Old Love (1 John 3:11)

WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.160 --> 00:00:06.719 I'm going to read one verse from First John Chapter Three, will be the 2 00:00:07.040 --> 00:00:14.150 text for sermon this morning. First John Three, verse eleven, for this 3 00:00:14.390 --> 00:00:19.629 is the message that you have heard from the beginning, that we should love 4 00:00:19.829 --> 00:00:26.260 one another. Amen. Please be seated. Well. Here in First John 5 00:00:26.660 --> 00:00:31.379 Eleven, we of course have a very simple, easy to understand verse. 6 00:00:32.340 --> 00:00:37.490 We have received a message, a message that is old, that we should 7 00:00:37.490 --> 00:00:43.369 love one another, and it's something that we, I think, instinctually know. 8 00:00:44.369 --> 00:00:49.490 Love as a requirement in our lives, as something that we ourselves desire, 9 00:00:49.770 --> 00:00:54.240 is built into us. It's the way we were made. We come 10 00:00:54.320 --> 00:01:00.840 into this world longing and wanting love and feeling the desire, in the need 11 00:01:00.079 --> 00:01:07.269 and the expectation to give it to others. We were made by God to 12 00:01:07.469 --> 00:01:15.790 love, to love him and to love one another. There's, of course, 13 00:01:15.950 --> 00:01:21.459 more to the message that these Christians had heard from the beginning. Paul 14 00:01:21.620 --> 00:01:26.579 Taught, or John, writes in verse five of Chapter One. This is 15 00:01:26.859 --> 00:01:30.900 the message we have heard from him and proclaimed to you, that God is 16 00:01:30.939 --> 00:01:36.569 light and in him there is no darkness at all. This is, of 17 00:01:36.730 --> 00:01:41.810 course, related to what we just read and First John Three Eleven. WHO, 18 00:01:41.969 --> 00:01:46.049 Jesus, is the light that shines in the darkness and the love that 19 00:01:46.209 --> 00:01:51.359 we ought to give one another. These things are connected. I mentioned that 20 00:01:51.560 --> 00:01:56.159 to make two points. One, they're connected and second, this message that 21 00:01:56.239 --> 00:02:00.519 they've heard from the beginning, that we should love one another, isn't everything, 22 00:02:00.680 --> 00:02:05.269 it doesn't say everything that could be possibly said about Christianity, but it 23 00:02:05.469 --> 00:02:08.870 certainly as at the very core of it. It's why John is able to 24 00:02:08.949 --> 00:02:14.349 express it so clearly. We ought to love one another. You know this. 25 00:02:14.629 --> 00:02:17.860 This is simple, this is true, and in the following verses he's 26 00:02:17.939 --> 00:02:23.460 going to give various reasons for that. He's going to help us understand why 27 00:02:23.580 --> 00:02:30.050 it is we, as Christians, ought to me marked by that. Before 28 00:02:30.169 --> 00:02:35.569 we talk about that command in particular, I want to spend some time thinking 29 00:02:35.610 --> 00:02:42.009 about the way he's making this point though, this message that you have heard 30 00:02:42.129 --> 00:02:49.039 from the beginning, that first half of the verse. It's important because John 31 00:02:49.159 --> 00:02:53.919 writes to a church whose faith is being tried. He's making this point, 32 00:02:54.120 --> 00:03:00.389 this thesis statement, because it's something he needs to argue, it's something he 33 00:03:00.550 --> 00:03:06.469 needs to defend. People are doubting this thing that we ought to love one 34 00:03:06.550 --> 00:03:12.669 another, and it's something that we always experience in the church. There's always 35 00:03:12.710 --> 00:03:16.860 a testing and a trying that's going on. Our faith is being questioned. 