Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. (1 John 4:7-12 NIV)
In the month of May, I went to twelve different churches to get ideas for our ministry here. On Mother’s Day, I ended up at a huge, non-denominational church. There had to have been over a thousand people there. Great music. All sorts of kids activities. Then the pastor came out and talked directly to the moms. She said, “I don’t care what anybody else says. You’re a great mom, because you’re trying your best.” And everybody nodded their heads: “Amen!” “You’re a great mom, because you’re trying your best.” Sound good? So, this should be an easy sermon today for Father’s Day, right? “Dads, you are good dads, because you’re trying your best.” Amen!
Except, do know how many times the Bible says, “Just do your best and you’re good.” Zero. That’s our false American religion: “Just work hard. Do your best. You’re good!” The Bible never says that. It says, “Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God.” Instead of saying, “Just try your best,” the Bible is way more specific. It says, “Love. Love with God’s love.” As a mom, as a dad, as a human being: Love one another with God’s love. Love puts that other person first every time. Love is willing to sacrifice everything. Love fills their needs, regardless of the cost to you. “Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God.”
Have you done that? I know what I have to say: “I could have done better.” Love says, “You first,” because that’s what God says to us: “You first!” But instead of saying, “You first,” to my kids, I often do all of my things first and then give them the spare time at the end. I could have done better. Instead of sacrificing for others, like God has done for me, I often expect everyone else to sacrifice for me. I could have done better. Instead of filling the needs of the people God has placed in my life, I often spend a lot of time wondering why other people don’t fill my needs. Love one another with the love that comes from God? I could have done better. I’ve sinned!
That’s why I can’t stand up here today and say, “Dads, you are great dads because you are trying your best.” What about the days when you don’t try your best? What about the days that your sinful heart gets the better of you? What about all the days when you make the wrong decisions and say the wrong words and do the wrong things? What about the days when your conscience whispers over and over again, “I could have done better”? Then what? If being a good dad or a good person depends on me doing the right things, I’m in trouble. Because I haven’t. I don’t.
This is serious. Our lesson continues: “Whoever does not love does not know God.” Jesus once said, “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another” (John 13:35). Love is the sign that someone is a Christian. I can know the Bible backward and forward, but if I don’t love other people, I don’t know God. I can be the hardest worker in the world, but if I don’t love, I don’t know God. I can come to church every Sunday, but if I don’t love, I don’t know God. And who of us can sit here today and say, “Yeah, I’ve done good. I’ve tried hard!” We all could have done better. We’ve all sinned. “Whoever does not love does not know God.”
Know why? “Because God is love.” Ever heard that before? This is where it comes from! I think that has become the most famous verse in the Bible. “God is love.” You hear that everywhere! But don’t take those words for granted. “God is love.” Did you know that the idea of a God who loves started with Christianity? In the ancient world, the “gods” didn’t love anybody. You had to do good to earn their favor. The famous Greek philosopher Aristotle said, “It is impossible that God should love.” But the God of the Bible—the true God—is so different. God doesn’t just love sometimes. God doesn’t just give favors to good people. God is love! Isn’t that beautiful?
Of course, the devil likes to take the most beautiful things that God says and twist them. I bet you’ve noticed how the devil twists this phrase, “God is love,” in our world today. He takes this beautiful concept that God is love and twists it into an excuse to sin. That’s why this verse is so popular today, isn’t it? In a twisted way: “God is love, so I can have sex with anyone I want to whenever I want to.” “God is love, so I can live my life my way, and you better not say anything about it.” “God is love, so don’t you dare tell me what I’m doing is wrong.” No. No. No! Those ideas come straight from the devil himself to lead us away from God. Watch out!
Here is what it actually means that God is love. God himself explains it! “This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.” “God is love” doesn’t mean that God sits back and lets people do whatever they want. How would that be love? “God is love” means that God went into action. When he saw our sin, he didn’t stay still. “He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.” Who is God’s one and only Son? Jesus. Think about this love on Father’s Day. Would you send your only child off to die for wicked, sinful people who have hurt you a thousand times? No way! But that’s what God did for us. He sent his Son for us. “God is love.” He really loves us!
