God to dwell. But here's
evidence of the work of the Holy Spirit. When one believes, with
the heart that Jesus is God in human flesh, it's evident that
God dwells in that man, that person. And that person dwells
in God. He not only dwells in me, I dwell
in Him. God takes up His abode in me.
And Christ said, if you abide in me, we abide in Him by faith,
That's how we abide in Him. He abides in us by His Spirit. Salvation is more than a creed,
some doctrine to be believed. It's a union with God, the living
God in Jesus Christ. That is salvation. Salvation
is not believing some things. It is not accepting Christ as
my personal Savior so that I won't go to hell. That's not the issue. The issue is this. It's my union
to God. How can that be? How can God
be a just God and He and I dwell together in Jesus Christ? He's the meeting place. He's
the meeting place. He's the place where God and
a sinner can have fellowship and communion together, and He'll
still be God. Still be God. Then he says in
verse 16, "...and we have known and believed..." That's how you
know it, you believe God. Don't wait to know something,
then believe it. No, you believe God. David said, I had fainted
unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the
land of the living. When we believe God, He gives
us more light. He gives us more understanding.
We don't say, well, I have to see that first. You know what
Thomas said, I don't believe. Now I have to put my finger in
his side and see those wounds. And then when the Lord spoke
to him, he said, Thomas put your finger in and he said, no, and
he just, he bowed down, ashamed, ashamed that he didn't believe
as you ought to believe. And we have known and believed
the love that God has to us. We know this. This is not speculation. It's real. We've experienced
the love of God in Christ Jesus. We've experienced it. God is
love. That's the nature of God. That's
His nature. And he that dwells in love dwelleth
in God, and God in him. I think the strongest evidence,
I do, I think the strongest evidence that a man or woman has been
saved, I think the strongest evidence of it is love. Their
love for one another, love for people, their love to God. I think it's the strongest evidence.
Peter, do you believe me?" He didn't say that, did he? After
Peter denied him three times. He didn't ask Peter if he believed
on him. He didn't even question Peter's faith. But what he did
question, what he did bring up was this, Peter, do you love
me? Do you love me? Feed my sheep,
feed my lambs. We know the love of God for us
by faith. That's how we know it. And the
only way to know such love is by believing God. There's no
other way to know it. No other way. God is in Christ and we who believe
are in Christ. Therefore, by this union, we
know that God loves us. We know by this union, by being
in Christ, that God loves us. I cannot be in Christ and God
hate me. God loves everyone in His Son. This is my beloved Son in whom
I'm well pleased. And God is well pleased with
absolutely everyone in His Son. Everyone. He that continues in love, it
says, and this is what it means. He that continues in love, continues
in God. He that dwells in love, dwells
in God. He that continues, that's what he's talking about. Continues
in love, he continues in God, and God continues in him. And he says, this is the nature
of God. God is love. John, we're in chapter
four now. We're going to finish this up.
How many times does he bring up this matter of love? I mean,
it's all through every chapter. It's through every chapter. And
therefore, if God is love, if God is love, where God is, love
is. Has to be. Has to be. It's that
simple. Where God is, love is. And then he says in verse 17,
"...herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness, not
fear, but boldness in the day of judgment, And this is why. Because as He is, so are we in
this world. I would to God that we could
get a hold of this. As Jesus Christ is, so are we. He puts us on the same level.
So are we. In this union, here's what he's
saying, in this union and communion with God in Christ, love is brought
to maturity. When he talks about being perfect,
it's brought to maturity. And because of this, we have
confidence. And that word confidence, or
boldness, means confidence, is what it means. We have confidence.