36 00:03:17.659 --> 00:03:23.219 How do we answer those questions? How do we make decisions about what is 37 00:03:23.379 --> 00:03:27.889 true and what is not? John writes in a context in which there were 38 00:03:27.969 --> 00:03:32.530 people who formally belong to the church who have now left and are casting doubt 39 00:03:32.689 --> 00:03:37.330 on what the church is, what the church ought to believe, how she 40 00:03:37.770 --> 00:03:42.159 ought to act. The question then is, how will those things be decided? 41 00:03:42.919 --> 00:03:49.199 Who's right, WHO's wrong? John's answers that these questions must be decided 42 00:03:49.319 --> 00:03:54.990 on the basis of what has already been taught. What was the word that 43 00:03:55.189 --> 00:04:00.509 was received from the beginning? That's his question. That's his way of creating 44 00:04:00.550 --> 00:04:08.830 a foundation for this truth that we ought to love one another, and this 45 00:04:09.030 --> 00:04:15.620 teaches us something very important about what Christianity is. Christianity isn't a set of 46 00:04:15.740 --> 00:04:21.819 beliefs that's construct did in a social moment. It's not a set of beliefs 47 00:04:21.980 --> 00:04:28.089 that are created for a particular time and then are made new in another time. 48 00:04:30.250 --> 00:04:36.449 Some people like to think of Christianity like a liquid. A liquid has 49 00:04:36.529 --> 00:04:42.920 no shape of its own, it has no boundaries or borders. It can 50 00:04:43.160 --> 00:04:46.839 be contained but it always takes the shape of whatever you pour it into. 51 00:04:48.279 --> 00:04:53.589 Imagine a glass of water, right. You pour water into a glass and 52 00:04:53.709 --> 00:04:58.069 that water takes on a cylindrical shape. But pour it into a ring and 53 00:04:58.189 --> 00:05:01.149 it takes on the shape of a ring. With liquids, there is no 54 00:05:01.310 --> 00:05:05.230 pounding or twisting to get it to fit. It simply fits. And this 55 00:05:05.350 --> 00:05:09.459 is a great way to think about water, but it's a terrible way to 56 00:05:09.579 --> 00:05:15.220 think about Christianity, about the revelation of God. We have to go back 57 00:05:15.220 --> 00:05:17.980 to the beginning. What is the thing we heard from the beginning? What 58 00:05:18.139 --> 00:05:27.329 was the message that we received? It may sound sometimes momentarily attractive to say 59 00:05:27.449 --> 00:05:32.209 that Christianity is whatever you make it to be, but ultimately it fails this 60 00:05:32.410 --> 00:05:36.680 this claim fails in several ways, but I want to mention a two, 61 00:05:36.720 --> 00:05:43.519 I think for one reason, the claim that Christianity he can can simply be 62 00:05:43.600 --> 00:05:47.879 shaped in folden and then it doesn't matter on what was in the beginning tends 63 00:05:47.959 --> 00:05:55.670 to make nonsense out of what used to be sense. It makes unusable what 64 00:05:55.829 --> 00:06:00.230 was once usable. It takes a blessing away. Let me give you a 65 00:06:00.470 --> 00:06:03.980 human example. Let's say your father says to you if you get an a 66 00:06:04.259 --> 00:06:08.779 on your test, I'll take you out for ice cream. So you get 67 00:06:08.779 --> 00:06:12.620 an a on your test, you go to dad and you say let's go 68 00:06:12.740 --> 00:06:15.699 for ice cream, and he says, I think you misunderstood. My promises 69 00:06:15.740 --> 00:06:21.250 are fluid and flexible. You may have hoped that we were going to be 70 00:06:21.370 --> 00:06:26.250 done eating ice cream, but what I intended was for you to take this 71 00:06:26.410 --> 00:06:32.439 new shovel and pick off at pick up after the dog. As any child 72 00:06:32.639 --> 00:06:36.519 will tell you, this is not an enlightened way of listening and speaking. 