Perfect Love - Week 7: “Perfect Love Makes God’s Truth Visible” - Full Service

God's love is brought to completion in us. The love that begins with God flows to us and then through us to others. Why? And this is how God loves us completely, which means that in the world today, we don't have to go to a location. We don't have to go to a temple to encounter God's love. We encounter it through one another. His love is perfected, brought to completion in us. When we forgive one another, when we serve one another, when we bear with one another in patience and kindness, the world sees the truth of God's love. [01:02:30] (39 seconds)  #LovePerfectedInUs

And that phrase, that is at the heart of the gospel message, that God loved us so much that when we were his enemies that Christ died for us. Notice what it doesn't say. It doesn't say when we were holy on our own, Christ died for us. It doesn't say when we had everything figured out because we were good enough that Christ died for us. It doesn't say when we perfected our theology and had perfect attendance at church that Christ died for us. No. As a matter of fact, it says the opposite. [00:53:52] (32 seconds)  #LovedAsEnemies

See, at the cross, the sin of humanity and the perfect love of God collided. And the good news for us today, church, perfect love won. And my prayer is that we would not become so familiar with this truth that we would forget about it. That when we look at the cross, and again, it's nothing magic in the actual object itself, but when we see it, we would remember what it represents. [00:54:54] (27 seconds)  #PerfectLoveWon

So we take a step back, you look at everything that John has shown us in this passage, you notice a really beautiful progression. You see that love begins with God, but it doesn't stop there. It flows into our lives, and then it flows out to the world around us. And when that happens, people start to see something they otherwise could never see, the truth of God's love for them, which again brings us back to our big idea that we know God's truth when we show God's love. [01:03:09] (31 seconds)  #KnowTruthByLove

So here's a question that we have to ponder today. Where's your heart's allegiance? Where is the allegiance of your heart? When we say that Jesus is Lord, is that just a phrase that we've picked up over time at church, or is it the reality of our heart's condition? And what I love here is that John doesn't just warn the church about these false teachers, he also reassures the church. Notice what he says in verse four. He says, he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. [00:39:45] (33 seconds)  #HeartAllegiance

Can I be honest with you? Sometimes I think that we lose sight of what an absolutely mind blowing amazing truth that it is. That God loves us so much that his love was made manifest as John talks about in the person of Jesus. That he came to this world and he died on a cross for our sins to pay the debt of sin that we could never repay. And I think that sometimes we become so familiar with the cross that we stop being amazed by it. [00:50:20] (36 seconds)  #AmazedByTheCross

See, John isn't just casually talking about saying some phrase that Jesus is Lord. Just speaking these words without any kind of heart motive that's going on behind us. As a matter of fact, we know from the gospels that even the demons would say that Jesus was the son of the most high. You see it in Matthew eight. You see it in Mark one and five. You see it in Luke four and eight. They said, who you are the son of the most high. They were scared. They were trembling. So John's not just talking about some sort of verbal acknowledgment. He's asking about the condition of our hearts. [00:39:05] (32 seconds)  #HeartNotWords

But here's what I love. God's word tells us what John writes here is that God never stops loving us no matter how frustrating, annoying, or hurtful that we can get. And that leads us to our fourth truth for today, that God loves us completely. God loves us completely. Notice what John says in verse 11. He says, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. Do you notice the repetition of this theme? [00:57:24] (29 seconds)  #GodLovesCompletely

And know what you're thinking. You're thinking, Chad, how does this relate to God loving us first? Hang with me. Notice what John says in verse seven. He says that love is from God. This agape love is from God. It didn't start with us. We didn't initiate it. We didn't deserve it. There was nothing we could do to earn it, and yet God loved us first. [00:44:57] (25 seconds)  #LovedFirstByGod

But we all have those people in our lives that it feels like it's impossible for us to love them. And you know what? In and of yourself, you may be right. It may be impossible for you to love them, but what does John say? God is love. God loved us first. God lives in us if we are followers of Jesus. So where we fall short, God is made perfect. [00:46:22] (24 seconds)  #GodCompletesOurLove

God's truth will always prevail. And the world resists that truth. That's what John says here, but he says, but those who belong to God welcome it. What truth? That Jesus, fully God and fully man is God's gift of perfect love to us. And so once John establishes that God's love is rooted in truth, he moves on to an even deeper question. He says, well, if if love and truth belong together, where does that love that leads to truth actually come from? Let's read on. [00:40:55] (31 seconds)  #TruthAndLoveTogether

And when we understand that truth, when we start to grasp this idea that the God of the universe chose to love us before we ever loved him, it begins to reshape the way we treat people around it. And this is part of what John's point is. This idea that God loved us first, when we understand that or begin to understand that, it reshapes how we live our lives. And I know what you're thinking. [00:45:22] (26 seconds)  #LovedFirstReshapesUs

Now I want everyone to pause and think for just a moment. I know that's a big ask for some of you, but let's just pause and think for a moment. I want you to think about a time in your life where you had someone really special reach out to you and make a big difference in your life. Someone who showed up and loved you in a really special way. Maybe they stood up for you. Maybe they had your back. [00:41:47] (22 seconds)  #RememberKindness

Now think about that person again. And I would ask you this question. You don't have to raise your hand. How many of you did anything to deserve that person stepping into your life and loving you in that way? Most of the time, we don't. Those kinds of folks, they step into our lives and they have our backs. They encourage us. They stand in the gap for us because they love us regardless of what we had done for them. [00:42:44] (21 seconds)  #UnmeritedLove

And I know what you're thinking. Duh. Right? But hang on. Because John is showing us something that is incredibly important here. He's showing us that God's love, it's not abstract. God's love is not theoretical. History. God's love was tangible in the person of Jesus. Notice what verse nine says. John writes, in this, the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only son into the world. [00:49:38] (36 seconds)  #LoveMadeTangible

So we come in this room and we see the cross, but do we see it? Do we remember God's great love for us? And not just when we feel like we were lovable, but at a time where scripture says we were enemies from God. I love how Paul puts this in Romans five six through eight. He says, for while we were still weak at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. [00:53:13] (24 seconds)  #ChristDiedForTheUngodly