The faith of fellowship, 1 John 5:1-5

My kids are some of my greatest critics.  If you have kids, then you know what I mean.  Especially now that they are older, they have heard all my old stories again and again.  And so now days, they never fail to let me know when I am repeating myself.  We are usually driving in the car or something like that,  having some sort of a discussion, and I start to launch into this story which I think illustrates the point, and they say something like, “Dad, you’ve told us this story before.”  And I say, “I have?” with this real disappointed tone to my voice.  And they say, “Yes, several times already.”  And of course I’m crestfallen.  But not always.  Sometimes, if I feel really indignant about the subject, I’ll tell them I’m going to tell it again anyway, because you need to hear it again.  After all, repetition, it is said, is the mother of all learning.  Or, as the famous pirate quote goes, “The beatings will continue until  the morale improves.”  I like that one.  So today some things may seem a bit repetitious, but its for your own good.

Now John is probably an old man when he is writing this epistle.  And if you have been following along in our studies, then you will realize that also John has a tendency to repeat himself.  But actually, John is deliberately repeating certain things over and over again. It’s part of his strategy.  His teaching style is to cycle back over certain truths again and again, but if you will notice, each time he seems to add a new nuance, or a new perspective to each cycle, so that you learn more and more as you go through this book about these essential doctrines.

The primary principle that I believe John is presenting in this book is that of Christian fellowship.  Fellowship is the goal of the Christian experience.  Fellowship with God, and fellowship with Christ’s body, which is the church.  Fellowship is the source of life, it’s the source of strength, it’s the source of love, and it’s the design of God for this new life in Christ.  

Today in our study, we are going to hear John bring up many of the same themes regarding fellowship that he has talked about before many times.  He talks about loving God, loving one another and keeping the commandments.  All of which are essential to  fellowship.  But in today’s message as he cycles back through these now familiar topics, he adds another dimension that has not been fleshed out to the degree we see here in this text.  And that new aspect of fellowship that he presents is faith.  So I’ve titled today’s message The Faith of Fellowship.  And as we examine this text, we are going to look at three aspects of faith, which are essential to our fellowship.  First we see the family of faith, then the fidelity of faith, and finally the triumph of faith.

Let’s look first then at the family of faith. John says in vs 1, “Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and whoever loves the Father loves the child born of Him.”  The ultimate fellowship that man can have is to have fellowship with God.  But Jesus said that God is Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and in truth.  The problem, according to the scriptures, is men and women are not alive spiritually.  We are dead spiritually.  We have a sin nature inherited from our forefathers, traceable back to Adam and Eve in the garden.  When they sinned against the word of God the punishment for that sin was that they would die, and their spirit died immediately.  Their body took a few years longer.  Sin brought about death, first spiritual, then physical.  And Adam passed on that sin nature to every human being born on this planet.  As a result, Romans 3:23 says, “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.”

But God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, Jesus Christ, to die on the cross to pay the penalty of our sins, that we might be restored and reconciled to God.  Thus John says that those who believe that Jesus is the Christ, that is the promised Messiah, our Savior, then that person is born of God.  That means that we who have faith in Christ have been born again, spiritually.  We now are now spiritual  like God, born into the family of God, and have the capacity to love God and worship God in spirit and in truth.

So if you would have fellowship with God, then it begins with faith in Christ.  You must be born again. You cannot belong to Him, you cannot have fellowship with Him, you cannot have spiritual life through Him unless you have been born of the Spirit of God into the family of God.

The question is, how are you born of God?  Well, John says in vs1, that it is by faith. By believing.  Paul teaches the same principle in Romans 1:17 saying, “The righteous man shall live by faith.” Faith, or believing in Christ, is the basis for receiving righteousness. Paul explains this further in Galatians 3:6-7 “Even so Abraham BELIEVED GOD, AND IT WAS RECKONED TO HIM AS RIGHTEOUSNESS.  Therefore, be sure that it is those who are of faith who are sons of Abraham.”  So there we see that faith and believing are the same thing, and that faith is the means of being granted the righteousness of Christ in exchange for our sins.

But let’s be clear.  What constitutes faith/believing in God?  Not just believing or hoping that He exists. The Bible says the devils believe and tremble, but they are not born again.  Faith is trusting in Him as your Savior and Lord. Faith is believing in the ministry and the message of Christ.  Jesus said, “I am the way the truth and the life, no man comes to the Father except through Me.” He was teaching not just three different aspects of His deity, but also He was teaching that these three aspects are synonymous; the way= the truth=the life.  And I will warn you, that if you start to tamper with the truth, then you do so at your own peril.  If you keep deleting ingredients from an antibiotic, soon you will be left with a placebo, and a placebo has no power to save.  Jesus’ gospel is the truth, about life, about God, about righteousness, and that truth is the way to reconciliation with God, it’s the way to life, abundant life, spiritual life, and eternal life.  Faith encompasses all of that truth as God has revealed in His word.

There is a word there which may need clarification,  Christ is the Greek translation which means Messiah.  You can see in vs 5 that John uses  Messiah interchangeably with  the Son of God. So the gospel is that Jesus is God, who became flesh, who suffered the penalty for sin upon the cross, who is risen and seated on the throne in heaven, and faith in Him and His work is the means of our righteousness, the means of spiritual life, the source of all truth.  All of that encompasses believing in Jesus as your Messiah, which is the means of being born again.

And one other word which we should clarify is the word faith. Hebrews 11:1 gives us the Biblical definition of faith; “Now Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” Faith is trusting in the truth; what God has promised concerning Himself and the life which He gives.  Faith is not mustering up some emotion, or a belief in something which isn’t true in order to make it true.  Faith is believing in what God has declared is truth. Jesus said, “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”  Natural man is spiritually dead.  Jesus is the truth that sets us free from the bondage of death, He is the truth that gives life.

If we skip ahead to vs11-13 we read about this life; “And the testimony is this, that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.  He who has the Son has the life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have the life.  These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life.”