73 00:06:36.759 --> 00:06:43.800 It's called lying. So if God says, for example, if you repent 74 00:06:43.879 --> 00:06:47.870 and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, you will be saved, it matters 75 00:06:47.910 --> 00:06:54.430 very much whether we can believe that or not, because our deaths are not 76 00:06:54.790 --> 00:07:01.060 fluid and flexible. We die, and the fact that we die in the 77 00:07:01.139 --> 00:07:05.660 fact that God is promising life after death, after eternal life, these things 78 00:07:05.819 --> 00:07:10.300 really matter. And if we take these truths and say, well, they're 79 00:07:10.500 --> 00:07:15.300 flexible and they can mean what you like them to mean, that God doesn't 80 00:07:15.339 --> 00:07:19.410 really say what he means, well then it takes a blessing away. It 81 00:07:19.569 --> 00:07:26.569 makes something usable and makes it unusable. It makes nonsense out of sense. 82 00:07:26.610 --> 00:07:31.639 And that brings us to a second reason that our faith is not a liquid. 83 00:07:32.759 --> 00:07:39.160 It's because God is not like a liquid. When God says something, 84 00:07:39.360 --> 00:07:44.199 he means it. Of course he has to be interpreted correctly, and that 85 00:07:44.310 --> 00:07:53.230 doesn't always happen. We must hear him right we don't take the word to 86 00:07:53.389 --> 00:08:00.779 mean what we want. We are supposed to want what it means. God 87 00:08:01.060 --> 00:08:07.500 is not a liar. His promises are real promises, his commands are real 88 00:08:07.819 --> 00:08:13.970 commands. The word is stable because God is stable. You want people to 89 00:08:15.009 --> 00:08:18.329 depend on your word, and you and I don't always speak the truth. 90 00:08:20.810 --> 00:08:24.649 We don't always understand the truth. We're often confused and trying to figure out 91 00:08:24.730 --> 00:08:31.319 the truth. And if we expect people to believe US and understand us when 92 00:08:31.039 --> 00:08:39.919 as confused as we are, how much more so ought we to always believe 93 00:08:39.159 --> 00:08:48.389 God, who is always truthful, always right, always stable? Let me 94 00:08:48.470 --> 00:08:52.990 mention just one more thing. Those who want to say that God's Word is 95 00:08:52.350 --> 00:08:58.220 fluid and changeable and morphing often do so for the sake of some good ideal. 96 00:09:00.460 --> 00:09:05.899 They want to preserve freedom, for example, or love, or maybe 97 00:09:05.059 --> 00:09:11.850 peace between people who understand that word differently. Now, those things, freedom 98 00:09:13.009 --> 00:09:16.769 and love and peace are, of course, noble virtues which ought to be 99 00:09:16.970 --> 00:09:22.570 strived for. But how can they be possible if the faith that is believed 100 00:09:24.320 --> 00:09:31.919 is contradictorily, if that's the word believed or differently believed, if I believe 101 00:09:31.080 --> 00:09:35.159 that it's okay to hate you and you believe that I must love you, 102 00:09:35.919 --> 00:09:41.629 how are we going to have peace by simply saying we're free to, or 103 00:09:41.830 --> 00:09:46.429 not just free to believe differently, but that they are equal truths, that 104 00:09:46.549 --> 00:09:54.500 they equally mean and are equally truthful? How can true love be obtained or 105 00:09:54.620 --> 00:09:58.179 had in a situation like that? And even freedom disappear, as I think. 106 00:09:58.580 --> 00:10:03.059 There might be freedom, and there is freedom and being allowed to think 107 00:10:03.100 --> 00:10:09.049 different things, but if one person hates another and feels justified, he's not 108 00:10:09.409 --> 00:10:18.409 giving that person freedom. He's taken away what is rightfully another's, namely love, 109 00:10:20.850 --> 00:10:24.679 but other things too, when we hurt out of a lack of love, 110 00:10:24.799 --> 00:10:30.639 another's good name, or we take away their possessions or we harm their 111 00:10:30.759 --> 00:10:37.110 bodies. What do these things have to do with freedom? To say that 112 00:10:37.470 --> 00:10:45.990 love is true, to say that there is a stable requirement