Authentic Love for the Brethren

1 John 3:16-18

April 6, 2003

            Take your Bibles and turn with me to 1 John 3:16.  We will be reading 1 John 3:16-18, which is our text this morning.  Follow along with me as I read.  Read text.  Let’s pray.

            It is reported that “about 200 years ago one of our well-known encyclopedias discussed the word ‘atom’ with the use of only four lines.  But five pages were devoted to a discussion of ‘love.’  In a recent edition of the same encyclopedia five pages were given to the word ‘atom;’ ‘love’ was omitted.”

            Love has fallen upon hard times in our world.  In many places love is completely non-existent, while in areas where love still dimly flickers it is horribly misunderstood.  This can be seen from theology to pop-culture.  One commentator wrote, “Love is no sentimental emotion, but it is something intensely practical.”  As we will see as we examine our text this morning, John probably would not have described love this way.  This commentators comment is like saying, “An apple is not food, but it is fruit.”  To say that an apple is not food, but it is fruit, is category confusion.  It makes a distinction where no distinction can rightfully be made.  Love is often misunderstood because of category confusion. 

            Another misunderstanding is in the basic nature of love, as is often seen in our popular culture.  One country song defines love like this: “Love is a rhythm of two hearts beating, pounding out a message steady and true.”  What does that mean?  Does it really mean anything?  What is the rhythm?  What is the message?  Love is reduced to seemingly matching heartbeats and contains no substance, no practical outworking, and no depth at all.  Perhaps the one who had it right was the person who sang, “What the world needs now is love, that’s the only thing that there’s just too little of.”  There certainly is a lack of love everywhere you turn in our world.

            What is the reason for such a lack of love?  I believe that this lack of love in our world, in our churches, in our families, in or marriages, and in every sphere of life results from two causes.  Either we do not truly understand love as it is defined and expressed in God’s Word, or we understand what God’s Word commands us to do, but we reject that understanding because of real love’s depth and demands.  Sometimes it is easier to enjoy mere sentimentality and fuzzy feelings rather than do the dirty work love requires, and other times it is easier to be a dutiful hypocrite rather than get emotionally involved in other people’s problems and suffering.

            We see both extremes in Scripture.  We see the people caught up in the sentiment who neglect the work of love, and to those people Jesus said, If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.  And we see the person whom Paul describes in 1 Corinthians 13:3, where he writes, If I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.  It is possible to sell all you own and feed the poor and not have love.  It is possible to be a dutiful hypocrite.  It is possible to be a Pharisee in the 21^st century.  If we don’t want to be sentimental, delusional fools or working, dutiful hypocrites we must understand what the Bible calls us to when it calls us to love one another.

            Love is demanding, and love is demanded.  But what exactly is love?  This is what John is now dealing with.  How does love work in relation to others, especially other Christians?

            Let me remind you of the context.  We are in a section that essentially began at the end of verse 10 where John insisted that the one who does not love his brother is not born of God, but he is a child of the devil.  And now in verses 11 through 24 John is expounding on this statement.  His doctrine is simple: The children of God love one another.  That is the theme of these 14 verses.  Last week John began by defending his doctrine, and he did so with the negative illustration of Cain.  Love is required because a lack of love, hatred, is tantamount to murder, and no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.  No one can argue with John’s doctrine.  If a person acts and lives like Cain, it is a clear indication that he has not passed out of death into life.  Hatred is a mark of the wicked.

            In verses 19-24, which we will look at next Lord’s day, we see why this doctrine is so important and useful for our lives as believers.  What makes it so essential that we not only understand but practice this doctrine? 

            This week we find ourselves in the middle of this section, verses 16-18, in which John defines love.  Jesus’ example sets the standard for how we should love one another.  John gives the illustration of Jesus Christ to teach us the true nature of love.  We must understand the example, and after we understand the example John gives us three action steps to implement that will enable you to follow it.  We have the example, and the actions we need to do to follow the example.  Let’s start with the example in verse 16.

Jesus’ example teaches us what love is (v. 16a)

            Jesus is the standard of love.  If we want to truly understand the nature of love, Jesus is the one to whom we look.  John writes, We know love by this.  Here John asserts that we have a way to know love.  There is a means that God has given us to understand the true nature of love.  That means starts with knowledge.  Knowledge is required if we are to adequately love one another.  That knowledge has two characteristics.