So we are born again spiritually by faith in Christ to new life.  And now, having been born into the family of God, John says in vs 1 that we love God and love His children. This love for God and for one another should be a natural outcome of our new birth. Children automatically love their parents. They should automatically love their siblings as well.   So our love for God should be the result of our new life.  We love our heavenly Father, and we love those who are born of God, those who have the same Spirit as us. 

The question arises though, who are the family of God? John answers that in vs.2, “By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and observe His commandments.”  Simply stated then, the family of God are those that love God and observe His commandments.  This is how we recognize them.  They exhibit the character and nature of God.  If they say they love God, but they don’t exhibit the love of God towards others, and they don’t keep His commandments, then John tells us in 1 John chapter 1 that such men are liars.  They are not born of God.  But on a positive note, we know the family of God because they exhibit the nature and character of God dwelling in them.

Now there is also a love we are to have for those that are unsaved.  There is a love we are to have for our neighbors.  There is a love we are even to have for our enemies.  All of that love is predicated on the realization that they need to know the truth to be saved, and we can show God’s love for them so that they might know the love which God has for them.  The object or goal of our love is that they might be saved.  But there is a special familial love that we are to have for the brethren.  Those that are our brothers and sisters in the Lord are to have a special relationship with us.  These family members make up the body of Christ.  And how can we not show a special love for the body of Christ?  There should be a closeness and a fellowship which is deeper than even the family ties of the natural man.

So we can know the family of God, as those who love God and keep His commandments.  Jesus said in John 13:35  "By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”  

Now let’s move on to the second characteristic of faith, which is the fidelity of faith.  Fidelity means faithfulness, trustworthiness, integrity, loyalty.  We not only claim to believe, we not only claim saving faith, but we act in accordance to what we believe.  Fidelity is often used in relation to a husband and wife.  They keep their vows to one another.  They love one another with an exclusive devotion.  They love one another with a selfless, sacrificial love.  The Bible teaches that marriage between a husband and a wife is a picture of Christ and the church.  We submit to our husband, who is Christ.  We honor and obey Him. This fidelity of our faith is realized in the faithfulness of our love, to honor and obey Him.

Jesus said in John 14:15, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.”  And so John urges us in this text to be faithful in our love by keeping His commandments. Vs.3, “For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome.”  

This idea of submission and obeying has fallen out of favor in marriages today.  But in divine love, it remains true that if you love Him, you will obey Him, you will submit your will to do His will.  The divine love that God has intended for us is sacrificial love.  It’s the love of the will.  And we are to love one another as Christ loved us.  So we love with a sacrificial love, giving up our prerogatives so that we might do His will. 

Now though that may sound oppressive or burdensome to the modern ear, yet it should not be. If you love someone, you should want to honor them, to please them, to serve them.  It’s not a chore, it’s a labor of love.  It reminds me of the story of a young man many years ago,  long before the days when it was possible to get in your car and drive to school,  and he was often seen  carrying a little boy on his shoulder. And as one particular passerby noticed, the little boy that was being carried on his shoulder was lame. So he walked up to the young man who was carrying the lame boy and he said, "Do you carry him to school everyday?" And he said, "Yes sir, I carry him everyday." "Well that's a very heavy burden for you to carry," said the stranger. And the young man replied, "He's no a burden, he's my brother." His attitude illustrates what a difference love makes in carrying out the commandments of the Lord God.

And let me add, that HIs commandments are not a burden, because His commandments are for our benefit.  God has made it possible for us to have new life, spiritual life, eternal life, abundant life, through faith in His Son.  But He has also made a plan that we might know how we are  to live.  His commandments lead us in paths of righteousness.  HIs commandments prevent us from going off into dangerous territory.  His commandments are not meant to bind us up, but to free us to live a life that will be blessed.  As someone once said, God’s commandments are not a wall to restrict us, but a guardrail to protect us. They are for our benefit.  So then we  should not find His commandments burdensome.  If we love Him, we will want to please Him and we should realize His commandments are for our benefit.

Furthermore, Jesus has promised the Holy Spirit to be our  Helper, so that we might be able to keep His commandments.  When we have the Spirit of God working in us, He lightens the load and helps us.  Jesus said in  Matt. 11:28-30 "Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.  Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS.  For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”

On the contrary, when we go against His will, and disobey His commandments, we cause ourselves to be weighted down with sins, which come with consequences that can weigh heavily upon us.  So the fidelity of faith is our willingness to submit to God’s will, to keep His commandments as a testament of our love for God.

Finally, let’s look at the last characteristic of faith in this text, and that I call the triumph of faith.  Let’s read the text in vs 4, “For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith.”

I want you to notice something in this verse.  John says whatever is born of God.  Not whoever, but whatever.  Now what does He mean by whatever?  Well, he gives the answer at the end of the verse; our faith is the whatever.  So then we must understand that our faith is born of God. Now I don’t want to get mired down in some deep doctrinal issue here, but I do think it’s important to realize that God gives us faith to believe. Eph. 2:8 says “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God.”  Now you may argue that can speak of either salvation or faith being a gift, but I think that the Bible teaches both are true.  

For instance consider Heb. 12:2 “Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.”  He is the author of our faith, and the completion of our faith. So faith originates with God.

So what I think John is getting at,  is that the object of our faith is the important thing here.  Some people get focused on the size of faith, as if we somehow can muster up enough faith to accomplish some great miracle or something.  But the emphasis I think John is giving us is that it is the object of our faith, Jesus, is the victory that has overcome the world.  It is not the size of our faith.  Jesus said if we had as little of faith as the size of a tiny mustard seed then we could move mountains.  The point is not the size of our faith, but the object of our faith.  We can have faith in what God has promised and who Christ is.

And Jesus has promised in the gospel of John 16:33  "These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world.”  Listen, we have faith in God’s promises which are fulfilled in Christ.  Not in wishful thinking, not in hoping for some miracle of my own design, but our faith is in the written word of God.  We have faith in what Jesus has accomplished and  has promised to accomplish.  And He has overcome the world.