that we must 113 00:10:46.269 --> 00:10:54.179 love one another, is important for freedom, important for love. It's important 114 00:10:54.340 --> 00:11:03.019 for peace. Now I say these things to underline this point. Christianity, 115 00:11:03.139 --> 00:11:07.090 in terms of the message that was given to the world through the Holy Spirit, 116 00:11:07.169 --> 00:11:11.730 is a fixed thing, it's a solid thing, it has boundaries, 117 00:11:11.850 --> 00:11:18.759 it is something and it is not something else. Of course our interpretations will 118 00:11:18.759 --> 00:11:26.200 differ, but God's message is the same as much as a chair as a 119 00:11:26.279 --> 00:11:31.600 chair, or a bird is a bird. It may be a generous thing 120 00:11:31.840 --> 00:11:35.629 to allow a person to call a chair a bird, but it's not helpful 121 00:11:35.750 --> 00:11:39.909 to you or anyone else to think and act as if they really are the 122 00:11:39.990 --> 00:11:46.509 same thing. With all that said, then notice what John says in the 123 00:11:46.549 --> 00:11:50.700 middle of this controversy. He says that the command they have been given has 124 00:11:50.740 --> 00:11:58.100 not changed. It's stable. God's message is stable and he says that the 125 00:11:58.259 --> 00:12:05.210 command it was from the beginning. Just because other people are acting as though 126 00:12:05.210 --> 00:12:09.769 the message has changed or can be changed doesn't mean that it has or that 127 00:12:11.009 --> 00:12:16.080 we think it should. Know in a the sake of controversies, we must 128 00:12:16.159 --> 00:12:20.200 go back to the beginning, to the message, to the word. For 129 00:12:20.279 --> 00:12:24.080 John, that means all the revelation of God that he had received in the 130 00:12:24.200 --> 00:12:30.070 person and work of Jesus Christ while he was here on the earth and after 131 00:12:30.110 --> 00:12:35.750 he had ascended into heaven. For us, it's only the latter, because 132 00:12:35.909 --> 00:12:41.509 Jesus is not here. Jesus is not teaching us now in an earthly ministry. 133 00:12:41.549 --> 00:12:45.940 He teaches us in a heavenly one, as he speaks to us through 134 00:12:45.940 --> 00:12:50.620 the Holy Spirit, as we have the many, many inspired words in our 135 00:12:50.700 --> 00:12:58.690 bibles. So we go back to the beginning, in controversies of old and 136 00:12:58.850 --> 00:13:03.049 in controversies today, we go back to the word of God and we hear 137 00:13:03.169 --> 00:13:09.490 it speak with this kind of clarity. For this is the message that you 138 00:13:09.570 --> 00:13:16.960 have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. Well, 139 00:13:16.960 --> 00:13:20.919 I hope you're not too tired to come to the main point. Love. 140 00:13:22.240 --> 00:13:26.679 We ought to love one another. Right, we ought to love one another. 141 00:13:28.269 --> 00:13:35.230 This perfect simplicity which this has been said. Let me ask a question. 142 00:13:35.990 --> 00:13:41.070 Let's test John for a moment with with humility, for the sake of 143 00:13:41.110 --> 00:13:46.379 understanding. Is this the message that we have heard from the beginning? Right? 144 00:13:46.620 --> 00:13:52.259 Is John Speaking truthfully here? Well, sure is. Jesus spoke it 145 00:13:52.500 --> 00:13:58.769 explicitly when he spoke about the Kingdom of God. He said, when he 146 00:13:58.929 --> 00:14:03.250 talked about the Greatest Commandments. When he was directly asked what the greatest commandments 147 00:14:03.289 --> 00:14:07.330 are, and of all the world said it. It was to love the 148 00:14:07.450 --> 00:14:13.320 Lord, your God, and love your neighbor as yourself. We gave various 149 00:14:13.360 --> 00:14:18.840 examples and parables and indeed it was taught about it in his whole life, 150 00:14:20.080 --> 00:14:24.870 did every moment and in every action that he he did and everything that he 151 00:14:24.950 --> 00:14:31.269 did. It was an act of love for us, even for the world. 