This weekend,
I witnessed so many examples of selfless love.
A mother who gave up a career to care for a daughter with cancer, a church
who gave up an entire weekend to rally around a sister in need and hundreds of
men and women who sacrifice time and money to minister to incarcerated
prisoners. All of these examples were so
touching and convicting. You see over
the past few weeks I have been teaching my Community Bible Study class from the
three epistles of John. The melodic
line, or the common melody of scripture that keeps repeating itself throughout
John’s letters is a call for the early church to remember Christ’s command to
love each other. In other words, just
don’t give lip service to your faith, but put it into action. Loving our brothers and sisters in Christ
should flow out of God’s love for us. Jesus
said in John 15:13, “No one has greater love than this, that someone
would lay down his life for his friends.” After all, Love is at the center of the
Gospel message. But is this how we
honestly live it out? Do we truly treat
our Christian family with the selfless love Christ demonstrated for us? John Calvin said, “When someone thinks
more of himself than he ought, he will love others less than he ought”.
God and the
Apostle John says man is inherently selfish in our human nature. We go to great lengths to protect our little
kingdom and defend our choices, sometimes at the expense of hurting
others. But the good news is, the gospel has the power
to change the heart. If the gospel has
taken root in your life, then love will be the fruit that grows naturally from
your heart. Verse 16 in 1 John 3 says, “By
this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to
lay down our lives for the brothers.” We
should love other Christians out of gratitude for our gift of salvation. I will call this gratitude for the
gospel. Loving others is proof that
Jesus is at work in our lives.
Verse 18 in 1 John 3 is our theme
verse for our CBS class this year and it mirrors the words of Christ spoken
earlier: Little children, let us
not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. When it comes right down to it, faith
without action and love is dead faith.
Here, on the
other side of the cross, John is telling us that God’s law is written on the
hearts of God’s children. The Love he is
calling us to live out in our Christian walk is the same sacrificial love
Christ showed for us on the cross. This
is AGAPE love. The ordinary love of
affection that we feel towards people is called phileo love, hence where our
city of Philadelphia gets its name-the “city of brotherly love”. Agape love is not an emotional type of love
that we are familiar with in our music, movies and television soap operas. It is a much deeper love. It is the love the Holy Spirit has for the
Father and for the son Jesus Christ.
When we are born again, the Holy Spirit empowers us with Agape love so
that we too can love God the Father and God the son. One way to test whether or not we are growing
in this Agape love, is if we are loving others as Christ commanded us to love
them.
If we are
walking in the light, then we should be putting aside our selfish desires and
love our brothers and sisters in the selfless manner in which Christ loved
us. Christ loved us so much that He was
willing to die for us, so that we could have our sins forgiven and come into a
right relationship with God the Father.
Agape is a sacrificial love that voluntarily suffers inconvenience,
discomfort, and even death for the benefit of another without expecting
anything in return. We are called to agape love through Christ's
example.
This year I
have have been on the receiving end of Agape love as I recovered from three
surgeries and treatment for breast cancer.
My husband has been there at my worse and loved my through the pain, the
sickness and even discouragement. He
would gladly trade places with his bride if it were possible. But as much as I love my husband, he isn’t my
true bridegroom….Jesus is. Christ is the
ultimate example of sacrificial love.
Dear brothers and sisters, don’t
let the world take the place of your love for God and his people. Don’t fall into the enemy’s trap to chase
after people and things that fill your happy tank.
For they are here today and gone tomorrow. Be content to let the love of God the Father,
that is found in His son Jesus come into your heart. The Father has loved you so deeply that He
gave us His only son to die for us. That
is the good news of the gospel we are to live out as we serve and love each other. For it may be my fight, but it is for God’s
glory!
This is a powerful message and I can see how it was likely part of your teaching. One thing I would add ... We are called to love our brothers and sisters in Christ in deed and truth ... and just as much those who are not yet our family in Christ. Praying often for you, my friend and co-worker in Christ.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree Flo. However, specifically in 1 John, his target audience was believers, the early church. Absolutely, we are called and commanded to love our neighbors as well. This weekend, I witnessed several hundred men and women in Christ serving both the church and community, but yesterday my niece was married and if not for her mother's covenant family serving my sister-in-law, that wedding would not have been possible. Hope all is well for you too fellow-co-worker in Christ.
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