Please understand what is meant by the world.  The world is the world system. It is under the dominion of the prince of this world; Satan.  Though God created the world and all things in it, Satan has subjugated the world system to his plan, to sweep mankind along in the course of this world to their eventual destruction.  To trap mankind in the mire and muck of this world so that they miss the life giving truth of God.  

Paul speaks of this world system in Eph. 2:1-3 “And you were dead in your trespasses and sins,  in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience.  Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.” The course of this world then is the world system conspired by Satan to sweep mankind to destruction in their ignorance of the truth.

But thanks be to God, Christ has overcome the world.  He overcame sin.  He overcame the devil.  He overcame death.  He has overcome the world.  And our faith in Him overcomes the world as well. By faith in Him we can overcome the world system.  We can escape the trap of sin that leads to death.  Christ has come so that we might know the truth, and the truth would set us free.  So that we might have life and have it more abundantly. 

That leads us to vs5, which says because of Christ, we who are born of God can overcome the world as well.  “Who is the one who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?”  Listen, as children of God, as children of the King, we have been given all the weapons necessary to overcome the world.  We have been given the light of truth, we have been given the sword of the Lord, which is the word of God.  We have been made righteous, we have been given the helmet of salvation, and the shield of faith.  And through the Spirit of Christ working in us, we can be overcomers.  We can overcome the world.  I believe that means we can overcome the world system that is trying to trap our children.  We can overcome the world system that has trapped sinners in it’s web.  We can overcome through the blood of the Lamb.  

Listen, we were made to be overcomers.  The church is designed to overcome the world. The problem with the world system is that it is designed to look so enticing, that we feel we are missing out on all this fun stuff or exciting stuff that it offers.  But the benefit to overcome the world is so much the better.  The course of this world leads to death, but overcoming the world leads to life.

John wrote another book of the Bible, the book of Revelation.  And in the first 3 chapters of Revelation Jesus gives John messages for 7 churches, which encompass not only 7 actual, historical churches, but also all the churches of the ages until He comes back.  And in every one of those messages, Jesus says something about being an overcomer.  To the church at Ephesus Jesus said, “To him who overcomes, I will grant to eat of the tree of life which is in the Paradise of God.” To the church of Smyrna Jesus says, “He who overcomes will not be hurt by the second death.”  To the church of Pergamum Jesus says, “To him who overcomes, to him I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, and a new name written on the stone which no one knows but he who receives it.”  To the church of Thyatira, Jesus says, “He who overcomes, and he who keeps My deeds until the end, TO HIM I WILL GIVE AUTHORITY OVER THE NATIONS; AND HE SHALL RULE THEM WITH A ROD OF IRON, AS THE VESSELS OF THE POTTER ARE BROKEN TO PIECES, as I also have received authority from My Father; and I will give him the morning star.”  To the church of Sardis Jesus says, “He who overcomes will thus be clothed in white garments; and I will not erase his name from the book of life, and I will confess his name before My Father and before His angels.”  To the church of Philadelphia Jesus says, “He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he will not go out from it anymore; and I will write on him the name of My God, and the name of the city of My God, the new Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from My God, and My new name.”  And to the church of Laodecia Jesus says, “He who overcomes, I will grant to him to sit down with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne.”

Those are some wonderful promises, aren’t they?  The greatest treasures of this earth at best are only temporary and cannot compare to the reward God has planned for those who love Him and who overcome this world.  I pray that you by faith in Christ will be an overcomer.  I pray that if you have never been born again that you would receive the faith that overcomes this world.  That you would be given the righteousness of Christ and receive eternal life in Him.  And I pray for you that have been born of God, that you would overcome the world through the testimony of your faith, by sharing the truth of God with others.  I pray that you would find freedom from sin through your faith which overcomes the world.  

And I will close by saying this; we overcome the world through our faith, and our faith produces love.  Love is the way we will win the world to Christ.  Love God, obey His commandments, and love one another even as Christ has loved you.  Share the love of God towards sinners, that Christ has come to reconcile us to God, that we might be born of God, and have the everlasting life of God.

The manifestation of fellowship, 1 John 4:7-12

If you have been studying with us for the last few months as we have been going through the epistle of 1 John, you will know that the theme of this book is fellowship.  We were created for fellowship with God. Another way of saying that is we were made to be in union with God, to have communion with God.  We were created in God’s image, according to His likeness, that we might be, as it were, the bride of God.  That He would abide with us, and we would abide with Him.  But sin broke that bond of fellowship.  And without God as the source of life, we are spiritually dead, and condemned to eternal separation from God. 

But though we were separated from God, God still loved us.  So God sent Jesus to be our propitiation, which means our payment for sin, that we might be reconciled to God.  Trusting in Christ’s atonement for our sins is the basis for our salvation, and is the basis for our relationship, being restored to God.  But forgiveness is just the beginning.  The goal is that we would have fellowship with God, both now and forever.  Through Christ we are a new creation, and in this new creation we are remade in the likeness of God spiritually, able to have fellowship with Him, and one day we will be remade physically when we see Him, then we will be like Him completely and be with Him forever. 

So all through this letter, John has been teaching us the basics of fellowship.  He has told us how to have fellowship with God, how to be like God, and how to please God.  And John has taught us that true fellowship with God naturally results in love for God and love for one another.  Jesus said that is the foremost commandment; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.  And the second greatest commandment He said was like the first; you shall love your neighbor as yourself.  So if, we have fellowship with God, we will love God, and love one another.  

Now as the once popular song goes, love may be a many splendored thing, but it is also something that although very much desired, is very little understood.  Popular culture does it’s best to elevate love as the epitome of human experience through songs, movies and poetry.  By far, love is what most people desire the most.  But for many of us, love never quite measures up to our expectations.  It is an ideal which is rarely ever met.  