152 00:14:33.389 --> 00:14:41.299 But when Jesus says that the command to love is the Supreme Command you 153 00:14:41.379 --> 00:14:45.980 might remember that he says all of the law and the prophets and the Old 154 00:14:46.059 --> 00:14:52.820 Testament is summed up in this commandment, which reminds us that the command to 155 00:14:52.929 --> 00:14:58.570 love, this message of love, goes back even before Jesus is earthly ministry. 156 00:14:58.330 --> 00:15:03.809 It's throughout all the Old Testament. You go to Deuteronomy, for example, 157 00:15:03.850 --> 00:15:07.600 and the many laws that you have hit there, the ten commandments included, 158 00:15:07.720 --> 00:15:13.320 and many others, every single one of them you can trace back to 159 00:15:13.440 --> 00:15:18.519 a requirement to love, whether that's how you ought to treat the boundaries between 160 00:15:18.600 --> 00:15:22.710 Your House and a neighbor's house, the ways in which you ought to raise 161 00:15:22.789 --> 00:15:28.909 your children, the kind of gifts you ought to give, how taxes ought 162 00:15:28.909 --> 00:15:33.710 to work or loans are all the rest. Every single law can be traced 163 00:15:33.789 --> 00:15:39.820 back to love. On the flip side of that, every single sin can 164 00:15:39.860 --> 00:15:45.460 be traced back to a lack of love, a moment, a time and 165 00:15:45.700 --> 00:15:48.659 attitude in which some bud he said to someone else, I hate you, 166 00:15:50.129 --> 00:15:56.570 I don't love you. From beginning to the end of the Bible, the 167 00:15:56.730 --> 00:16:00.169 command to love is central. In fact, we can go back to the 168 00:16:00.250 --> 00:16:07.759 days, even before the fall, to highlight the necessity of love. We 169 00:16:07.879 --> 00:16:11.279 see it in the way in which Adam and Eve came together in the garden, 170 00:16:12.039 --> 00:16:15.720 the way in which they clung to one another. We're made one in 171 00:16:17.039 --> 00:16:22.230 love. We also see it in the consequences when sin entered into the world 172 00:16:22.269 --> 00:16:26.269 and disrupted love. What was what are some of the first things we see 173 00:16:26.350 --> 00:16:36.539 happening? Kane and able hating Kane, hating his brother, murdering his brother. 174 00:16:37.139 --> 00:16:40.220 In fact, this is a point John will go on to make verse 175 00:16:40.340 --> 00:16:44.659 twelve. Immediately the next verse, he says we should not be like Kane, 176 00:16:45.820 --> 00:16:52.210 who was the evil one and murdered his brother. This is the opposite 177 00:16:52.250 --> 00:16:56.889 of love. We see, then, that this command to love goes back 178 00:16:57.809 --> 00:17:03.120 to the be very beginning, to Jesus as ministry and message, to the 179 00:17:03.440 --> 00:17:07.640 entire Old Testament, and you know, we can even go back further than 180 00:17:07.680 --> 00:17:12.240 that, for the command to love is not only a command that's given in 181 00:17:12.279 --> 00:17:18.710 a particular moment of time, but it flows from the very nature of God 182 00:17:18.910 --> 00:17:25.509 himself. While the command here applies to us in our relationships to one another, 183 00:17:26.109 --> 00:17:29.869 it flows from this love of God that is in his own being, 184 00:17:30.059 --> 00:17:37.700 in his essence, in his very being, in a way we have preached 185 00:17:37.819 --> 00:17:41.299 to us the way in which we ought to love one another. This is 186 00:17:41.339 --> 00:17:47.329 a remarkable fact, but I'm trying to say is the very existence of God 187 00:17:48.450 --> 00:17:53.009 commands us to love one another. Listen to what Jesus says in John Seventeen, 188 00:17:53.170 --> 00:17:57.210 twenty six. He says, in a prayer