The next verse explains why Jesus came. “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” Life is not about what we’ve done. Life is about what Jesus did. Life is not about our trying hard or working hard or even our loving. Life is about how God loved us and sent his Son. “Not that we loved God, but that he loved us.” There will come a day in your life when you are no longer able to do anything. And it will be okay. Because it’s not about what you’ve done, it’s about what Jesus did. “Jesus is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world” (1 John 2:2).
Do you know what that means? Almost every service we hear about Jesus being the atoning sacrifice. What’s an atoning sacrifice? Hundreds of years ago, a man was translating the Bible from Greek into English for the first time. He came to this section. It says that we are sinful, and our sins separate us from God. But Jesus, in love, offered himself as the sacrifice that paid for our sins and brought us back together with God. And this man realized there was no English word to describe all that. So he created one a new word: Atonement. We pronounce it wrong. At-one-ment. Jesus is the atoning sacrifice—the at-oning sacrifice—that makes us one with God. Do you get it? Because of Jesus, you’re forgiven. God is your loving Father. You are his loved child.
Now I want you to compare these two ideas: The world says, “You’re good, because you do your best.” God says, “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” The world says, “If you try hard, you’ll succeed.” God says, “While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). The world says, “Good people deserve good things.” God says, “It is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8). Can you see a difference? It’s not about what you do. It’s about what Jesus did. God is love, and he proved it when he sent his Son.
So, Dads, know this: When you do your best, Jesus loves you. And when you could have done better, Jesus loves you. Moms, on the days when you feel like a good mom, Jesus loves you. And on the days when you feel like the worst mom in the world, Jesus loves you. Because God’s love doesn’t depend on you. “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” Kids—of all ages!—Jesus loves you. When your mom or dad makes you feel loved, Jesus loves you. When your mom or dad doesn’t make you feel loved, Jesus loves you. Nothing you do or don’t do can ever change that truth: Jesus loves you!
So, “dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.” Our lesson started with that same phrase “dear friends” in verse 7. It’s a cool phrase. In Greek, “dear friends” really says “loved ones.” So John really writes, “Loved ones, love…” When you know that you are loved—loved by the God who is love—that’s what enables you to love. “Loved ones, love.” In fact, “No one has ever seen God, but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.” No one can see God, but when Christians love like Jesus loves, people see God in us. Isn’t that cool? So, “loved ones, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”
That makes me think of Will Rogers. I’ve been learning as much about Oklahoma as I can. I’ve seen a snake. I’ve killed a million spiders. And I’ve read a little about Will Rogers. Do you know Will Rogers’ most famous saying? “I never met a man I didn’t like.” Isn’t that the attitude God calls on us Christians to have? “I never met a person I didn’t like.” Of course, that’s not really true, at least for me. I’ve met all sorts of people I haven’t liked. But Jesus changes that. When I know that I’m loved by Jesus, I want it to be true that “I never met a person I didn’t like.”
I got to visit our member John Christ this past Friday. By God’s grace, he’s recovering day by day after suffering a stroke. He told me a great story. He said, “While I was in the hospital, suddenly I had a revelation. All these people were serving me, and that gave me the right to tell them how much I love them. So I started telling all my nurses, ‘I love you. And Jesus does too. And I really appreciate what God is using you to do for me.’ Most of them were surprised. Some started crying. They said, ‘I really needed that.’” Even if you’re on your back in the hospital, you can help people see Jesus, just by saying to them, “Jesus loves you, and I do too.”
Wouldn’t that be a great way for us to be known as a church? “Jesus loves you, and we do too.” As I visited those dozen churches in May, I learned a lot. If people go to church for the tradition and the ritual and the liturgy, do you know where they should go? The Catholic church. Catholics do all that stuff way better than we do. We can’t out-tradition the Catholic church. If people go to church for the programs and fun activities and music, they should go to one of all the mega churches around. We can’t out-program or out-event anybody. But do you know what we can do to stand out? To be different? We can tell people: Jesus loves you, and we do too.
We can share the true grace of God is a deep way that every single person desperately needs. And we can love people in a personal, caring way that you don’t find other places. To the dads here today, “Jesus loves you, and we do too!” To the moms here today, “Jesus loves you, and we do too!” Is it your first time here? “Jesus loves you, and we do too!” Is it your first time here in a long time? “Jesus loves you, and we do too!” Wouldn’t it be great if that’s what our church were known for? “Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”
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