If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.

1 John 4

If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. 1 John 4:20

I continue my study of 1,2,3 John using the Christ-Centered Exposition commentary series volume for these books.  Today, my focus is a commentary-assisted review of 1 John 4:13-21. 

Per the commentary for this text:

Main idea: "God’s love in His people gives them assurance of His presence, confidence awaiting judgment, and power to reflect His character in the world."

Excerpts from the introduction:

• "Our actions are often determined by our identity—who we are and who we think we are. John wants us to be loving (actions), but first he wants us to know we are loved as those who abide in God through the gift of His Spirit (identity)."
• John seeks for us to love as Christ loves us and for us to abide in Him and know Him intimately, including an understanding of how He loves us and blesses us.  As we abide in Him and grow in our relationship with Christ, we are able to be obedient in our love for others - this requires "supernatural assistance" that only the Holy Spirit provides.
• Love of others is evidence of the Spirit and God as the invisible is made visible.
  

Divisions:

1. Love Is an Evidence That We Have the Spirit (4:13-16): "When we experience the power of divine love, we experience the work and enjoy the fellowship of the triune God....Love is certified proof that God now resides in us, not in a pantheistic sense, but through His personal presence....John wants his readers to know, to be assured of many things. Here he wants them to know they abide in God and God abides in them through the gift of the Holy Spirit, the Third Person of the triune God."
   
2. Love Gives Us Confidence As We Await the Day of Judgment (4:17-18): "Love has an intended goal. The word “perfected” carries the idea of completion, being brought to maturity. Abiding in the love of God gives us “confidence,” boldness, for the judgment day. Judgment day is something every person should consider with healthy seriousness. It is real, and it is coming....those who do live in fear of future punishment give evidence that something is wrong, that God’s perfecting work of love has not done its work in their lives. So, out of gospel gratitude for who you are in Christ, love others as He has loved you. The threat of punishment will disappear. The fear of punishment will evaporate. Love never fears judgment or punishment. It is bold. It is confident."
   
3. Love Is a Command Because It Reflects God’s Character (4:19-21): We cannot love God without loving others.  "The Father’s prior love is source and cause for our love of others. If I am not loving others as I ought, then I do not know God’s love as I should....If you do not manage to love His creatures, then you cannot love the Creator."  
   

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My Prayer: Lord Jesus, You are an awesome God who loves me and who is full of grace and compassion for me - thank You Jesus!  I am not deserving of the love, grace and compassion You have for me - my sin is great and it continues...daily.  Please forgive me Jesus and help me overcome and turn from my sin towards You.  Help me love You with all of my heart, soul, and mind and love others as You love me.  Help me grow in my faith.  Give Lisa and myself wisdom and strength.  Please heal Lisa of her cancer and from the side effects of chemo.  Help us lead Zach and Dustin to You Jesus and for them to choose You as their Lord and Savior.  Please provide Godly friends and spouses to Zach and Dustin.  Help me serve You, my family, my church, and others.  Help me understand, be obedient to, and apply Your message for me today and every day.

By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is so also are we in this world.

1 John 4

By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is so also are we in this world. 1 John 4:17

I continue my study of 1,2,3 John using the Christ-Centered Exposition commentary series volume for these books.  Today, my focus is an unassisted review of 1 John 4:13-21. John continues his discussion on love sharing first how the Holy Spirit is given to believers and resides in their hearts - v13.  We have faith and testify in Jesus as God and our Savior - vv14-15.  Those who confess Jesus as Lord and Savior - as the Messiah (as Peter did) demonstrate evidence that God is in them and them in God as a child of God adopted by Him - v15.  God loves us, He is love, and if we love Him and others then others will know that we are from God and of God - v16. As we abide in God, love (of Him and others) is perfected in us and this gives believers confidence that we are prepared to face Jesus and be held accountable in our final days - v17. The love we have gives us hope, confidence, peace - fruits of the Spirit (see also Galatians 5:22) - and freedom from fear and condemnation.  No earthly power can hurt us or take our salvation from us - we have a power great than that in the world (see also 1 John 4:4); fear is a measure of lack of faith - see v18. God loved us first and on becoming one of His, adopted into His family as one of His elect, as we abide in Him and Him in us - we love also - v19. The text for today closes with a commandment that we love our brothers and sisters in Christ - we must not hate nor have hardness of heart - vv20-21. 

