Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.Beloved, if God loved us in this way, we also ought to love one another.Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another.Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
6 sermons cite this verse
… He says, oh, let me tell you what you should do. Dear friends, dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love God. Oh, no, no, no, no, that's easy. No, no, no. If you really understand what I'm saying, he says, then you also ought to love one another. Yeah, but she's not lovable, which John would say, and neither are you. God doesn't love you because you're lovable. God loves you because he's love. And it's that kind of love that has been demonstrated for you that you are to demonstrate for her because it is not about her. It is about the God who loves you because God is love. And it's like, yeah, but that takes away all my excuses to which Jesus would say, welcome to my kingdom. if we love one another he goes on he says this if we love one another God lives in us and his love is this is okay real quick if you've been thinking about something else playing with your phone you know whatever you're doing at home you're driving you turn listen I just need you to hear this next part then you can go back to your grocery list or whatever you do this next part is so important I don't want you to miss this okay so everybody real quick I'm gonna read this again I got your attention, okay. …
… is the context you see in verse 7 john says beloved let us love one another and then verse 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. So this call to love each other brackets our passage. But tonight our focus is upon God's love for us because our love for others is rooted in His love for us. And John points that out. He says in verses 7 and 8, Whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. If you love, it is a sign that you have been born of God and you know His love. When you know His love, then you love others. And he says it on the other side as well. Anyone who does not love does not know God. Because God is love. What John is telling us is that it is in the love of God for us, out of that can flow love for others. Or another way of saying it is, John is saying God's love is always first. …
… other because love is from God and everyone who loves is born from God and knows God. The person who doesn't love does not know God because God is love. What a powerful scripture. Now, love is the driving ethic of the Christian life. In John's gospel, Jesus repeatedly claims, he says, this is my commandment, that you love one another. He says that on the night he's about to be crucified, the next day he would be arrested that night. This is my commandment, that you love one another. In Matthew, Mark, and Luke, he quotes twice, or once in each of those gospels, the great commandments. Love God with all that's within you. Love your neighbor as you love yourself. Love even your enemy, Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount. We read in Paul, the summation of the law. He says in 1 Corinthians chapter 13, if I speak in the tongues of mortals and angels, but do not have love, I'm a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. …
It paid the bill. We were drowning in debt that was going to take us out and sink us. and he paid the bill in one fell swoop and said, put it on my bill. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought, don't you figure? Don't you reckon? We also ought to love one another. And we'll end here. No one has seen God at any time, but if we love one another, God abides in us and his love has been perfected in us. Could we thank God for his word, church? Thank you, Lord. The big idea today, and the title of this message is, the Holy Spirit, not the only spirit. John ended with this thought, hey, guys, how great is it? The Holy Spirit's been given. We can know we're his because of the Holy Spirit. And we're like, oh, amazing. And he's like, oh, just so you know, there's other spirits, too. There's other spirits. And the holy one isn't the only one. …
… Not that we love God, but that he loved us and sent his son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. And why does it matter? Because no one has ever seen God. but if we love one another God lives in us and his love is made complete in us your neighbor has never seen God and neither have you but your neighbor can see God by the way that you love them and that's going to happen proportionately I believe to your ability to love yourself and find yourself in the love of God. So you don't have to start today with, oh my goodness, this new commandment, I got to love God with all my heart, all my mind, and all my strength. Jesus is reaching back to Deuteronomy for that phrase. It's the Shema, the summation of faith to the Jewish mind found in Deuteronomy 6. Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your mind and all your strength. And another place in the Gospels adds to it another dimension as well. All your heart, all your mind, all your strength, all your hands, everything about you in life. Love God. …
… the propitiation, the satisfaction for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abides enough in us, and His love is perfected in us. Again, you're never more like God than when you love sacrificially, unconditionally, and with forgiveness. And we have a model of that, a pattern. The plea is in verse 1, the pattern is in verse 2. And Christ, as we saw last week, is the One who loved us and gave Himself up for us as a satisfactory offering to God that arose from the cross as a sweet aroma. That's all so magnificent, so beautiful, so wondrous, so precious, that in a sense I hate to descend into verse 3, but necessarily must, because it starts to turn here, and it turns very darkly, and it's very ugly. But immorality or any impurity or greed must not even be named among you as is proper among saints. …