But even though the human ideal of love is a standard many fall short of, the apostles add insult to injury by saying that even if the ideal human love is experienced, it still falls short of God’s standard of love.  They reserved a different Greek word just for God’s standard of love, the word agape. It means a sacrificial love. Human love is often self serving, or at it’s best a give and take kind of love, but God’s standard of love is more noble.  It is the highest expression of love, the love of sacrificial giving, and that love is God’s design for us.  That we would have the kind of sacrificial love that God has for us.  True fellowship with God will produce this more noble love, in a love for Him and for one another, which is described by John in vs.12 as  perfect love.

Now as we look at this text, we are going to see that John has given us 10 principles of this perfect divine love, so that we might know what it is and how to employ it.  Ten principles of divine love that are the product of fellowship with God.  There is a little overlap in some of them, but that is the method that John uses to teach us.  He uses a certain cyclical method of teaching, which serves to add further details each time he references them again.  So bear with me as we go quickly through this list, and hopefully it will serve to teach us more fully how love looks from God’s view point. 

The first principle of love we see is in vs.7, is what I have called the mandate to love.  The mandate to love.  You know the New Testament is full of commandments.  A lot of people think that in the new covenant there are no commandments anymore.  We are just free people, we can do whatever we want, with no consequences, because we are under grace.  Paul said in Romans 6:2 that is an abuse of grace. How can we who have died to sin still live in it?  But though we are free from the penalty of sin by Christ’s propitiation, yet we still have commandments that we are to operate under.  And John makes it clear in this epistle that if we love God we will keep His commandments.  1John 5:3 “For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome.”

So as we begin this text, we see this commandment spelled out in vs. 7.  “Beloved, let us love one another.”  John says it in a nice way, by calling us beloved.  But don’t be fooled by his kindness.  This is not a suggestion, but a command.  For instance, in 1John 3:11 he says “For this is the message which you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another.” And in 1John 3:23 he states it even more clearly:  “This is His commandment, that we believe in the name of His Son Jesus Christ, and love one another, just as He commanded us.”  Twice in the same verse John says it’s a command.

Now that’s the mandate, the law, the commandment.  Next John is going to show us where this kind of love we are supposed to exhibit comes from.  The second principle then is the origin of love.  Where does one get this kind of divine love which we are supposed to show?  It’s not a natural, human love.  It’s another level of love than what we often think of, when we think of love.  So we need to know where it comes from.  Well, vs 7 again, tells us the origin of love;  love is from God.  “1John 4:7 “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.”  

Skipping ahead a little bit, in vs19, we read, “We love, because He first loved us.”  God is the originator of love.  God loved us before the world was created.  And He formed us out of that love, and formed us for love with Him.  God desired fellowship with someone who would love Him in return.  And so He created man in His likeness, in His image, that He might have fellowship and communion with us.  God created in us that capacity to love, that desire for love, that we might find love’s fulfillment in Him.  That innate desire for love in us can only find fulfillment in Him.

Some of you might be familiar with the Westminster Shorter Catechism, which asks a series of questions.  And the first question speaks to this purpose of man.  The question is; What is the chief end of man? And the answer; Man's chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever. Our life finds it’s fulfillment in love, which is the chief end of fellowship with God.

So God is the origin of love. Thirdly, that leads us to the fellowship of love.  Now I have already alluded to the relationship between fellowship and love again and again in previous messages.  But I want to expand upon it today this way; we can only have that fellowship of love if we are born of God.  That is how we come to know God on an intimate level.  Vs 7 again, “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.”   

Listen, you cannot love God until you are born of God.  You cannot know God until you are born of God.  Jesus told Nicodemus who came to Him to enquire about God, Jesus said, “You must be born again.”  Your spirit must be born again.  When God created man, He made him in HIs image.  God exists in three persons; the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  So He made man, spirit, soul and body.  But when man sinned, his spirit died, and God’s order was overturned.  The flesh now ruled over man’s soul.  And his spirit; that part of man that was designed for fellowship with God was dead in his sins. So man is born the first time carnal, and he must be born again the second time so that he becomes spiritual.  So when we are born again by faith in Christ’s propitiation, God gives new life to our spirit.  Furthermore, His Spirit dwells with our spirit, and through this regeneration, God’s order is restored.  This new man is now ruled by the Spirit, which governs his soul, and subjugates the flesh.  Therefore, if you would know God intimately, if you would love like He loves, then you must be born again.  In your present carnal nature it is impossible to please God.  You must be born again by the Spirit of God, so that you die to your old nature of the flesh, and your mind, or soul, is regenerated and renewed.  Only in that spiritual capacity can we love as God loves. 

Fourthly, John tells us that natural kind of love falls short of God’s love. In vs.8, he gives us the antithesis of love. “The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.”  Here is the evidence of being born again, the evidence of truly knowing God intimately, we will love like God loves.  And negatively, John says the one who does not love with this divine love, does not know God.  

So many people place their confidence in heaven on the basis of things other than what God says is necessary.  Some think they know God because they belong to a particular church.  Some think it’s because they have participated in some rite or ceremony.  Some place their confidence in some experience that they had.  Some think that God will accept them because they are sincere in their efforts.  Or because they are good people.  But God says that the evidence of whether or not you are born again is you will love like God loves.

The fifth principle John gives us is the standard of love.  What is that standard, you may ask?  Vs.8 says, God is love.  Love is an attribute of the essence of God, that He is love.  But we must be careful with this verse.  John does not say that God is only love.  Furthermore, you cannot say this verse in reverse.  It is not true to say love is God.  God cannot be defined by one word.  When Moses approached the burning bush, God told him to take off his sandals because the ground he was standing on was holy ground.  And shortly thereafter, Moses asked God His name.  But if you remember, God would not give His name.  A name in Moses’ culture was a means of defining you.  Moses was trying to put God in a box, by calling Him a name which would limit Him and thereby he might manipulate God.  But God said, “I Am.”  That is who God is.  He is the great “I Am.”  And as we examine God’s word by which He describes His nature and His characteristics, we see many attributes which are the nature of God; He is holy.  He is righteous.  He is just.  He is merciful.  He is Spirit.  He is light.  He is love.  And we could go on with that list.  But I want to make the point that God is love.  But He is not only love.  But His love is compatible with all His other attributes without contradiction.