            First, that knowledge is experiential.  Our knowledge of love is not second-hand knowledge.  It must be something we ourselves have experiences first hand.  The type of knowledge to which John refers is not knowledge gained by study, by reading, by hearing a story, or by reflecting on a theorem.  The knowledge to which John refers is knowledge gained by experience.  His argument is that we know love because we have been shown love.

            Not only is it experiential, it is also personal.  We have not just had first-hand experience of it, but we have actually been recipients of it.  John is writing to believers in this letter.  He says, in effect, “We know love by this, we have experienced love personally, first-hand, and we have been loved personally, and we have this personal knowledge of love.” 

            Our personal, experiential knowledge of love is found in Christ’s work on our behalf.  We know love because of how Jesus Christ has loved us.  John says, We know love by this, that He laid down His life for us.  Jesus’ love in action was a sacrifice.  It was a sacrifice of His own life.  Jesus did not merely tell us that He loved us; He showed us by laying down His life.  This is the act of love.  The act of love. 

            When we think about Jesus laying down His life as an act of love, we need to ask at least two questions if we are to understand what it means to lay down your life as Jesus laid down His life.  The first question we need to ask is: How did Jesus lay down His life?  How did He do it, or in what manner did He do it?  There is a proper act of love – laying down your life – and there is a proper attitude of love, otherwise it would make no sense for Paul to talk about giving your body to be burned and not having love in 1 Corinthians 13:3.  So how did Jesus do it?  What was His attitude about it? 

            First, we see that Jesus laid down His life of His own will and choice.  He was not coerced into doing.  He was not forced to do it.  He did it of His own will.  In John 10:18 Jesus, talking about His death, said, No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative.  No one took Jesus’ life from Him.  Oh yes, the Roman soldiers held the hammer that drove the nails through His hands and feet.  The Romans beat Him and crowned Him with a crown of thorns.  The Jews shouted, “Crucify Him!  Crucifiy Him!”  The Romans and the Jews were both responsible for murdering Jesus, but they did not take His life from Him.  He gave His life to them and for them.  He laid it down of His own initiative.  This means that it was His idea and He put the steps in motion for His life to be taken for the sins of the world.  Jesus made a willing choice to lay down His life. 

            Second, He laid down His life without regard for His own rights.  He did not consider what was rightfully His due when laying down His life.  Philippians 2:6-8 makes that clear.  Paul wrote that He did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself.  Jesus Christ did not think of His own rights when He thought of our situation and our need.  He did not use His right as God to exact punishment upon us for our sins.  Instead of making us pay what we deserved to pay and what was rightfully His due, He emptied Himself and served us by being obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.  Jesus Christ could have exacted punishment on the whole human race for sin and not saved anybody.  That was His right and prerogative as God.  But He did not use His rights to serve those ends.  Rather, He used His power, eternity, infinite greatness and holiness to make an infinitely great and holy sacrifice for us.  Jesus’ rights as God were not regarded on the cross.  He did not deserve to die.  He had the right to stay in heaven as God and would have been perfectly just to exact punishment and pour out wrath upon us.  But He didn’t.  He made a choice of love, and in that loving, merciful choice He set aside what was rightfully His and lowered Himself and humbled Himself.  How many of us love this way?  How many of us love even if it means giving up our rights?  How many of us choose to give up our rights for something greater than ourselves, namely loving another person?  We are Americans and we have rights!  Jesus was God and He had all rights!  Yet He did not consider those things something to be retained for Himself or used to exact punishment, put He used His power and infinite greatness to save us by dying on the cross.

            He gave His life willingly, without regard for His own rights, and, thirdly, with compassion.  He did not hang on the cross cold-hearted toward sinners, staunchly, stoically doing His duty with a face of stone and a heart of granite.  No, instead He prayed, Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing (Lk 23:34).  “Oh Father,” He prayed, “forgive the ones killing Me because they don’t know what they’re doing!”  This was a cry for a broken heart for the sins of the world.  Jesus loved in action, and He loved with compassion.  His love was not action only when He laid down His life.  He surrendered His body for the cross, and He did it with love, and He found great gain.

