Will you turn with me in your Bibles to the portion of scripture advertised on the service sheet, 1 John chapter 4, verses 7 through 19. I'm going to be reading from the English Standard Version, which differs slightly but significantly in a number of places from the New International Version, which you have before you in all probability. 1 John chapter 4, verses 7 through 19. Let us hear the word of God. Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God. And whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this, the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, If God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God. If we love one another, God abides in us, and his love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God. And God abides in him. 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. There is no fear in love. But perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment. And whoever fears has not been perfected in love. We love because he first loved us. Amen. May God bless to us what can only be his word. There's so much talk about love today, isn't there? Well, so it seems. Perhaps there's nothing new in that. And in society at large, the word can stand for something valuable, but on other occasions and given other uses, it can mean not that much. It's been a major theme in the church for some time. It's as if John didn't write, God is love, but love is God. As far as so much of the emphasis in recent Protestantism speaking generally is concerned, the fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man. God loves everyone. There's another dangerous version of this idea of love being prevalent and all-embracing, which is contemporary and likely to become more influential and potent in the days to come. It relates to the way in which this subject of love is regarded as providing a bridge between Islam and the Roman Catholic Church initially and now, of course, Christian churches as well. There's a website with a lot of information on this discussion that has begun and is proceeding between Islam and Rome under the heading of The Common Word. And the common word, of course, is the word love. This is what allegedly provides the foundation for Islam and Christianity to begin to speak more respectfully of each other, to begin to associate with each other, and who knows from there on. The common word. And attention is focused on the two great commands common to Islam and Christianity. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, soul, mind and strength, and thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. And so it's likely given the climate, the religious climate, the pluralistic climate of our time, That this is something which is likely to grow, and we need to be aware of it and alert to it. But not concede that though love may be a common word, a common love undergirds these religions and provides a foundation for the whole of humanity. The portion of scripture that we've read together makes it perfectly clear that love is something distinctive and special and unique. This is John's concern to describe it from various angles and that's why the word beloved rather than the rather innocuous expression dear friends which you have in the NIV. This term, beloved, that John uses a number of times in these two chapters, three and four, of his first epistle, is intended to convey the fact that those he's writing to are loved with a special love, a unique love. And they are to love others with that unique love. The two great commands, that terminologically anyway may be common to Islam and Christianity, They need to be supplemented. They need to be clarified, strengthened by the well-known New Testament expression, As I have loved you. Words of the Lord Jesus Christ. Which introduce an altogether different dimension. Bringing out what is innate in those two commands that are Old Testament and then in the Gospels. Now they're in the light of his coming, his living, his dying, rising, ascending, interceding and reigning. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, soul, mind and strength as Jesus did. Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself as Jesus did. Love one another as I have loved you. And there are several distinctive things that John has to say. Let me mention them to you very quickly. He says, as you know here twice, verses 8 and 16, God is love, not love is God. God is love. And he doesn't leave it merely with that generic designation, God. He talks about the Father having sent his Son. He talks about the Spirit. The God who is love is the God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Love therefore isn't a principle, it isn't a moral virtue, or it isn't a shape. Have you looked at that Arabic script, so picturesque? It isn't a colour like the mosaic that you'll see in a mosque. Love is relational, and there would be no love for you and me to know to share if there were not a trinity. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Each having the other to love. Each being loved by the other. That's why there is such a thing as love at all. The other is necessarily included, you see, by definition. And that wouldn't happen if God were a monad, if he were not Trinitarian. And then another thing is that there is much more in this passage that we've read about loving than love. John has much more to say with reference to something active, something dynamic, changing, transforming. Sure, he uses the noun love, but it's in connection with the loving, God-loving sinners, dead sinners. The Father sent the Son so that we might live through him. Christ loving and the Spirit loving. Producing love. Believers, brothers, a community of the beloved. Love isn't just an idea. It isn't even just a power. It isn't even just a doctrine. It's truth. That's powerful. Well, if that's the case, if God has shown and demonstrated His love to us so that we believe in His Son in whom He has revealed Himself and find that there are others that do the same and we love each other and love the one who first loved us, well here is perfection here is something quite rare something unique here is a community of people who are caught up with caught up by God in Christ by the power and ministry of the Holy Spirit here is a perfect world and even as I say it you are saying no it isn't I agree with you of course why am I making that point for this reason that in spite of all these wonderful things that John the apostle, apostle of love as he's been called has to say about the love of God he envisages a possibility among the beloved among those who do know that the father has sent his son who do believe it, who do confess it as we've confessed it and who love those who love him. If you want a text, my text is verses 17 and 18 of this portion of scripture. Let me read them to you again. By this is love perfected with us. It's a reality. It exists. It's known. It's shared by us. Toward each other, is it perfected? John makes this distinction. 