In fact, all those attributes of God’s nature, His holiness, His righteousness, HIs justice, His mercy, even His judgment, were revealed in His great act of love, which was to send His Son to be our propitiation for sin, by dying on Calvary’s cross.  We see all those characteristics revealed in God giving Christ for our sakes.  Vs.9, “By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him.” This is the standard of love; that God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)  This is supernatural love.  This is giving,  sacrificial love.  This is love most noble, most divine.  And this love is the standard for our love.  The standard was that God loved us when we were unloveable.  When we were not lovely.  He loved us when we were yet sinners.  He loved us when we were in rebellion.  This is love, and this is the standard for love.

That brings us to the 6th principle, the life of love. Notice how the last phrase of vs.9 corresponds to the last phrase of John 3:16.  Vs.9 says, “ so that we might live through Him.”  And John 3:16 says, “whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  When we read the fairy tales they always end with “and they lived happily ever after.”  We grow up hoping that will be the case when we find love.  But as the divorce rate indicates, most of us don’t find that to be true.  

But God’s love is perfect.  God’s love is the real deal.  When we love God, then God gives us not only joy and peace and blessings in this life, but He gives us eternal life, where we will forever be with the Lord. Jesus said we should comfort one another with those words.  We will be forever with the Lord.  There will never be separation.  In this life, even if you have the best marriage you could ever hope for, one day there will be a separation.  But in our marriage with Christ, we will be with Him forever.  He will never leave us nor forsake us.  He will love us till the end, to the uttermost.

But there is another implication in this 6th point, the life of love. And that is we can only live this life of love through Him.  Notice what John says in vs. 9, “By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him.  His love was revealed to us, and manifested in us, that we might live out this love through Him.  Once again this reiterates the fact that we must be born again, so that He might live in us, and live through us by His Spirit.  In our flesh we cannot love like God, but through His Spirit in us, we can love like God loved us, sacrificially loving one another.

So on to principle  #7, we come to the definition of love.  Let’s read vs.10, “In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”  What John is saying, is that love is not defined by us, but it is defined by God.  This is tremendously important in today’s culture that wants to redefine everything.  One of the most popular statements today in modern culture is “love is love.” We think we can define love any way we want.  Well I got news for you.  The Bible says God is love.  And love is defined by God sending Jesus to die for our sins.  

Isaiah 53 says, “But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, And by His scourging we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray, Each of us has turned to his own way; But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all To fall on Him. ...  But the LORD was pleased To crush Him, putting Him to grief; If He would render Himself as a guilt offering, (that’s propitiation!) As a result of the anguish of His soul, He will see it and be satisfied; By His knowledge the Righteous One, My Servant, will justify the many, As He will bear their iniquities.”

O ladies and gentlemen! That doesn’t sound like “if it feels good do it”, does it?  That doesn’t sound like it’s my body, my choice.  It’s my life.  No, He bore our sins on the cross so that we might be reconciled to God.  That is the definition of divine love, and that is the love which we are required to exhibit towards one another.  Listen, those ridiculously high divorce rates which we spoke of earlier; those are true for Christians as well.  Christians have just as high a divorce rate as the world.  And yet if we would just learn to love as Christ loved the church and gave His life for her, then we could bring that divorce rate down to single digits in no time.  Try loving your wife like Christ loved you.  Try loving your husband as Christ loved you.  It will change your marriage.  And beyond marriage, try loving that rebellious teenager like Christ loved you.  Try loving that hateful coworker the way Christ loved you. Try loving a stranger like Christ loved you.  And I will guarantee that if we practiced sacrificial agape love for one another, we could change the world.

That leads us to number 8, the product of love.  Look at vs.11, “Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”  If God loved us when we were yet sinners, when we were hateful, when we were unlawful, rebellious, ungrateful, if He loved us when we were like that, then we ought to love one another, not because they deserve it, not because we are attracted to them, not because we can get something out of that relationship, but because God loved us when we were unloving, and we show our love for God by loving one another.  

Eph. 5:1-2 says “Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children;  and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.” Paul says our agape love for others is a way of offering sacrifices to God.  Ephesians 5 is the passage that I often use when I preach at weddings.  And the key point that Paul makes when he tells us to love someone is that he says we are to do it “as unto the Lord.”  That’s the key to a successful love relationship.  Love one another as unto the Lord.  

Whenever I counsel married couples I always use the illustration of a triangle. Every human relationship is like a triangle. The two people in the relationship are at the base of the triangle, and God is at the top. As the two people draw closer to the top of the triangle, closer to God, they will also draw closer to one another.  The triangle is a very strong engineering concept.  That’s why it is used to support roofs or trusses.  But a flat line is the weakest engineering principle.  A marriage without Christ in the center is like a flat line.  It cannot stand much pressure or stress without cracking,  But weak relationships are made strong when both people draw close to the Lord!

The ninth principle is the manifestation of love.  Look at vs.12, “No one has seen God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us.”  Jesus said “God is Spirit.” He is unseen. No man has seen God the Father at any time.  What man has seen was Jesus Christ who was the manifestation of God.  Jesus told Philip in John 14:9, “If you have seen Me, you have seen the Father.”  

But if the Spirit of God abides in us, if we have fellowship with God, if we have the love of God, then John says that the world will see Christ in us.  That is the manifestation of love.  When we show that kind of divine, unnatural, sacrificial, noble love of God towards one another, then the world sees Christ in us.  I have said it many times before, there is no greater testimony than the testimony of a transformed life.  We can have our entire car covered with Christian stickers, we can carry a Bible as big as a suitcase, we can put Christian memes all over our Facebook page, but nothing will cause your friends to see Christ more than seeing you love like Christ loves us.  Our love makes the invisible God visible to a watching world. Jesus said in John 13:35 "By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another."