We have confidence that we can stand before God in the day of
judgment. We have confidence in that. We
can face God without fear of judgment, because as He is, so
are we in this world. As Christ is loved, so are we. You know, the God the Father
does not love Christ more than He loves you, His children. He
doesn't love him more. I can't grasp that. I can't grasp
that. I can't grasp it, but yet I can
give you an example. I have two grandkids. I can say
this with honesty. And I have two sons. I don't
love my two sons any more than I love those two grandkids. That's
so. And God does not love Christ
any more than He loves you. As He is, so are we in this world. As Christ is accepted and seated
at God's right hand, so are we. So are we. As Christ is God's Son,
so are we, even now. Now, John said, are we the sons
of God. Now. And we should have the same
confidence, the same boldness in God as Jesus Christ has. Get a hold of that one. We should
have the same confidence and boldness in God as the Lord Jesus
Christ has. We should have it. If we don't,
it's because of sin. It's because of sin. And we've
got plenty of that too. Now John says there's no fear
in love. There's no fear in love. If someone
truly loves you, are you afraid of them? Not if they love you. There's no fear in love, but
perfect love, which is God's love. Only God has perfect love. Perfect love casteth out fear,
because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect
in love. He's not mature... It's absent. It's absent. But it says here,
there's no fear in love. You know that if God loves you...
This has meant a lot to me this week, looking at this. You know
If God loves you, no harm will come to you. You know that. You
know that. No harm will come to you. Perfect
love, which is God's love, drives out fear as light drives out
darkness. When you really begin to understand
and experience God's love, it drives out that fear and dread
of judgment or punishment Torment, it drives that out. And you really
look to God as your Father. As a child looks to its father.
When we understand how God can be just and save us in Christ,
it gives peace. Does it not give peace? When
you understand that, the Lord enables you to get a hold of
it by faith. It drives out fear. We no longer fear. We no longer
fear the curse of the law. We no longer fear God in a slavish
fear. It drives it out. Perfect love
drives it out. He says here, fear has torment,
and that word torment means punishment. You're afraid of punishment.
Punishment. Afraid of God's punishment. You
know what that shows? If I right now, If right now
I'm afraid of judgment, I'm afraid of dying and meeting God in judgment,
that says I don't understand the gospel. I've not yet laid
hold of eternal life. I'm really still in unbelief.
Because perfect love, which is God's love, which is shed abroad
in the heart, drives out that fear. It drives it out. This person does not believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ at all. He's still lost. He's still lost. Then he said here in verse 19,
We love Him because He first loved us. We
do love God. I'm ashamed how little it is. In this life, we will never love
God as we ought to. But we do love God. We love God
because He first loved us, and our love to God is a response.
It's a response of His love to us that's shed abroad in the
heart. It's a response. And you're going to respond.
You're going to respond. and you're going to respond by
the way you treat one another. That's exactly... The way I love
you and the way I treat you is in direct proportion to my love
for Christ. It is, direct proportion. If any man say, verse 20, we'll
wind this up. If any man say, I love God, and
hateth, continues to hate his brother, he is a liar." Much
strong language, isn't it? But it's so. He is a liar. For
he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he
love God whom he hath not seen? John's saying that's not even
possible. It's not possible. A good evidence of a false profession
is no love for the brethren. No love for the brethren. You
don't love to gather with the family. You'd rather be off doing
something else. No love for the brethren. John
said, this man's a liar. He's a liar. Love for God expresses
itself It expresses itself in a confident, someone said, in
a confident attitude towards others, void of fear, and shows
concern for his fellow believer. That's what love is. Love for
God is going to express itself. It's going to come out. Listen to this. The perfect love
that casts out fear also cast out hate. That's one worth writing down.
The perfect love that cast out fear of standing before God in
judgment will at the same time cast out hate that's in me for
my brother, whether he be in Christ or in Adam. Doesn't matter. Love and hate do not come from
the same fountain, no more than salt water or fresh water does. And he asked this question, how
can one claim to love God whom he has not seen and hate his
brother whom he has seen? John Calvin said this, It is
a false boast when anyone says that he loves God but neglects
His image which is before his eyes." We were created in the
image of God. Marred by sin. Yes, marred by
sin. But nevertheless, we were created
in the image of God. And how in the world, he said,
how can you say that you love God whom you've never seen? I've
never seen God. I've never seen Jesus Christ.
Not in the flesh. But I do see you. I do see you. And when I look in the mirror,
you know what I see? I see you. I see the same image. I see the same image. And John's
saying, it's not possible to claim to love God and hate God's
image. It's not possible. And this commandment, to love
one another, have we from Him. God gave this to us. God gave
it. That he who loveth God, love
his brother also. We are most like Christ. Now
listen, we are most like Jesus Christ when we love one another,
when we express our love in deeds, not in word only, to one another. Love is the evidence of God in
you. It's the evidence of it.