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My Prayer: Lord Jesus, You are SO good as You willingly went to the cross, being obedient to death, perfect and sinless, becoming the propitiation for our sin...so that we can can forgiveness from sin, and eternal life with You.  Thank You Jesus for this gift - the greatest gift of all time.  I am not deserving of such a gift.  My sin is great and it continues...daily.  Please forgive me Jesus and help me overcome and turn from my sin towards You.  Help me love You with all of my heart, soul, and mind and love others as You love me. Help me grow in my faith.  Give Lisa and myself wisdom and strength.  Please heal Lisa of her cancer and from the side effects of chemo.  Help us lead Zach and Dustin to You Jesus and for them to choose You as their Lord and Savior.  Please provide Godly friends and spouses to Zach and Dustin.  Help me serve You, my family, my church, and others.  Help me understand, be obedient to, and apply Your message for me today and every day.

By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.

1 John 3

By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. 1 John 3:16-18

I resume my study of 1,2,3 John using the Christ-Centered Exposition commentary series volume for these books.  Today, my focus is a commentary-assisted review of 1 John 3:11-18.  

Per the commentary for this text:

Main idea: Those who truly belong to God in Christ will live and love after the pattern of Jesus rather than the pattern of the world.

Excerpts from the introduction:

• "In 1:5–3:10 the message was “God is Light.” Now in 3:11–5:12 the message is “God is Love.” And because God is love, Christians are to love one another."
• Christians loving one another is to serve as an example for unbelievers in the world that we are God's children. 

Divisions:

1. Love One Another and Do Not Follow the Example of Cain (3:11-15): Love is not just repeated in this letter from John but of course throughout scripture, as the commentary points to John 13:34, 15:12, 15:17, Romans 12:10, 13:8, Galatians 5:13, Ephesians 4:1-2, 1 Thessalonians 3:12, 4:9, Hebrews 10:24, and 1 Peter 4:8. "John, following Jesus, says we are to love consistently and comprehensively, continually and individually. Play no favorites. Show no biases. Practice no discriminations among your brothers and sisters. After all, we are family!" Cain is provided as a negative example of who Christians are to be as "Cain's actions revealed his true spiritual father, the Devil." See also John 8:44. At the heart of Cain's story is how he, in contrast to his brother Abel, brought a sacrifice to God that was "evil and unacceptable."  We are also urged to avoid responding to how the world hates us by demonstrating hate ourselves.  We are to love and respond accordingly. We should at the same time avoid loving out of any motive that it will earn us anything - we are to love our brothers as a natural response from the overwhelming love (including how God saves!) God has for us that is planted as a seed and Spirit within us.  The core focus of this letter is for us to love our brothers in sisters in Christ and we must be united in our love for another as an example to the world. Avoid hate. 
   
2. Serve One Another and Follow the Example of Jesus (3:16-18): "Real love, God’s love, is shown as well as spoken. It is tangible and not theoretical."  Our love and service to others may mean for some dying - following Christ's example.  While most will not suffer this fate, we are still called to sacrifice and deny ourselves in service of others in the church. "If we really understand the magnitude of what has been done for us and the implications for eternity, we won’t feel obligated to show gratitude; we won’t be merely willing to be thankful; we will joyfully present our lives to God as a living sacrifice in grateful worship." We must not turn a blind eye to our brothers and sisters in the church who need help. See also James 2:15-17 as James seeks for us to have both faith and action - but done out of our heart and motivated out of love for Christ and what He has done for us.  
   

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My Prayer: Lord Jesus, YOU are love and You died for me, loving me while I was still hostile to You - thank You Jesus for Your love and sacrifice to me - I am of course not deserving of how You save but You nonetheless saved me and continue to pour out Your love for me.  Thank You Jesus.  Yet I am undeserving because my sin continues...daily.  Please forgive me Jesus and help me overcome and turn from my sin towards You.  Help me love You with all of my heart, soul, and mind and love others as You love me.  Help me grow in my faith.  Give Lisa and myself wisdom and strength.  Please heal Lisa of her cancer and from the side effects of chemo.  Help us lead Zach and Dustin to You Jesus and for them to choose You as their Lord and Savior.  Please provide Godly friends and spouses to Zach and Dustin.  Help me serve You, my family, my church, and others.  Help me understand, be obedient to, and apply Your message for me today and every day.