And when we do that, then we achieve the 10th principle; we have the perfection of love. Don’t get defensive over this word “perfected” that John uses.  The word translated perfect is from the Greek word teleioō.  It comes from the same root word as the word Christ cried out from the cross; “tetelestai!”  It is finished!  He completed His mission, He completed His work which He came to earth to do, to be the propitiation for our sins.

So this word perfected is better rendered completed.  Now what does that mean in this context?  Let’s read vs.12 again; “No one has seen God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us.”  What he simply means is that when we love one another we have fellowship with one another.  And when we love one another, He abides in us, that is we have fellowship with God.  And when we love one another, HIs love is completed in us.  That means that we complete the cycle.  God loves us, then we love one another.  We complete the cycle of God’s love when we love one another as God loves us.  That’s perfect love, when we love others as Christ loved us. We complete love’s purpose.

Listen, let me remind you in closing of the first principle again.  Let us love one another.  It’s a mandate, not a suggestion.  Let’s ask God to help us do it.  God has given us of His Spirit that we might have the encouragement and strength of God, and the leading of God, the conviction of the Holy Spirit to help us to love one another.  Let us love one another.  

But let me also remind you that you cannot do this in your natural flesh.  You must be born again. You must receive the love of God to love like God.  You must be born of God to be able to love like God loves.  That salvation has already been paid for through the atonement of Christ, but you must receive it.  You must confess that you are a sinner in need of being forgiven, in need of transformation.  And when you accept by faith Christ’s propitiation for your sins, you receive new life through His Spirit.  So now you can be the person that God designed you to be.  But first you must be born again.  If you are here today and you cannot say for certain that you have been born again by the Spirit of God, then I urge you to trust Christ for your salvation today.  Call on Him right now, ask Him for forgiveness, receive Him as your Lord and Savior, and be born again.  Christ came for this purpose, to reconcile you to God. That you might have fellowship with God forever.   Today is the acceptable day of salvation. 

The perfection of fellowship, 1 John 4:13-21

Jesus said in John 14:6, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.”  And essentially what that means is that the gospel of Jesus Christ is the truth of life.  It is the source of life, and it’s the way of life.  Belief in Christ’s gospel gives us life, and it teaches us how to live.  You cannot truly live unless you have accepted this gospel as truth, and trusted in Christ as your Savior.  Without that new life, the gospel teaches us that you are essentially dead in your sins.  

Now a lot of people are attracted to religion for a variety of reasons.  Far too many reasons to speculate on today.  But John tells us in chapter 4 verse 1 that not everyone that claims Christianity is of the truth. He says there are many false spirits, deceiving spirits that have gone out into the world.  So we are to test the spirits to see if they are from God. But John is writing this epistle primarily to people who are already supposed to have this new life in Christ.  They are supposed to be born again, to be saved, to have become followers of the truth of Christ.  They already have received the source of life that faith in the gospel provides. 

So John isn’t primarily writing to people who are  unsaved, to those who are still dead spiritually, but he is writing to people who have received this new life, and he is writing to make sure that they know the way to live.  You understand the distinction?  He’s not primarily teaching people how to become born again, how to have new life, (though the truths of salvation are evident in this epistle) but he is teaching believers how to live this new life.  

And the major principle that John has been teaching is that if you are truly made alive in Christ, you are a new creation, then that new life will be characterized by fellowship with God.  I believe that practically everything that John is presenting here in this book can be characterized as an aspect of fellowship.  Fellowship is essential to this new life.  This life cannot be lived as God designed it to be lived without fellowship.  Now if you want to investigate this further, I would suggest that you go on our website and read some of the past sermons in 1John, and hopefully you will learn all the principles of fellowship and the benefits and blessings of it.

But as an introduction to today’s message, let me revisit one important principle of fellowship that John has stressed  again and again.  And that is that fellowship with God will produce love for God.  The natural result of fellowship is love for God. You can illustrate that principle by looking at a couple that is dating.  The more they hang out together, the more they learn about one another, the more they know the other person, the more they begin to love that person.  So in like manner, fellowship is communing with God.  Fellowship is spending time with God.  John likes to use another word to indicate fellowship, and that is the word “abide.”  To spend time with someone to the point that you never leave.  And of course, in human love, that’s when the couple get married.  They become one.  They abide with one another.  And their happiness and contentment comes from that abiding, or that fellowship. And  that is the goal of  our fellowship with God.  That we would become one with God, that we have HIs Spirit abide  in us, and we are in Him, that we communicate with Him through His word and through prayer, and the more we know Him the more we love Him, and the more we love Him the more we want to please Him.  So the principle is that fellowship results in love.

The problem when we start talking about love is that the world’s concept of love falls far short of God’s definition of love.  There is a tendency in the church today and in music and in teaching to present the word “love” as a euphemism for God.  You hear this in contemporary Christian songs quite a bit, they talk about love coming down, or something to that effect, instead of using the name of Jesus.  But the Bible never presents God and love as being synonymous.  The Bible teaches that love is an attribute of God, it is defined by God, but God is not solely defined by love.  And to attempt to reduce God to a one word description  is to slight the name and character of God.

However,  the possible basis for this misappropriation of God’s character is found right here in this chapter.  Twice in this chapter it says “God is love.” Vs.8 and vs16.  These are the only two places in the Bible where you find this statement in these exact words. But we need to understand that this statement does not limit God’s character to this one dimension.  But rather John is just expounding this dimension of God’s nature, not excluding other essential attributes of God like He is holy, He is righteous, He is just, He is omnipotent, He is sovereign, He is light, He is Spirit, He is truth, He is light, and He is life.  

But let me explain this attribute of God is love by saying that what John is teaching through this phrase“God is love”, is he is giving us a synopsis of the gospel.  It is the gospel in shorthand.  He isn’t talking about some sort of affectionate feeling  from God.  In fact, John himself interprets this statement for us in vs.10 which says, "Here is love, not that we loved God but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." To say that God is love is to say that he sent the Lord Jesus Christ to be the propitiation for our sins. That's the apostle's definition of divine love.