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. There is no fear in love, But perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment. And note these words. Whoever fears has not been perfected in love. Whoever fears has not been perfected in love. What is this condition of imperfection? Clearly, it's not to do with God. He's talking about love perfected with us. This is where things need to be perfected, not there. What is this kind of imperfection? We'll look at verse 12 of this fourth chapter, and we have some idea. We're given some idea, rather. No one has ever seen God. if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. If we love one another, in our loving of one another, God's dwelling within us, among us, is demonstrated and his love is perfected in us by our loving one another. What does that mean? Well, it means something like this, doesn't it? That it's brought to its end, its intended end. It has produced its desire. The aim that God has, part of it, the aim that God has in loving you and me is that we should love one another. And when we love one another, the reality of his love is demonstrated and it reaches its intended goal and end. James, you remember, talked about patient endurance in this sort of way. Let patience or let endurance have its perfect work, that you may be perfect, wanting nothing. That is, endurance is tough going, but it has a beneficial result and consequence. What? We become stronger, more consistent, more balanced, wiser. So love, love has a purpose. Love has a desire. It doesn't merely have an object. Of course it has an object. You know, if someone were to say to you, I love, and you were to say, well, who do you love or what do you love? And they couldn't answer the question. What would you deduce? They don't know much about love. In exactly the same way, if somebody says, I believe. What do you believe? Don't know. Don't know anything about faith. Love has an object, but it also has a purpose. it also has a name doesn't it we know that what is love like love is like two extended arms with a gap in the middle it's it looks for fulfillment it looks for response it sees it seeks to be productive that's why this statement we love because he first loved us his priority in loving us is productive in all our loving it's not that we loved God how could it be it's that he loved us and so this being perfected in love refers to a result it refers to a not a conclusion that's too theoretical a consequence it has an effect reward if you like in the sense of harvest it reaps something it produces something well in the verses that are our text verse 18 tells us the particular matter that relates to this need for love to be perfected it's this 1 john 4 18 4 17 i'm sorry by this is love perfected with us how in what well so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment that's part of God's desire in loving you and me in Jesus Christ brought home to us by the power of the Holy Spirit is that each and every one of us in the here and now may have confidence with regard to the day of judgment. Think of a husband and wife. Each is loved and loves the other, yet each is afraid of the other. What do you think? There's something wrong there. There's something missing in the relationship, in their love, in their awareness of what it includes, what it entails, what it guarantees somebody needs to help this couple to help each to rest in the other's love to trust the love of the other and that was part of the task that the lord jesus christ gave to his apostle john 1 john 3 1 behold what manner of love the father has bestowed upon us that we should be called the children of God he's not addressing those who are enemies of God you see he's addressing those whom he knows have been loved who love and he wants them to consider to contemplate to ponder the amazing love that God has toward them the world's a small place and with all the means by which we can have instant pictures from the other end of the globe there's hardly an unknown place anymore what John wrote here was behold from what country the Father hath loved us in other words this isn't something that's common on earth it comes from another realm altogether it comes from heaven it comes from glory it comes from the triune God himself and at the end of this epistle you might remember John says These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life. That was his purpose. They were lacking assurance. They were hesitant, doubtful, some of them, about the sureness and the continuance and the indestructibility of God's love toward them. And that is my task this evening. particularly to any one of you you see it's singular whoever fears he uses the first person plural so often in the letter here it's singular he comes as it were in and with the word of Christ to each and every single believer in the church at Ephesus or the churches in Asia Minor and he says whoever fears is not made perfect in love it's possible you see it's possible for us to know that God is love that God sent his only son into the world it's possible for us to confess it it's possible for us to testify to it it's possible for us to believe it it's possible even for us to love God in measure surely and to love our brothers and sisters in measure surely and yet, and yet not be at peace oneself at rest in God's love to