to the father, I 189 00:17:57.369 --> 00:18:00.759 made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, 190 00:18:02.640 --> 00:18:07.359 that the love which which that that the love with which you have loved 191 00:18:07.559 --> 00:18:14.549 me, may be in them and I in them. Here the FAUGHT, 192 00:18:14.750 --> 00:18:18.589 the son, speaks to the father about the love that they have for one 193 00:18:18.630 --> 00:18:25.349 another, a love that they have shared in their essence from all time, 194 00:18:25.630 --> 00:18:33.180 from before all time and he asks that that love would be in us. 195 00:18:36.420 --> 00:18:41.369 That's an amazing thing. You see how essential this command to love is, 196 00:18:41.569 --> 00:18:47.970 then why Paul says love binds all things together. Love, you see, 197 00:18:48.170 --> 00:18:53.210 is fundamental to everything. It's the glue that holds together the Commandments, our 198 00:18:53.329 --> 00:19:00.799 society, our families. Love is the thing that demands that we seek the 199 00:19:00.920 --> 00:19:07.960 higher things in each other and in God. To Act Against Love is to 200 00:19:07.079 --> 00:19:11.750 act against nature, as much as standing on a street corner and jumping up 201 00:19:11.869 --> 00:19:17.230 again, up again, up again, trying to defy the laws of gravity. 202 00:19:17.269 --> 00:19:22.670 Right, if I just keep doing this, I'll somehow push against God's 203 00:19:22.670 --> 00:19:26.980 law. As foolish as that would look, as crazy as that would look. 204 00:19:29.539 --> 00:19:33.420 How much more so is the person who lies and cheats and steels, 205 00:19:33.500 --> 00:19:40.930 thinking it will gain him some good, pushing against this Eternal Law of love? 206 00:19:41.730 --> 00:19:45.809 But this is, of course, exactly what we do. We hear 207 00:19:45.849 --> 00:19:48.650 John's words. It says this is the message that you've heard from the beginning, 208 00:19:48.690 --> 00:19:52.730 that we should love one another, and we all go thumbs up. 209 00:19:52.769 --> 00:19:57.160 John. Right, we agree with that, but do we? Is that 210 00:19:57.279 --> 00:20:08.109 what we actually do? Despite the fundamental soul law of love, it's essential 211 00:20:08.309 --> 00:20:17.950 importance in all our lives beloved. We don't love as we ought. We 212 00:20:18.069 --> 00:20:27.259 don't love one another as we ought, isn't that true? We despise others, 213 00:20:29.619 --> 00:20:37.289 we hate others, we grow in bitter, impatient, in kind. 214 00:20:37.650 --> 00:20:44.970 We want to hurt other people. Were angry at them. The sweetness that 215 00:20:45.049 --> 00:20:51.920 we ought to have for one another's turned in deceiving. The honesty that we 216 00:20:51.960 --> 00:20:56.720 are supposed to display to one another and give to one another's used for to 217 00:20:57.079 --> 00:21:03.880 lie and be deceptive. We Make Sacrifices, Oh yes, but only in 218 00:21:03.079 --> 00:21:10.069 so far as it brings US pleasure or benefit. And this is exactly why 219 00:21:10.230 --> 00:21:17.430 the commandment had to be made new. New, that's a very important word. 220 00:21:18.470 --> 00:21:23.619 It's an old commandment. I've titled This sermon Old Love, because love 221 00:21:23.740 --> 00:21:29.900 is old. It goes back and back and back and back. But it 222 00:21:29.980 --> 00:21:36.890 had to be made new in a way, we who do not do love 223 00:21:37.410 --> 00:21:44.250 had to be made lovely in order to love. And God did this for 224 00:21:44.410 --> 00:21:51.160 us, as we read in Ephesians, as we've considered in John's letter here, 225 00:21:52.480 --> 00:21:56.440 that light that came into the world, that light that shined into darkness. 