Word of Salvation – Vol.14 No.38 – September 1968
Passing On God’s Love
Sermon by Rev. J.H. Derkley, Th. Grad., on 1John 4:11,12.
Scripture Reading: 1 John 4:7 – 5:5
Suggested Hymns:
Psalter Hymnal 184: 1,2,3. (New): 316: 3; 30: 3; 447; 490
Beloved Congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ,
There exists in Dutch a saying, “Love cannot come from one side”. This is so true. It may start on one side only (as it often does), but there must be a reaction. If the returning love does not flower, the first love will cool down and finally disappear.
Peter, the disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ, once lost his love. In fact, he became so frightened by the danger of death that he denied his love, even three times in a row, underlined with horrible curses. Jesus did not give up His love for Peter. But matters could not rest there. Soon Peter had to declare his love for his Master anew – the relationship between Peter and the Lord Jesus had to return to normal again. Peter, do you love Me? Then things were back to normal again. Or rather… Peter’s love had found a safe basis.
so often it has been said to us that the Lord loves us. Children sing about it: “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so”. The Bible tells me so. On every page of God’s Word we read God’s declaration of love for us. And when next week we are invited to sit at the Table of our Lord we hear it again: “I love you!”
But as we saw before, this love must have its returning love. No, we cannot say that up till now we have not loved the Lord at all. We have been loving God for a long, long time, haven’t we? Certainly not as firmly as we should have done – but there was love indeed.
This does not mean however, that we can leave the matter at that …and just go on as we have done these many years. Every Sunday we are confronted with the law of God, and each Sunday we are shown that this law means, at heart: LOVE! Each Sunday morning again – and is it not so that we truly mean what we say? – each Sunday morning again we confess that we have fallen short in our returning love; we say that we are sorry; we ask to be forgiven; we promise…. at least that is what we should do…. we promise to make a better effort next week.
But, when we are confronted with the Table of the Lord, we are so much more forced to see this very point: “God so loved me! God did so much for me!” But what do I do in return? How small is my love when I compare it with His. “Lord, teach us to love Thee as the angels love.”
Yet, how are we to go about loving God? How can we do this? The Lord Jesus gave us – of course – an instruction about the nature of our love to God: to love Him with heart and soul and mind and strength. In other words, with everything we have and are. Our will, our intellect, our feelings, our longings and desires: there should not be anything, not the least corner of our hearts that does not flower into love for our God. God never held back anything when it came to expressing His love for us…. we should be exactly the same.
But still, this is the nature, we might even say the quantity, of our love to God. But it still does not say HOW this powerful and all-consuming love can become VISIBLE. Do you love only by saying: “Lord, I love Thee so much?”
Mind you, when a man loves a woman, he must show that in many different ways. First of all he must show it by telling her that he loves her. Even after 25 years or more of wedded life, this still should be heard regularly. But…. it cannot stop at words only. DEEDS should follow. The man must help his wife; he must support her in her difficulties, comfort her when she “has the blues” – showing little kindnesses, so many little things, that together add up to and form the great song, “I love you truly”. Naturally, this is the same also for the woman in her expression of love for her husband.
But…. the trouble is that you just cannot show your love to God in any of these ways. Is there no other way? Bible reading…? Of course! Prayer…? Of course! Worship…? Naturally! And still, we all feel that this could not be all. Some may be able to give special expression to their love by spending much of their precious time in His service…. as office-bearers, or by working in one or other Church committees. And still, we feel, this is still not the full answer. Even liberal offerings will not do.
John says here in our text, “Beloved, if God so loved us, WE also ought to love…. ONE ANOTHER!” Don’t you think this sounds strange at first? God loves us, the next sentence should be: so we love God. But John says that this would be the wrong sort of reasoning. The proper reasoning is: God loves us… we love each other.
Why is this? Well, says John, it is impossible to express true love in any other way. No-one has ever seen God. So no one CAN even express his love to God as he would have to express it. God is the totally different One. And YET, God demands from us that love goes beyond mere words…. even if these words are sincerely meant.
This means, then, that “love which expresses itself in many deeds” may never be missing from our relationship with God. But, as our DEEDS, as our WORKS cannot affect God, they must be performed in connection with those whom God has given to us in His place.
They are…. our fellow-men. Our neighbours, the people around us; especially the brothers and sisters within our Church, THEY are, in a real sense, the representatives of God for us.
Do we love God? Certainly! Do we want to show it? All right… here in the next pew we see God’s representatives…. let us show our love… to them. It is as easy as that. Real men and women of flesh and blood, boys and girls whom we know so well. Nothing is easier than to love them. And there are so many more people who need the benefit of our love to God. There are poor people, lonely people, sick people, neglected people, all around us in our neighbourhood. Let us give them too, the joy of our love. There are the sufferers, the oppressed, the hungry, the homeless, the friendless. They may be farther away, even in other countries, but don’t we have the opportunity to show them also a token of our love to God?
