Dennis Tuuri

# Sermon Transcript – Reformation Covenant Church
Pastor Dennis Tuuri

As I said, we’ve been called to worship God and to learn how to live. To learn how we should live, we hear a message from God’s word. And today, the sermon scripture is found in 1 John 3:10-24 and chapter 4:7-21. First John starting in the 3rd chapter verses 10-24 and then we’ll go to the fourth chapter. 1 John 3 beginning with verse 10.

In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil. Whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother. For this is the message that we heard from the beginning that we should love one another, not as Cain who was of that wicked one and slew his brother. And wherefore slew he him because his own works were evil and his brothers righteous. Marvel not my brethren if the world hate you. We know that we have passed from death unto life because we love the brethren.

He that loveth not his brother abideth in death. Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer. And ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him. Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But who so hath his world’s goods and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?

My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and in truth. And hereby we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before him. For if our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart and knoweth all things. Beloved, if our heart condemns not, then we have confidence toward God. And whatsoever we ask, we receive of him because we keep his commandments and do those things that are pleasing in his sight.

And this is his commandment, that we should believe in the name of his son, Jesus Christ, and love one another as he gave us commandment. And he that keepeth his commandments dwelleth in him, and he in him. And hereby we know that he abideth in us by the spirit which he hath given us.

Going to verse 7 in chapter 4. Beloved, let us love one another. For love is of God, and everyone that loveth is born of God and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love. And this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten son into the world that we might live through him. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another. No man hath seen God at any time.

If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us. Hereby know we that we dwell in him, and he in us, because he hath given us of his spirit. And we have seen and do testify that the father sent the son to be the savior of the world. Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God. And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us.

God is love, and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment. Because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casteth out fear, because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. We love him because he first loved us. If a man say, “I love God,” and hateth his brother, he is a liar.

For he that loveth not his brother, whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have we from him, that he who loveth God love his brother also.

This time the younger children may be dismissed to go to their Sabbath schools. Their parents desire that for them now. Going through the first epistle of Paul to the church at Thessalonica, 1 Thessalonians. We’ve been at verses 6-8 of chapter 3 for several weeks.

My apologies once more to the congregation, the announcements for not keeping them up to date on what I’m doing in terms of the sermons. And actually there’s another complete curve being thrown in next week. Next week, right now it looks like God will be in his providence taking Roy and I up to Seattle for a meeting up there. And so Tony Tossy will be talking next week on the book of Romans. Kind of an overview looking at the first seven verses of chapter 1 of the book of Romans.

The responsive reading will be Isaiah 53. And then the following week I’ll get to the sermon I was supposed to do today which is filling up faith. But in any event what I’m doing today is I’m going to stay one more week on this theme of love. And verses 6 through 8 of 1 Thessalonians 3 talks about the good report that really changed the letter from a kind of a concern now to rejoicing over what’s happened in Thessalonica.

And basically Paul says he got this response back from Timothy. He sent Timothy. Timothy told them well they’re standing firm in the faith. And the two evidences of that were their faith and their love or their charity. And so we’ve been talking about how to stand firm in the faith in the context of different trials and tribulations that may come into our lives individually or corporately. And what we said is that it’s evidenced and really it keeps us standing firm in the faith when we exercise faith and love.

Last week we talked about love in terms of the family and we’re going to go a little broader now talking about love of the brethren. Brotherly love I suppose would be a little shorter way to say that. I talked about how definition is very important when we talk about these sort of big broad concepts particularly we live in a world that has an increasing—it seems incredible that it could continue to do this—but increasingly spirals further and further away from God’s definition of these terms.

I saw just a snippet of a video from a Donahue show that the Garretts had made. John Loughton was on with six or seven naked people. Now they had little blurs, you know, over—you couldn’t—there was nothing X-rated about it in that sense, but there were actually naked people sitting on this television stage and John Loughton was there. I guess it’s kind of a rebuttal or something, but he looked a little strange. He had kind of a Bullwinkle hat on or something. But in any event, these people were there because they’re members of an art exhibit in some museum in New York, I believe, where different sexual activities occur in the context of a museum. It’s supposed to be like art, right? And the name of this is love, “spit love.” And I don’t know where the punctuation marks go and all that, but at the very end of it, they talk about that title.

What is that all about? And they were saying, well, you know, we got to remember that love really is the transmission. Essentially, love is the transmission of bodily fluids, spit, and other things. And so, love having been redefined to be only romantic love in this culture for the last twenty or thirty years—male, female romantic love, emotions, feelings, etc.—occasionally has been defined as sex and now sex itself has been redefined as the exchange of bodily fluids somehow.

So that the definitions are really getting whacked out and far away from the word of God. And it’s very important when we use these terms that we recognize that the culture that teaches us most of our language is pagan and in rebellion against God. We want to wash out those old definitions and wash in new ones. Now, not too many of us are going to go along with love spit love. But on the other hand, most of us probably if you listen to popular music will increasingly think of love in terms primarily of male female relationships.