226 00:21:56.599 --> 00:22:04.069 God loved us when He gave us his only begotten Son, Jesus says 227 00:22:04.109 --> 00:22:11.869 in John Thirteen. A new commandment. I give you that you love one 228 00:22:11.910 --> 00:22:17.420 another. Right, that is that interesting. A new commandment. I give 229 00:22:17.460 --> 00:22:21.660 you that you love one another just as I have loved you. Jesus says, 230 00:22:22.180 --> 00:22:29.619 you also are to love one another. New, Jesus. How is 231 00:22:29.740 --> 00:22:33.210 it new? Well, it's not new because it hasn't been said before. 232 00:22:33.289 --> 00:22:38.210 We've seen that very clearly. Jesus himself had said it before he met says 233 00:22:38.250 --> 00:22:44.960 it in John Thirteen. He means something different. It's not new because it's 234 00:22:44.960 --> 00:22:51.960 not been said before, but because in him love becomes effective and useful and 235 00:22:52.119 --> 00:22:56.240 glorifying to God. The old commandment to love, the old message, in 236 00:22:56.359 --> 00:23:03.349 our sinfulness and in our darkness, falls on deaf ears, but in Christ 237 00:23:03.509 --> 00:23:08.269 we hear it anew. If you go back to the previous chapter and first 238 00:23:08.309 --> 00:23:14.940 John, John Explains this, you might remember. I'll read from first John 239 00:23:15.940 --> 00:23:21.299 A, chapter two, verse seven. He Says Beloved, I am writing 240 00:23:21.380 --> 00:23:26.539 to you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you heard from the 241 00:23:26.579 --> 00:23:32.410 beginning. The old commandment is the word that you have heard. At the 242 00:23:32.490 --> 00:23:36.329 same time, it is a new commandment that I am writing to you, 243 00:23:37.130 --> 00:23:41.079 which is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away 244 00:23:41.599 --> 00:23:48.279 and the true light is already shining. So John is essentially saying we're talking 245 00:23:48.279 --> 00:23:52.960 about old and new in two different ways. It's old in one sense, 246 00:23:52.079 --> 00:23:56.710 it's new in one sense. It's old and that it's been said for a 247 00:23:56.829 --> 00:24:00.829 long time. We've had it from the beginning, but it's new in its 248 00:24:00.869 --> 00:24:06.750 effectiveness. It's new because the darkness is passing away and the true light is 249 00:24:06.789 --> 00:24:12.140 already shining. Okay, now what's the commandment we read on? Whoever says 250 00:24:12.259 --> 00:24:18.779 he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness. Whoever 251 00:24:18.980 --> 00:24:22.420 loves his brother abides in the light and in him. There is no cause 252 00:24:22.460 --> 00:24:32.730 for stumbling. Well, where is this light coming from then? Where is 253 00:24:32.809 --> 00:24:37.890 this newness coming from? How is the darkness of hatred and evil being overpowered 254 00:24:37.210 --> 00:24:45.599 in a way that love becomes new? I told you already the message that 255 00:24:45.720 --> 00:24:49.720 we heard from the beginning and proclaim to you chap chapter one, Verse Five, 256 00:24:51.039 --> 00:24:55.670 that God is light and any him there is no darkness at all and 257 00:24:55.829 --> 00:24:57.789 that light, as John says in the beginning of the gospel of John, 258 00:24:57.950 --> 00:25:03.630 has come into the world and the darkness has not overcome it. The light 259 00:25:03.829 --> 00:25:11.460 of God has shined into the world, Paul says. It's shown in our 260 00:25:11.660 --> 00:25:21.019 hearts, in the grace and in the face of Jesus Christ. John was 261 00:25:21.099 --> 00:25:25.250 going to build on this point to show how love is necessary in the Christian 262 00:25:25.329 --> 00:25:33.650 life. But love doesn't make us Christians. It marks us as Christians and 263 00:25:33.849 --> 00:25:37.240 without that mark, he says, we have no right to think that we 264 00:25:37.359 --> 00:25:41.799 belong to him. How can we walk in the darkness and say we are 265 00:25:41.880 --> 