Now to take that a step further, to fully comprehend “God is love” you must also understand what God hates.  God hates sin.  Sin is antiGod.  In that it is the opposite of God’s nature and God’s intention and design in creation. Sin is death, God is life. Sin put the curse of death upon God’s creation.  And  God hates sin so much that He sent Jesus His Son to die on a cruel, horrible cross; beaten with a whip to within an inch of death, His head lacerated by a crown of thorns, HIs hands and feet pierced through with great iron nails.  God put your sins and mine on Christ and let Him hang there naked and bleeding and hardly able to breathe and watched Him writhe in agony and torment and called it “love.”  Now that is what “God is love” means.  

Furthermore, God is love speaks of divine love.  Not romantic love, not sentimental love, not sexual love - that’s how man speaks of love -  but the love of God  sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. That divine sacrificial love is the type of love that God desires for us to have in this new life.  And as a spiritual new creation, if we truly have the life of God, then we have been given the capacity to love like God loved us.  And God wants us to love like He loves so that our fellowship may be complete.  That’s the title of my message today; the perfection of fellowship, or the completion of fellowship.  John uses the word perfection, or perfected four times, which in every case might be interpreted as complete.  God’s design for us is that we might have our fellowship, our love, completed.  

Now John gives us a few principles which will help us to see how that is accomplished.  How we can have complete fellowship with God.  First fellowship is completed through the Spirit of God abiding in us.  Vs. 13 says, “By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit.”  Remember, John started this chapter by saying that we should test the spirits to see if they are from God, because not all are. So you test the spirits how?  How do you test to see if a spirit is from God?  Well, the answer is that you test the spirits by the word of God.  Because the Holy Spirit is the author of scripture.  

Peter said in 2Peter 1:21 “for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.”  So scripture is authored by the Holy Spirit, and since God cannot deny Himself, we can verify the spirits by the word of God. That’s the primary job of the Holy Spirit; to teach us through the word of God.  Jesus said that “He will lead you and guide you into all truth.”  

When you are born again, you are born by the Spirit of God.  The Spirit lives in you.  He abides in you, and you know this John says, because He has given us of His Spirit.  That simply means that our spirit is reborn with God’s Spirit, so that our spirit has life, it has the interior witness of God’s truth as we read His word.  We know that God is speaking to us.  We are able to come to know God, to have communion with God.  The Spirit of God in us is the foundation of our fellowship.  He indwells us, so that we have communion with God.  This is the first and foundational step of perfect fellowship with God.  We must be born again by His Spirit and His Spirit must live in us. 

Listen, don’t be deceived here by false spirits.  Being born again by the Holy Spirit is not some supernatural or emotional  or ecstatic experience by which we think we have come to know God.  Being born again comes through faith; through believing in the truth of Christ’s propitiation for our sins.  When we come to God as a sinner, and confess our sins, and call upon Christ to forgive us our sins and make us a new creation, to give us a new heart, then God answers that prayer and transfers our sins to Christ, and gives Christ’s righteousness to us, and once we are made holy and righteous He gives us a new spirit and the indwelling of His Spirit, so that we might be the children of God.  We cannot have complete fellowship until we have the Spirit of God abiding in us.

So the Spirit in us is the internal witness to our fellowship.  But there is an external witness as well which is closely correlated.  We have already introduced it; it is the gospel of Christ, the word of God, which is the testimony of the apostles.   Look at vs.14 “We have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.”  John is speaking of the testimony of his fellow apostles.  The apostles doctrine is the foundation of the church according to Ephesians chapter 2.  So there is an external witness to our fellowship, and that is that we hold to the testimony of the apostles to Jesus being the Savior of the world. 

We confess, we agree with the gospel as recorded by the apostles.  His word abides in us, and that is evidence that He abides in us. Look at vs.15, “Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.”  To confess means to agree with.  So that’s the completion or perfection of fellowship.  We have the Spirit of God in us through salvation, we confess, that is agree with that testimony of the apostles, and  the word of God confirms that we have God abiding in us and that we abide with God. 

Listen, God is love means God is truth.  Love comes from faith, and Rom 10:17 says that “faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.”  And if there is not this relationship of faith, belief in the word of God, there cannot be the life of God and there cannot be the fellowship with God and there cannot be the love of God. So faith in God’s word confirms God abiding in us.  As you read and study HIs word, the Spirit confirms your faith.

John states this principle succinctly in vs.16 once more; “We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.”  Now that is the perfection of fellowship.  We have come to know the love of God because we have believed in the gospel by faith. As a result we have the abiding Spirit of God in us. And we abide in Him through obeying or abiding in His word.

This is how our love or our fellowship is perfected.  We have faith in His gospel, we have His Spirit abide in us, and we abide in Him through obedience to His word.  That is the perfection of fellowship says John in vs.17, “By this, love is perfected with us…” By this faith in the gospel, by this indwelling Spirit of God given to us as a result of our faith, and by our faith and obedience to His word.  By this love is perfected within us.  Now as a result of this love, this fellowship completed, John gives us three benefits or  blessings of this perfect fellowship which are described in vs17 and 18, “By this, love is perfected with us, so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment; because as He is, so also are we in this world. 18 There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love.”

The first benefit is that of no fear of judgment. Because we have this fellowship with God through  the inner testimony of the Spirit and the external witness of the Word, we have confidence concerning the judgment that is coming upon the world.  We know we have nothing to fear when Jesus comes back because we love Him and He loves us, we are His bride and He is our bridegroom.  The rest of the world will mourn that they rejected Christ as their Savior, but we will rejoice as a bride rejoices to see her husband. 