            Which leads us to our second question: Why did He do it?  What was the motivation of this loving act?  One text I want to look at to answer this question.  Hebrews 12:2.  We read, 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.  Why did He endure the cross?  For the joy set before Him.  He did it for joy.  He did it because He knew at the end of the Calvary road was a grave, and He would on the third day burst out of that grave victorious over sin and death, and He would have accomplished the redemption of the elect, His bride, the church, and He would sit down next to the Father and be forever glorified, and every knee would bow and every tongue confess that He is Lord to the glory of God.  This was the joy set before Him.  He knew that giving up His rights with compassion and tenderness and mercy, even though it cost Him His life, ended in a place filled with joy.  It was for the joy set before Him.  He did it because He knew the end of the story, and the end is filled with joy. 

            Don’t think of love as being ruined if you love because you know the end of the story, and you want the joy of being near Jesus and glorified with Him.  Nothing will enable you to love like Jesus if you do not endure because of the joy of heaven and Christ and God set before you.  In fact, if that joy in God and in Jesus isn’t the goal and end of all that you do, you cannot glorify God no matter how loving your actions may outwardly appear to be.  If the joy that God has set before you is not your motivation, you exalt yourself above Jesus Christ.  Why do I say that?  I say that for this reason: If joy was Jesus’ motivation, and you say that joy is not the best motivation for loving, sacrificial acts, then you say that your love is more pure, more authentic, and more noble than the love of the Son of God.  Jesus did not die without thinking of the joy set before Him.  He endured for the joy set before Him, and if you say that you have a more noble, more pure motivation than maximizing your joy in God, then you ultimately are saying you have a more noble, more pure motivation than Jesus had on the cross.  Joy in Christ is the only proper motivation for enduring suffering to love the brethren.  Joy is not a side benefit of loving.  Joy in God is the motivation for loving, and the only way not to lose all the reward you might have had for surrendering your body to be burned, or to be executed, or to be tortured, or to be cold and naked and hungry. 

            Jesus laid down His life as an example for us so that we might experience love and know love by that experience.  He did it willingly, sacrificially, and compassionately.  And He did it for the joy set before Him.  And He did it on behalf of those who did not deserve it.  John tells us that He laid down His life for us.  For us.  On our behalf.  We were the recipients of Jesus’ love.  We, enemies of God, sinners, children of wrath, by nature haters of God, we were the ones for whom Jesus died on the cross.  This is His example for us to teach us love. 

We should follow His example in the big things (v. 16b)

            And John’s exhortations to us begin after describing this example.  John proceeds to give us three action-steps to follow Jesus’ example and demonstration of love.  The first step to following Jesus’ example of love is to follow His example in the big things.  Even if it costs us our own lives, we should follow the example of Jesus.  There is no sacrifice too big for the Christian to give when his heart is like Jesus’ heart. 

            Notice verse 16.  John writes, And we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.  We are obligated as Christians to lay down our lives for the brethren, for other believers.  We should follow Jesus’ act of love and be willing to lay down our lives.  This does not mean, of course, that all of us will die in showing love to the brethren.  I think there are at least two implications of this.

            One is that we should be willing to die, if necessary, for our fellow Christians.  Our love for them should extend to such an extent that we would die for them if the need was there.  We should be willing to sacrifice our blood and our physical comfort and our lives for them if called to do so.  Many, if not most, are not called to die this way or to demonstrate love this way.  So the second implication is where most of us will live.

            The second implication is that we willingly give up our lives for the brethren, meaning that we die to self to serve others.  We have our lives, and we have every right to live them pursuing our own goals, our own dreams, our own families, our own desires, but this text clearly implies that our lives are not to be used to meet ends that are centered around and focused on just ourselves.  Our lives are to be spent for Christ and His church.  We are to actively seek to give up our lives to help those in need, especially other believers. 

