Introduction: Grace be to you and peace, from God our Father, and from our Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ. Our text is the Epistle Lesson just read, from 1 John 4. We begin with prayer.
Dear fellow disciples of our Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ:
- Surely love has always existed. God is love, and God is eternal. Therefore surely love has always existed. But love has not always existed in human hearts. Our text asserts that “whoever loves has been born of God.” Love does have a birth in humans – it accompanies being “born of God.”
- Some do not love – those who are yet to know God, yet to know that “God is love.” Among humans, love must be born. In order that this blessing might occur, God has loved the world – in the gift of His Son, our Redeemer, our Savior.
- But some will argue that of course love exists – even in those who do not know God. They assert that everyone is capable of love. One might counter this argument by posing that those who think this way do not really know what love is – or recognize just what limitations exist in unregenerate human beings.
- And we know that love is variously defined – even in ways that are a direct contradiction of love. So many define love today in terms of personal pleasure, personal satisfaction – when real love is often just the opposite: sacrifice, suffering, persecution, misunderstanding, and loneliness.
- The birth of Jesus, His life, His suffering, death, and resurrection is “THE BIRTH OF LOVE” for human beings, for:
I. In Christ God’s Love Is Made Manifest, Clearly And Plainly Revealed To All Mankind
Text: “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 blood atonement for our sins.”
Statement: A person not knowing God’s love in Christ might ask why we should love God at all. He might point to the apparent ambivalence of God’s creation toward the pleasures, well-being, and even life of human beings. He might point to earthquakes, storms, floods, tornadoes, disease, aging, and hunger – and argue that if “God so loves us, perhaps He doesn’t deserve our love.” This is the perfect proof that love is not born within us – by nature we have no love for God. In fact, even among those who know God’s love we struggle to love Him enough to fully trust His Word, to be eager to worship Him every chance we get, to love His other children and support them, and to be content and confident in what He has given us.
Application: Those who acknowledge this are eager to hear of how God has loved us – by sending His Son as the blood atonement for our sins, including our lack of love for God and our lack of genuine love for others. God’s love, and real love, is “manifested” among us by Christ’s self-sacrifice, by His commitment to serving us, our real good and welfare, taking the just punishment for our sins of lovelessness upon Himself in His suffering and death. This is love – not some feeling, not some self-satisfaction, not some fulfillment of pleasure. Love is tough in a loveless world – not on others, but on the one loving.
So “THE BIRTH OF LOVE” corresponds to the birth of Jesus, the Lamb of God, the blood atonement for our sins, and also for the sins of the whole world. Love is sobering and serious.
Transition: But this manifestation of God’s love brings great blessings, for:
II. God’s Love In Christ Jesus Gives New Birth To Fallen, Spiritually Dead, Sinful And Loveless Human Beings – By Enabling Us To Know God As He Actually Is
Text: “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.”
Statement: The knowledge of God’s love does not come from observing nature, our natural world that is under the curse of human sin. There is witness even in nature as to mankind’s problem with sin – which God intends as a blessing, to call us to repentance. It is a neat trick that we try to play – blaming nature and God for our own darkness, rather than allowing the witness of nature to convict us of the dastardly darkness of our sin and lovelessness, our selfishness, pride, and apathy toward the good of others, and even malice toward others.
Application: God’s love is however made manifest in Jesus, in the atonement and peace that He has provided for us in His gracious mercy and forgiveness in Jesus our Savior. He is the clear revelation of God’s great love for us, and thus “THE BIRTH OF LOVE.”
If we find this difficult to believe and to understand, it may be because we remain unwilling to love, and thus unwilling to actually grasp and stand in awe of God’s love. But “THE BIRTH OF LOVE” in us requires a proper understanding of how beholding we are to God for His gracious mercy and forgiveness. It is exactly as Jesus asserted: “the one who is forgiven much loves much, but the one who is forgiven little loves little.” [Luke 7:47]
Transition: But for those willing to humble themselves in genuine repentance, love is born, and:
III. Those Born Of God, Those Who Know His Love For Us, Also Love One Another – Especially Those Others Who Have Also Been Born Of God, Our Fellow Christians
Text: “Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”
1 John 5:1 “Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father loves whoever has been born of Him.”
Statement: So you see how our coming to the knowledge of God’s love is “THE BIRTH OF LOVE” in us – and only to the degree that we know God’s love are we capable of love. And we come to know the degree of God’s love by knowing and confessing the great sin and guilt that Jesus has atoned for and forgiven. The more clearly we understand God’s forgiveness in Christ, the greater our love.
Application: And we must remember that love is not just a warm fuzzy feeling, one which gives us a sense of inner fulfillment. Rather love is defined by God’s love in Christ – it is laying down one’s life in service of another, especially in the service of those who have also been born of God. It is at times sacrificial, painful, lonely, and even deadly – for not all will requite love with love. You know how Christ’s love was requited, and Stephen’s, and John the Baptist’s love for Herod.
Transition: And because this love is so strange and unusual, noticeably noble and admirable, it is important for us to continue growing in our knowledge of God’s love – through greater repentance, for:
IV. Our Love Is The Proof And Evidence Of The Existence Of God, The Evidence Of The Power And Reality Of His Love In Christ – So Let Us Abide In Love And Abide In God
Text: “No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and His love is completed in us.”
Statement: Obviously people have “seen” love – although true and genuine love, sacrificial love that is in keeping with the truth, often grinds unbelieving and unloving people the wrong way, confronting them with their lovelessness and selfishness. Such love is at times like a stab into the heart of the loveless and unbelieving, a profound evidence that their unbelief is grotesque rebellion against God and hatred of God – an unwillingness to be one of His children. Nonetheless, it is proof and evidence of God and of the power of His love, so that those who reject Him in unbelief are without excuse.
Application: So our very lives are witness to “THE BIRTH OF LOVE,” real and genuine love, sacrificial and selfless love. They are witness to God Who is love, and to the power of His love. Surely this is what we want to be, and what we will to be – bright stars bearing witness to the light of God’s love and shining His love into all the world!
Conclusion: So John encourages us to receive new birth from God, through faith and the knowledge of God’s love for us in Christ Jesus. He concludes: “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.” As we continue to confess our sins and to rejoice in God’s loving forgiveness, we will be growing in love.
So let us abide in love, that we may indeed abide in God. Then we have assurance that God abides also in us. So we allow Him to nurture within us the life of love that He Himself has birthed in us in His beloved Son, our Savior Jesus Christ.
This is the real joy of Christmas – “THE BIRTH OF LOVE.” Amen.
Votum: And the peace of God, which surpasses all human understanding , shall keep your hearts and minds in the true faith, which is in Christ Jesus, even unto life everlasting, Amen.