Further, John says we have confidence because as He is, so also are we in this world.  We have confidence that we are as He is because we keep His word.  Because we keep His commandments.  Listen, if we disobey His commandments then we have reason to fear.  But if we truly love God, then we want to please God, and Jesus said if you love Me you will keep My commandments.  So if we are keeping His commandments then we have no reason to fear.  As He was a light to the world, so are we lights to the world.  As He did the Father’s will, so we do the Father’s will.  As He kept the Father’s word, so we keep the Father’s word.  As He ministered in the power and strength of the Holy Spirit, so we minister in the power of the Holy Spirit.  And we are able to keep His commandments because we have His Spirit abiding in us.  Jesus is not just our Savior, but He is our example for how to live as God would have us live.  He is our pattern as Peter tells us in 1Peter 2:21 “For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps.” So as He is, so are we in this world.

The third benefit is that we have no fear of punishment.  We have no fear of punishment because we have the love of God perfected in us.  When the love of God is completed in us, when we love God as we are loved, then we have confidence in judgment, because there can be no punishment for those who have been forgiven.  Now I want to make a distinction between punishment and discipline.  The author of Hebrews tells us that if God loves us, He will also discipline us.  Heb. 12:6-7 “FOR THOSE WHOM THE LORD LOVES HE DISCIPLINES, AND HE SCOURGES EVERY SON WHOM HE RECEIVES."  It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline?”  So discipline is a necessary part of being a child of God, so that we might learn to walk as Christ walked.

But John isn’t taking about discipline here, he is talking about eternal punishment. The word punishment could also be translated as torment, as in eternal torment.  I was speaking with a man in prison the other day, and during his incarceration he has become very knowledgeable about the law.  And in the law is a principle called double jeopardy, which prevents a person being tried or punished twice for the same offense.  I was telling this man that God has placed his punishment on Jesus.  Christ has paid the penalty for our punishment.  God being just and holy cannot punish twice for the same offense.  So that is what John is getting at.  We need not fear that God will punish us in eternal torment because God is love means that God has already punished Jesus for our crimes against Him.

Now there is one more point John makes concerning this completed fellowship, or the perfect love.  And that is what we might call the expression of perfected love. The expression of love. In other words, the love of God does not stop with us.  It is designed to flow through us, to be given out again to one another.  Love is not just self directed, it is not selfish, love is self less.  Love isn’t completed when it finds me, but when I love another as God loves me.  

John declares this great principle in vs 19 “We love, because He first loved us.”  Now this statement is so simple yet it is so profound.  There are two major principles that are incorporated in this little statement.  First is that our love for God is predicated on His love first finding us.  As I said at the beginning, we cannot come to love God, to have fellowship with God without first coming to know the love of God towards us. That is the basis for our relationship. We have to first come to believe in God’s love for us that He sent His only Son into the world to save sinners by dying on the cross for our sins.  That is how we are saved and how we are given the capacity to love.  

But there is another application of this principle as well.  Not that we are loved, but that we love others because He first loved us.  Because we have the love of God in us, we are able to love like God loves.  We are to love one another as we love God.  There are two commandments Jesus said that are the foremost commandments of God.  All the law could be contained in these two,  which we read from Mark 12:30-31 “AND YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH.' The second is this, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' There is no other commandment greater than these.”  So we are to love God and love one another in fulfillment or completion of the love of God towards us.

Now John illustrates these two commandments in the following verses.  First, the commandment of loving God, John says, cannot be completed if you do not love others.  Vs. 20,  “If someone says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.”  

John doesn’t give us an easy out.  If we say we love God, but don’t love our brother, then we are a liar.  We don’t really love God.  Because if we have the love of God, then we share the nature of God, and God’s nature is to love.  And he gives us only two options; you either love your brother or you hate him.  You are either one way or the other.  You either exhibit the nature of God or you do not.  We tend to measure our Christianity by degrees.  “I may not be perfect, but I’m better than this guy, and I’m not so bad as that guy.”  But God measures our Christianity by Christ.  He is perfect, so we are to be perfect. Peter said it this way in 1Peter 1:15-16 “but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; because it is written, "YOU SHALL BE HOLY, FOR I AM HOLY.”  We either love our brother or our Christianity is a lie.  That’s the options John gives us.

And the last illustration of this love of God, which is the love we are to have, is simply restating the commandment in vs.21, “And this commandment we have from Him, that the one who loves God should love his brother also.”   I said last time that this is a mandate, it’s not a suggestion.  Jesus said in John 14:15  "If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.” And His commandment is exactly what John has just said; the one who loves God should love his brother also.   Our love for God is evidenced by our love for one another.  We love others not because they are lovable, not because they are loving towards us, not because they deserve it, but we love them because God first loved us even when we were sinners, even when we were in rebellion against God.  So in like manner we love others in order to manifest the love of God towards them.  God uses His people to reveal His love to people.  It’s that simple.  

If we love God then we will love the things God loves. We love God enough to love those that God loves.  And when we exhibit this kind of love, then the circle of fellowship is complete.  There is so much talk today about how much God loves me.  And He does.  Thank God for His love for me.  But I don’t reciprocate that love by just singing it back to Him.  Or  by saying it back to Him.  We reciprocate God’s love by being obedient, and if we are obeying Him, then we will love one another because that is His commandment to the church. This is the template for fellowship.  This is the way of life which God has designed for us to live.  This is the way to fulfillment, to joy and contentment.  Love one another, even as God loved us, giving up His life for us, revealing God’s truth to us, that we might have life in Him and fellowship with Him.  

I cannot help but wonder if today there is someone here who does not know the love of God.  You cannot say you have fellowship with God.  You cannot say that you have the abiding presence of His Spirit within you.  But perhaps today the Holy Spirit has convicted you of your need for forgiveness, your need for new life.  I am here to proclaim to you today the good news.  God sent Jesus to take the punishment for your sins, so that by faith in Jesus Christ, you might be born again by His Spirit, that you might come to know the truth, and that the truth would make you free.  Jesus has paid the price for your salvation, all that remains is for you to recognize that you are a sinner and that Christ has paid your penalty, and by faith in Him as your Savior you can receive eternal life right now.  Call on Jesus today, and He will save you.  Today is the acceptable day of salvation.  Let’s pray.