            This is so easy to say, but so difficult to do.  To follow Christ’s example in this area is something that is totally contrary to the flesh.  And it is totally contrary to the world.  The world does not seek to give for the sake of another as a regular, habitual pattern without any desire for compensation in this life.  Those of the world do not lay down their lives regularly and consistently like Jesus did.  In fact, they don’t do it at all!  Sadly, the same can be said of many Christians, all Christians at one point or another.  We all fail at this point, but we all must seek to live the example of Christ as we receive grace to do so, and we should constantly come to God for the grace to do it.

We should follow His example in the little things (v. 17)

            Not only should we follow His example of love in the big things, but we should also follow His example in the little things of life.  In verse 17 John writes, But whoever has the world’s goods, and sees his brother in need and closes his heart against him, how does the love of God abide in Him?  This is a rhetorical question, and the answer is, “It doesn’t!”

            John is here arguing from the greater to the lesser.  His argument is this: We should be willing to give our lives for the brethren, but how can we say we would willingly give our lives for the brethren if we won’t even give something small to help our brethren?  The children of God ought to follow Jesus’ example, but since most of us won’t be called to die, but all of us at some time will see a brother in need and be able to meet that need, John descends to where we all live.  The response to verse 16 for many would be to say, “Yes, if the need arose, I would give up my life.”  But it’s all hypothetical, and chances are good that this hypothetical will never happen.  So John’s way of combating this easy response to verse 16 is to give a practical, every day, ordinary example in verse 17.  And the argument is that if you won’t do the small thing of giving someone food or clothing to live and be warm, then it’s obvious you won’t do the big thing of actually dying for the brother in need.  Can you be faithful in a little?

            We see a person in verse 17 who is described as having three characteristics.  First, he has this world’s goods.  He has the world’s goods as a normal way of life.  This simply means he has what is necessary to sustain life.  He has what is necessary to keep himself alive and fed and warm and with shelter.  He is not necessarily rich, but he is not necessarily poor.  He may be rich, or he may be poor, but he has the basic necessities of life.  This is a constant for him.  He is not uncertain of where his next meal will come from.  And day to day he eats three meals a day, has a roof over his head, pays his bills, has clothing that keeps him warm, and everything else that is seen as a necessity to maintain life in this world.

            Secondly, he sees his brother having need.  He personally observes his brother having need.  This is a personal observation, and it is a continuous observation.  This is not a glance.  It is not a rumor he heard that someone somewhere was hungry or in need of a jacket.  This is a long look, a personal examination of his brother and his brother’s need and full knowledge of that need.  He personally knows about this need and has beheld it.  And he knows that the brother’s need is not being met.  The brother has a continuous need that no one is meeting.  He has a need of basic life necessities that no one is willing to meet.  So we have a person who has enough to feed himself and keep himself warm, and we have another person who lacks these things, and the person who has the goods knows about the need of the one lacking them.

            What is his response to his needy brother?  He closes his heart against him.  He makes a decision not to help.  Perhaps for a while he sees his brother’s need, he thinks about it, he wonders if and how he should help, and then he comes to the conclusion that he will not help.  And he closes his heart, he slams shut the door of his affections.  He makes a decision to not feel pity or compassion on his needy brother. 

            John’s question is, How does the love of God abide in him?  How can this man have the love of God abiding in him when he refuses to help his needy brother?  The love of God is the love of which God is the source.  It is the love that God produces.  It is the love of God that met our need as sinners at Calvary.  The love of God, love that comes from God, meets the needs of those who are His own.  The love that God produces and of which God is the source always meets the needs of His people.  And so the question is rhetorical, and the answer obvious: How can the love of God that met our need for a Savior abide in a person who won’t meet the need of his brother for daily life-sustaining food?  It can’t!  God’s love doesn’t act that way.  God’s love does not close itself to the needs of His people. 

            The love of God encompasses our whole being.  It is intellectual; it knows about the need.  It is emotional; it feels compassion and affection for the needy.  It is an act of the will; it meets the need.  If this is the love of God, then a person who has goods to meet a need, knows about the need, and shuts off his emotions so that he will not meet the need does not have the love of God abiding in him.

We should love with authentic love (v. 18)

            True Christian love follows Christ’s example in the big things, it follows His example in the little things, and it is authentic love.  It is not fake, hypocritical, self-seeking, or phony.  We should love with authentic love if we are to follow Christ’s example, and this is John’s point in verse 18.  He writes, Little children, let us not love with word or with tongue, but in deed and truth.  The command is to love, the example of Christ shows us how, and this exhortation sums it all up for us. 