00:25:51.269 of the light? But in Christ when a light shines into darkness and the 266 00:25:51.349 --> 00:25:56.670 darkness is immediately gone, because that's the nature of lights, right. Darkness 267 00:25:56.750 --> 00:26:00.230 does not overcome light. When you shine light, when the darkness is overcome 268 00:26:00.349 --> 00:26:07.019 and we become children of the light, love becomes new. A new commandment 269 00:26:07.180 --> 00:26:11.900 I give you Jesus says that as I have loved you, you also love 270 00:26:12.140 --> 00:26:18.539 one another. In Jesus Christ, love is new because it's connected to him. 271 00:26:18.730 --> 00:26:22.049 We Love, as John will later say in this letter, because he 272 00:26:22.650 --> 00:26:30.970 first loved us. Each one of us here have people in our lives that 273 00:26:32.130 --> 00:26:41.119 we need to love better. You know their names and I know the names 274 00:26:41.240 --> 00:26:45.799 of the people in my life. They may be at work or here, 275 00:26:45.880 --> 00:26:52.069 in the Church or in your families? Who is it for you? Who 276 00:26:52.269 --> 00:26:56.910 is the person that you are trying desperately to love and yet not loving, 277 00:26:56.950 --> 00:27:03.579 or maybe not even trying anymore? You feel like love is slipping away. 278 00:27:04.619 --> 00:27:08.619 You wonder if it was really ever there. You wonder what you can do. 279 00:27:11.980 --> 00:27:21.250 What can you do? Two things. First, remind yourself of the 280 00:27:21.369 --> 00:27:27.609 necessity of love. Don't trick yourself into thinking that love is optional, that 281 00:27:27.809 --> 00:27:33.839 love is partial. Hear the word of the Lord and believe what he says. 282 00:27:36.000 --> 00:27:40.079 If you love the Lord, you will want to obey him, you 283 00:27:40.119 --> 00:27:45.589 will want to love one another as he is loved. You remember it's necessity. 284 00:27:48.589 --> 00:27:52.950 And Second, here the command to come, or the command to love, 285 00:27:55.430 --> 00:28:00.259 as coming from the one who is the King of love, who is 286 00:28:00.619 --> 00:28:11.460 in his very being love. God is love, whose love goes deeper than 287 00:28:11.460 --> 00:28:18.849 the deepest ocean, higher than the highest mountain. He gave himself perfectly fully 288 00:28:18.930 --> 00:28:25.369 as an act of love for you, despite all of your impurity and your 289 00:28:25.450 --> 00:28:33.119 sins and your unloveliness. He has made you lovely, even as a husband 290 00:28:33.240 --> 00:28:37.440 ought to love his wife. Jesus Christ has loved the Church and made her 291 00:28:37.799 --> 00:28:44.869 belong to him. So that he might present himself or herself to him pure, 292 00:28:45.109 --> 00:28:52.150 spotless and lovely. I do I say this to remind you of this, 293 00:28:53.470 --> 00:29:00.059 that when you are struggling to love others, remember the strength of his 294 00:29:00.420 --> 00:29:07.220 love which is given for you. In other words, you can depend on 295 00:29:07.380 --> 00:29:15.009 him when you can't depend on yourself. I know it's hard, but it's 296 00:29:15.130 --> 00:29:22.089 true. It's the message that we've received from the beginning. It's solid, 297 00:29:22.130 --> 00:29:30.200 it's stable, it's from the very mouth of God. You must rely on 298 00:29:30.319 --> 00:29:37.559 him. There's no other place to go. In prayer, in patience and 299 00:29:37.680 --> 00:29:44.589 in perseverance. Trust him. Trust him for what you need. Trust him 300 00:29:44.589 --> 00:29:49.390 to help you love beyond how you have ever loved before. Ask Him to 301 00:29:49.549 --> 00:29:56.099 put his spirit in you and teach you, perhaps, as he has already 302 00:29:56.140 --> 00:30:03.140 begun to do. This is his love toward us. You can depend on 303 00:30:03.339 --> 00:30:07.569 it, you can trust it. Let's pray.