Beloved: Love One Another Because God Is Love

Beloved, you who are loved by me and by God. Beloved, let us love one another. There, that's the main point. You can get out your pillows and blankets. Let us love one another. Let us love one another for love is from God. And whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. And so then as he switches to to verse eight, we'll see that he's just said how if we love, we have been born of God and we know God and then he sort of says the opposite of that in in the next verse. [00:46:27] (50 seconds)  #LoveOneAnother

Now how can you command someone to love someone else? What if those feelings, those emotions just are not naturally there? There are people that we meet who, you know, we appreciate and we're attracted to them, not necessarily like in a romantic way, but but there's a charisma and a and a joy and we look forward to being with them. But there are other people even within the church that sort of rub us the wrong way. Maybe it's the way they talk or the way they do things or don't do things or whatever they maybe they smell bad, whatever. [01:00:35] (38 seconds)  #LovingTheHardPeople

The love doesn't come naturally, automatically. So how can Jesus command us to love one another? And again, Jesus isn't talking about loving everyone, our neighbor and the stranger at this point. He's talking about loving those within the church. Love one another. How can we? Because love is more than just an emotion or a reaction. Love is a choice. Love is a choice. We can choose love or we can choose resentment. Choose love. Obey Jesus' commandment. And he goes on in the next verse to say this, by this, by you loving one another, all people will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another. [01:01:13] (70 seconds)  #ChooseLove

People are very creative in trying to figure out ways to get God to love them, to forgive them, to be on their side. But it all starts with the real God who is love, who created us in love, who gave himself in love as the propitiation. He sent his son. He gave himself to be this propitiation, this payment, this sacrifice, this reconciliation, this atonement. He doesn't ask us to make sacrifice. Well, he does, but that's that's another topic. He himself provides the sacrifice for our sins. This is our amazing god who we are here to worship and adore. [00:52:53] (65 seconds)  #GodProvidedSacrifice

But, again, John comes back to his main point. We love because he, God, our heavenly father, our lord Jesus Christ, the spirit of god, he first loved us. Verse 20, if anyone says, I love God and hates his brother, he's a liar. He may think he loves God, but he doesn't know God. He doesn't have the spirit of God living in him. For he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him, whoever loves god must also love his brother. [01:03:54] (57 seconds)  #LoveYourBrother

Anyone who does not love does not know God. Why? Because God is love. And so if you know God, if you have experienced God, if you've been born of God and God is love, then you are filled with his love and you have love for one another because God is love. Now, it's an important distinction to note that he isn't saying love is God. Right? Like, just sort of the love in the universe, that's God. He's not talking about some, you know, other force other than God our heavenly father and his son our lord Jesus Christ and the holy spirit. They are love. But love in and of itself isn't God. [00:47:16] (58 seconds)  #GodIsLove

The love is initiated by God who is love. It's not our love of God. It's his love for us that is the foundation of our creation, of our even being alive. Because God loved us, he created so that he would have people and a and a creation to love and that would love him in return. And he sent his son to be a propitiation for our sins. Now that's not a word that we use very often, is it? That word sins. No. That that word propitiation. [00:50:27] (46 seconds)  #LoveInitiatedByGod

Verse 11, beloved, if god so loved us, now Paul's or John is back to his main point. If God so loved us that he gave himself to die on a cross for us. If God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. Surely, if we have experienced this god of love, if we have been, forgiven of our sins, if if we know that we are loved by god and are have a place in eternity with him, surely we ought to love one another. [00:53:58] (40 seconds)  #LovedSoWeLove