Perhaps we might feel that it is not so easy after all, this love to the neighbours; especially if they are not-so-lovely people. Even within the very Congregation of which we are members, there are those who constantly “get under our skin”. There are those who envy our possessions, those who always talk behind our backs, those who are so hopelessly selfish. How in the world could we love them? Real people of flesh and blood can be real obstacles in our way.
Sometimes it can become such a burden that we give up hope ever to come to terms of friendship with our brothers and sisters. In many congregations there are those who have stopped trying altogether. They have come to the stage of refusing to reach out a hand of friendship and forgiveness to their “brother” or “sister” – a better term would be “their enemy”.
But, brothers and sisters, if this is the case with anyone of us; if anyone of us REFUSES to show love to the brothers and sisters here in Church… EACH brother and EACH sister…. then don’t ever say again that you love God…; it is a LIE. And let such a brother or sister not dare to come and sit at the Table next week in this way: R E P E N T. For John says in verse 20 of this chapter: “If any one says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.”
And don’t let us try to hide ourselves behind the excuse that we do not really HATE him or her, but that we “just don’t mix, that’s all”; in other words, “I am cold towards him”, for again John comes to us with the piercing words (verse 21): “And this commandment we have from Him, that he who loves God SHOULD LOVE HIS BROTHER ALSO.” Either we have both – love to the brother AND love to God – or we have neither.
But, to be right with God, this love cannot be deficient. The (old) Form for the Lord’s Supper states this so beautifully: “… and SHOW this toward one another, NOT ONLY IN WORDS, BUT ALSO IN DEEDS.”
So it comes back again to DEEDS, ACTIONS. We should deal with each other in the way of love. Our Lord Jesus, again, gave the indication of the quality of that love: Love your neighbour…. as you love yourself.
There is, then, nothing wrong in loving yourself. You have to take care of yourself, you have to look after yourself properly. Eat and drink in time and wisely. Work for progress – but also leave sufficient time for leisure and relaxation. Avoid danger, prevent harm. This love for self can never turn into selfishness, for the very reason that Jesus said: Whatever you do to yourself, do THAT also to your fellow-man. So it becomes impossible for us to stand in the centre of our own little “big I” – Jesus placed us into a circle with the others. We are never on our own.
But then again, in WHICH way can we now express our Godly love for our brother and sister?
The answer we find in that jewel of Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, chapter 13. A jewel we could well call it,…. and it would not be amiss if we wrote it out and pinned it to the wall of our workshop, our kitchen, our lounge, our bedroom, not to forget the Session room…
Love is patient and kind;
love is NOT jealous or boastful;
love is NOT arrogant or rude;
love does NOT insist on its own way;
love is NOT irritable or resentful;
love does NOT rejoice at wrong,
but it DOES rejoice in the right.
Love BEARS all things,
love BELIEVES all things,
love HOPES all things,
love ENDURES all things.
LOVE NEVER ENDS .
How far, brothers and sisters, has THIS become true in our lives? Now, mind, if we have to confess that there ARE brothers and sisters for whom we DO NOT have this love – or for whom we do not even want this love – WE DO NOT LOVE GOD!
For the Lord has made no exceptions; the Lord has never given us permission to take it easy about this commandment in regard to this or that brother or sister. AND SO WE CANNOT COME TO THE TABLE. For the (old) Form for the Lord’s Supper says clearly that everyone must examine his conscience whether he, without any hypocrisy, HEARTILY laying aside all ENMITY, HATRED, and ENVY, earnestly resolves henceforward to live in TRUE LOVE AND UNITY with his neighbour. For those who do not feel this testimony in their hearts eat and drink judgment to themselves.
At the same time, we are not permitted to stay away either. We MUST come, but we must come in the RIGHT WAY. That is, then, in true love to our brother and sister. This means that we have to make “AN EARNEST RESOLUTION” that, as from now on, we ARE GOING to love ALL.
This will be far from easy, no doubt. But let us not forget that we are called to go in the footsteps of our Lord. It would not have been easy for Him to keep on loving Peter when this coarse fisherman kept on swearing and cursing: “I don’t know that Man!”
But easy love is too cheap for words. Love means that we have to GIVE OURSELVES. And we should not wait for the brother or sister, either, that they make up the quarrel – God did not wait for us! The initiative should come from us – as it came from God.
But… if we indeed set ourselves earnestly to do what God demands from us o what a wonderful week of blessings we are going to experience!
John says: In that case… God abides in us. This means nothing else but that God takes over in us. As Paul said: “then I find suddenly that it is no longer I, but Christ Who is living in me.” This makes it so much easier, too. For, mind you, being filled with this Spirit, we will find that ALL will draw together. That the Church will truly be one.
Yes, what is even more, my love for God finds expression. And GOD’S love for me finds its intended fruit. Without brothers and sisters around us, we may be in the dark HOW to show how much we love the Lord; but, surrounded by fellow-believers as ourselves, we experience the true communion of the saints.
Of the early Church it was said that many marvelled BECAUSE THEY LOVED EACH OTHER SO STRONGLY. And in THIS spirit they came together to break bread. What about the Church today? What about us? We have the very same Lord, we possess the very same Spirit, we have the very same bread to break, we delight in the very same heavenly love….
Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
AMEN.