you to me and when that is the case God's love in Christ is not perfected with us perfect in him manifested without any imperfection at all but in us in us the objects of that love it isn't perfected that's a possibility it's addressed here in these verses what causes it what hinders love being perfected in us well fear quite clearly there is no fear in love perfect love casts out fear Fear is the problem But fear of a particular kind Fear of a particular kind Not true of all fear of course Love and godly fear Love and reverential fear are not incompatible The two are closely connected To love without godly fear is to trivialize God It's to sentimentalize him It's to merely gratify our own feelings And cultivate some kind of warmth within us between us love without godly fear isn't true love but john isn't speaking about godly fear here he isn't saying that if you and i ceased to be reverent then love would be perfected the very opposite the very opposite is what he's saying there are warnings in this letter look at verse 8, anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. And then there are so many exhortations that are found in this letter. And at the close of the chapter, if anyone says, I love God and hates his brother, he's a liar. For he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him, whoever loves God must also love his brother no the fear which is being referred to here is not godly fear it's not loving regard it's not a willingness to engage in costly obedience and self-sacrifice that isn't saying that that is the enemy of fear that is to be cultivated developed what is the kind of fear then well it's obvious isn't it what he has to say here is this there is no fear in love for perfect love casts out fear for fear has to do with punishment that's the kind of fear that he is talking about punishment the old king james had fear has torment and that more serious term has a degree of accuracy to it because it's the word that's used for eternal punishment. The Son of Man comes, Matthew 24, 5, in the glory of his Father with the holy angels, the sheep and the goats are separated. Depart, ye cursed, into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. And they go away into torment, everlasting, everlasting punishment. That's the term that John uses here. And once we begin to see that, Then, don't we begin to realize that perfect love casts out fear, that kind of fear? Don't we begin to see that that kind of fear is hostile to, is inimical to, the nature and character and freeness and fullness and finality and richness of the great love of God toward us? This is what he's talking about. This is the fear that resists love's perfection. This is the cause. Just think of it for a moment. Here is someone who knows that God is love, knows that the Father has sent the Son so that he or she might live through him, knows that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world, and they're in the world. They can't exclude themselves from the scope of this love. They know, they believe, they love in return in measure. They love those who love God in Christ in measure. And they fear. Fear what? They fear that when the day of judgment comes, they'll be cast out. That there'll be no place for them. Or there's an if in their minds. They wonder whether that might be the case. As they look toward the day of judgment and anticipate standing there, they have no boldness. They'd love to have it. No confidence. This is what he says, you see. By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment. Confidence now. Boldness. But when that day dawns, there's something which is utterly impossible. And it is that they should be in hell. Only because they've been loved. This is what he's talking about. And so in their mind and heart and conscience, there's some kind of apprehension and anticipation that wrath might descend on their unworthy heads. There's an inner trembling where there ought to be a confidence and a boldness. You see, sin is the problem, as always. And you and I know, the moment you say sin, you have to say law. And the moment you say law, you have to say the holiness of God. And the moment you say that God is holy, he's just. And then you have to go on to that condemnation that is inescapable and appropriate and just on account of that sin which is transgression against his good law. It's a lockout. And you and I are still sinners. We still sin. Is there a specter stalking the halls of your mind and memory? but makes you uncertain as to whether there is a place for you in heaven, whether your name has been written in the Lamb's book of life from all eternity. If that's the case, then this is a word for you. I don't know whether it is the case. You know your own heart. And I charge you in Christ's name to answer what your conscience is telling you before the Lord. Are you at peace, though you're a sinner, as you anticipate the day of judgment that is drawing nearer? If you were to die tonight, would you be ready? Would you be at peace? Would you know, without a shadow of a doubt, where you're going? That is not merely John's desire for those he loves. It's the desire of Jesus, whose apostle he was. Jesus wants you to know that if you trust him, it is impossible for you to be punished on account of your sin eternally. He who fears, verse 18, that is, he who fears punishment is not perfected in love. Now note, someone can be loved, someone can love in return, both God and his brothers and sisters in Christ, and yet fear. I'm not saying that if you fear, you're not a Christian. I'll say it again. I'm not saying, if you fear, you're not a Christian. No, if you fear, you're not perfected in love. There's something more that love has to do in your mind and heart. So let's look at what that is. And let's look at the solution. That love that produces fears, expulsion. Perfect love expels, throws it out. Shuts the door on it. Perfect love casts out fear. How does that happen? Well, verse 16 tells us. 1 John 4, 16. God is love. And whoever abides in love, abides in God, and God abides in him. Abiding in love expels the fear that is associated with punishment on the day of judgment. That's