            John starts with how not to love.  We are not to love with word or with tongue.  The implications of this are that we are not to just talk about how loving we are.  We are not to only love with our words.  In the book of James we get a striking illustration of this.  In James 2:14 James gives us an illustration of someone who loves with word and with tongue.  He writes, What use is it, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but he has no works?  Can that faith save him?  If a brother or sister is without clothing and in need of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and be filled,” and yet you do not give them what is necessary for their body, what use is that?  Even so faith, if it has no works, is dead, being by itself.  This person James describes is the person loving with word and with tongue.  He sees a brother or sister having need and his response is, “Be warmed, be filled.”  He tells them he wants their need met, but he does not do what is necessary to meet that need!  And James response is that this person’s faith is not real faith at all.  It is dead.  Its works are not works of true faith.  Faith must work to be real. 

            Now you may be wondering what this has to do with love.  This is an issue of faith, right?  Turn to Galatians 5:6.  In Galatians 5:6 we read this, For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything, but faith working through love.  Faith works through love, and this synergy of faith working through love is the only thing that matters.  The essence of Christianity is faith working through love.  It’s not about circumcision, about being a Jew or being a Gentile, and it’s not about what you say; it’s about faith working through love.  Real faith works, and it works through love.  So it is of no use to love with word or with tongue.  Real faith loves in a far more profound way.

            Notice, it loves, in 1 John 4:18, in deed and in truth.  We must love in deed.  In work.  One commentator wrote, “The necessary expression of genuine love is loving action.”  Love must work to be real.  John Bunyan put it like this, “Practical love is best.  Many love Christ with nothing but the lick of the tongue.”  Love, if it is real, authentic love, must work.  It must act.  It cannot just be words, but it must translate into action.

            Second, we must love in truth.  Our love must be genuine love and not a sham.  Love is a choice, but it is not a choice made apart from feelings.  Real love is a choice filled with heartfelt compassion and empathy.  Don’t reduce love down to actions.  Love is not just actions.  And don’t reduce love down to feelings.  Love is not just feelings.  John Piper said it like this, “Love is not a feeling, but it is not less than a feeling.”  If you strip away the feelings from love, you destroy real, authentic love.  If you strip away the actions from love, you destroy real, authentic love.  Love is knowledge translated into proper emotions translated into proper actions.  Love starts in the mind with the proper knowledge.  It sees the brother in need.  This knowledge moves the heart, and compassion is opened wide.  And this compassion moves the will, and the need is met, and the act of meeting the need is a genuine act of love.  When Jesus described the parable of the Good Samaritan, He included in His parable in Luke 10:37 that the Samaritan “felt compassion” for the man lying in the ditch.  He did not coldly throw him on his donkey and take him to the inn.  No, he felt compassion on him.  He loved him with his emotions and with his actions.  True love sympathizes with others’ afflictions as though they were our own. 

            In John Piper’s book Future Grace, he tells a true story from Ernest Gordon’s book Miracle on the River Kwai.  A group of POWs were working on the Burma Railway in World War II, and the story goes as follows:

At the end of each day the tools were collected from each work party.  On one occasion a Japanese guard shouted that a shovel was missing and demanded to know which man had taken it.  He began to rant and rave, working himself up into a paranoid fury and ordered whoever was guilty to step forward.  No one moved.  “All die!  All die!” he shrieked, cocking and aiming his rifle at the prisoners.  At that moment one man stepped forward and the guard clubbed him to death with his rifle while he stood silently to attention.  When they returned to the camp, the tools were counted again and no shovel was missing.

            This story is an example of living the love of Christ.  An innocent soldier who did not deserve to die willingly laid down his life, gave up his rights, for the good of others.  He stepped forward and sacrificed himself to save his comrades. 

            We might say we would do that too if we were in a similar situation, so John argues from the lesser to the greater.  How are we doing at loving in small things?  If you won’t give up the things that maintain your life, why would you think you would give up your life itself? 

            Little children, let us not love with word or with tongue, but in deed and truth.  Let’s pray.

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