For this is the message that you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another.

1 John 3

For this is the message that you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. 1 John 3:11

I resume my study of 1,2,3 John using the Christ-Centered Exposition commentary series volume for these books.  Today, my focus is an unassisted review of 1 John 3:11-18. Here, John dives right into the second greatest commandment as given to us by Jesus - to love one another (see Matthew 22:34-40).  We are given the biblical negative example of Cain from Genesis 4, where Cain, driven by envy, killed his brother.  Then, in v13 we are told not to be surprised if the world hates us as believers - the world (those not children of God - children of God bear the image of God and follow/obey God) loves itself and created things first and not God first.  As such the world does not love as God loves and there is no Holy Spirit for the world - so of course the world will want to hate and persecute Christians.  But we as believers, per v14 we have life and this is marked by our love of God first then for others.  Hate - even in our heart - per v15 is murder itself and contrary to love and this is a marker of being of the world and a lover of the world vs God. A positive example of love is provided in v16 where we know love because of what Jesus did - he died for us! A negative example of love is provided in v17 where we see that we are not obeying God or abiding in Him if we see a brother or sister in Christ in need but we don't help them.  This commandment is carried over into v18 where John shares that we should not be seen as hypocrites by talking about love but not doing it - similar to a message in James 1. 

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My Prayer: Lord Jesus, I KNOW You laid down Your life for me and that You love me - and that You ask that we love You and love others.  Help me grow in my love for You and others - please help me with obedience to You.  I am grateful for the blessing of being a child of God but I need Your help - every day as my sin continues...daily.  Please forgive me Jesus and help me overcome and turn from my sin towards You.  Help me love You with all of my heart, soul, and mind and love others as You love me.  Help me grow in my faith.  Give Lisa and myself wisdom and strength.  Please heal Lisa of her cancer and from the side effects of chemo.  Help us lead Zach and Dustin to You Jesus and for them to choose You as their Lord and Savior.  Please provide Godly friends and spouses to Zach and Dustin.  Help me serve You, my family, my church, and others.  Help me understand, be obedient to, and apply Your message for me today and every day.     

Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness.

 1 John 2

Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness. 1 John 2:9

This morning, I continue my study of 1,2,3 John using the Christ-Centered Exposition commentary series volume for these books.  My study today focuses on an unassisted review of 1 John 2:3-11. 

V3: If we truly know him, we will follow Him and be obedient, not out of obligation but out of love for Him because as we more fully understand God and His attributes we know that He is Holy, good, true, just, loving, faithful, etc. It is also in response to what He has done for us and that we are all undeserving of the grace He pours out for us. See also 1 John 5:3.

V4: Similar to 1 John 1 where it is written how we cannot claim to be without sin and how if we do so, we make a liar out of Jesus, here it is written that if we truly know Him we cannot be seen to not follow Him or to be disobedient.  This would make us liars.  

V5: A healthy relationship with Jesus where we consistently (i.e. daily) study His word, pray, and seek Him, will result in sanctification where God's love is perfected in us and we become more like Him.  We will bear fruit.

V6: We are expected (ought) be obedient if we say we know Him; as we grow closer to Him more is expected of us as God makes us more like Him (see also Luke 12:48)

Vv7-11: We must not hate anyone - as this is murder.  We should instead love and seek to save all. If we hate we remain in darkness/sin.  See also 1 John 3:15.

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My Prayer: Lord Jesus, You are good, true, perfect, just, loving, etc. and You pour out grace and blessings for me every day that are overwhelming...I desire to be obedient - help me be who You intend for me Jesus! I need You to help me battle sin daily because I know my sin is great and it is daily.  Please forgive me Jesus for laziness, etc.  Help me overcome and turn from such sin towards You.  Help me love You with all of my heart, soul, and mind and love others as You love me.  Help me grow in my faith.  Give Lisa and myself wisdom and strength.  Please heal Lisa of her cancer and from the side effects of chemo.  Help us lead Zach and Dustin to You Jesus and for them to choose You as their Lord and Savior.  Please provide Godly friends and spouses to Zach and Dustin.  Help me serve You, my family, my church, and others.  Help me understand, be obedient to, and apply Your message for me today and every day.