the way to deal with it. it's love not law obviously it can't be law can it because the law condemns and anyone who knows anything about how searching the law can be knows that they have to look for a peace in connection with its investigative power and its censuring, even condemning, voice. We need an answer to it. But not even the law that guides, that tells us how we ought to live, how we ought to love, can provide us with that peace and quietness of conscience and confidence. It's like the signpost that shows us where we ought to be going and we know that we're not walking firmly, consistently, unswervingly on that right path. Law isn't the answer. It can't be the answer. Don't look to it. Love is the answer. Love is the answer. Don't think that if only I tried harder, did better, loved God more, which we ought to do, love our neighbor more, which we ought to do, then this fear would be dealt with. It wouldn't. It would be increased. That's the devil's trap. That's his lie. Keep the law more and more, and you can be sure that God loves you. Are you going to succeed if you do that or fail? Are you going to find peace or joy? Fear or guilt? You know the answer. It will become worse and worse. No, the solution is to abide in God's love. And there are two things that John says here to help us to do so. Two great truths that we can turn to time and time again and depend on and bask in and bathe ourselves in. Mind and heart and spirit and conscience. The first is this. Atonement has been provided. Atonement has been provided. Look at verse 10. In this is love, not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. In this, you want to know what love is? You want to know whether God is love? You want to know whether God loves sinners? You want to know whether God loves you and will never cease to love you? In this is love, not that we loved God. We didn't ask him to, we didn't offer him something in the hope that he might. In this is love, not that we love God, but that he loved us. And he did something. He did something about our terrible condition and awful plight. And what a thing he did. He sent his own son, the one whom he loved, the one who loved him as much and as perfectly as he was loved by the Father. He sent his own son to be the propitiation for our sins. Here's the problem, our sins. God has already done something about it, about them, about them. All, all, propitiation is atoning sacrifice, substitution, execution, punishment outpoured. That's been done, hasn't it? And it's been done once and for all. It's been done so perfectly that it's the height of blasphemy even to think that it isn't sufficient. God raised him from the dead, there's the proof. Atonement has been provided. Now ask yourself, as I ask myself this question. How many commandments did he leave unkept? How many sins did he not suffer for? And it's one and the same answer to them both. None. Every commandment, every sin, perfect righteousness in obedience, outpoured wrath without mitigation on account of our sins. Atonement has been made. And do you know why it was made? It was made because God loves you. You're in his love. It's love that's behind the gospel. It's love that wants to save. It's love that has atoned. It's love that provides forgiveness, pardon, peace, joy, stability forever. Abide in it. The second great truth is this. That acceptance is sure. Absolutely rock solid. Why? Have you noticed this expression before? Because as he is, so are we in this world. As he is, so are we in this world. In 1 John 3, Jonas says, as he was. Nobody knew him when he came. So are we. Nobody knows us as well. But no, it's not as he was. He's not talking about Bethlehem to Calvary. He's saying that if you and I want to know the love of God, cast your anchor back to Calvary and look toward the throne. As he is. He's at the right hand of God. He's in the Father's love. That's what he prayed for. That the Father would restore to him that glory that he had with him before the world. And he's there. Yes, he's not in the world. And you and I are. And yet, what we read here is this. As he is, and we may add, in heaven. In the love of his Father, so are we on earth, in the world, in the love of his Father, and our Father too. So that God the Father regards each and every sinner who trusts in Jesus with the same love with which he regards his Son. We're as good as there, my friends. We're as good as there. Whom he justified, he also glorified. Abide in that love. That doesn't mean reach for some higher level of spirituality. It just means stay where you've been put. Remain there. To abide is to live. It's a word that refers to an address, a home. Here's your home. Here's my home. It's not as replete, we may say, as it will be in heaven. But we're as good as there. Why? Because we're loved. Because we're in his love. And because that love has dealt with all our sins. Kept all the commands for us. Born all the wrath for us. There's nothing left for us to do. As a condition of acceptance with God and nothing left for us to fear. On account of our transgressions, Christ has borne it all. Now that doesn't mean that you and I need not be concerned about how we live. It's impossible for someone who knows how much they owe to the love of God in Jesus Christ to fail to realize they're not their own. How are they going to live? They're going to live out of that great love that God has toward them that has provided atonement for them. And they hear the same Savior who said, As the Father loved me, even so have I loved you. Abide in my love. If you abide in my love, you will keep my commandments. It's the inevitable result. Don't let the devil tell you that if you emphasize love, you do violence to law. Love, as we heard, is the fulfillment of the law. Herein is love perfected with us. May it be perfected in each and every one of our hearts and minds and spirits. So that we not only love one another, but that we may have boldness in anticipation of the day of judgment. Knowing that he will say to us, come, not depart, come. Come you who have been blessed of my Father. Inherit the glory prepared for you from before the foundation of the world. Amen.