And that in itself really isn’t very biblical. It’s interesting to me that the word the Greek word agape is used over 200 times in the New Testament. I mentioned last week that one form of agape is the word translated beloved. That’s used 64 times in the New Testament. In the Gospels, it’s used exclusively of the father’s love for the son. In the epistles, it is used exclusively save one occurrence or it’s quoting from the gospels of the love for individual brothers or sisters within the church.

That kind of brother we love. The word agape itself is used over 200 times apart from the word beloved. And only, at least that I found, only in four occurrences out of 214 or so does it have reference to the love of a man for his wife or a wife for a man. Ephesians being three of the references and Colossians being the other. And so, you know, to limit our understanding of love to this romantic love thing is just completely inappropriate scripturally speaking.

I mentioned that Roy and I had taken this class from George Scipion a month or so ago now. And I think I’ve mentioned this to some of you individually, but I don’t think I mentioned it from the pulpit. It’s an illustration kind of what we’re trying to do in understanding what love is. George at this class was talking about dating and how he didn’t believe that dating really is a very good model. And he talked about courtship and he talked about him and his wife the first or second time they met.

They discussed what they were looking for in a marriage partner and they just got right to the business of trying to think through are we really going to proceed on to marriage and if not we don’t really want to continue to see each other. And there were two different women or number of women in the audience. There was about 25 or 30 people there or so, but two of them had completely different reactions to what he was saying.

One gal thought this was just the height of you know unromantic nonsense. This idea that you should have courtship, whatever that means, and somehow not really focus dating on the romantic aspect of love, but rather look at the goal of getting together with another gal or with a guy eventually to form a Christian household and see love in that context. She thought this was just took all the romance out of it, etc.

And another gal was sitting there quietly listening to this debate between this gal and Mr. Scipion. And after about 10 or 15 minutes, it began to get a little heated. She said she said, “I want to give a testimony here.” She said that she had troubles with her own marriage and that while her pastor had been a very godly man, he’d never really done premarital counseling or explained to them what relationship the male female relationship was all about biblically never worked through that. And she was saying this in terms of this courting versus dating thing and she said that she sees now after listening to Mr. Scipion talk and some of the scriptures he referenced etc that she saw at the root problem of their marriage really was a failure to go into this thing with the correct definition of what this relationship was all about to begin with.

Now here you had two women. One who really doesn’t get it, that what we’re trying to do, as I’ve said again and again over the last few weeks, is to rip out the old deadwood of bad unbiblical definitions and put in good biblical definitions of everything that we do across the board 100%. And so one woman wasn’t that way, the other one was and she was giving testimony to the fact that God had, you know, was saying that this is correct. This is true what Mr. Scipion was saying. That’s what marriage is all about.

Now, I say that just by way of helping you to remember that what we’re trying to do here is to look at what the scriptures say about love and let it replace any objections that we might have. If our objections are not rooted in scripture, but rather in the culture or in our heritage or in what our parents said or anything else, in other words, you don’t have to accept what I’m saying last week about expressions of love or today about brotherly love if you don’t want to. But your objection to it should be based on the scriptures, not upon some kind of thing. Well, gee, it seems to mess up the whole idea of love if that’s love is just covenant, commitment, lawkeeping, etc.

I’m not I don’t think it is just that. But what I’m saying is evaluate it according to the word of God, not according to these definitions that are that are really not scriptural. Last week, we tried to talk about expressions of love. And I was going to use the illustration. The Fabulous Thunderbirds, I think, was the name of a group, had a song, “How do you spell love?” And M O N E Y was their answer.

We last week tried to say the Bible spells love in at least 13 different ways of expressing love that the scriptures speak about. What we tried to say last week was these the outlines we handed out last week can be real helpful in two things. One, understanding how your mate expresses love biblically and what their language of love is, so to speak, if it’s biblical. And the second is to redefine your understanding of love to learn a new language and to say that when my mate does these things here that we listed last week in terms of usefulness, patience, etc. that he really is communicating love to me or who she really is. And so, so we can change our definition to be more biblical.

We talked about that last week. One other thing I just mentioned before we leave the male female relationship and go to brotherly love is that Titus 2:4, if I understand it correctly, says that the older women are to teach the younger wives how to love their husbands and love their children.

Now, it’d probably be really helpful to spend some time just on that verse. I won’t do it cuz I want to move on to brotherly love today. But just consider the implications of that. It means that if you are a younger wife who is having trouble understanding or loving your husband or your children, then maybe you should turn to some of the older women in the church for instruction in that. And you know in our culture again it’s just the other way around, right?

It’s the young people who are involved in romantic really libido sort of love and they’re the ones who think they can hear nothing from the older people about it because they’ve gone past it all. They’ve lost love, you know. Well, the Bible says no, the older gals will understand better if they’re biblical and been maturing in the faith what real biblical love is all about. They’ll help the younger girls in the context of our culture to get rid of those goofy definitions and to put instead in biblical definitions.

But today, we’re going to move on to love of the brethren. And I, you know, I these the a lot of verses I just read from First John, you know, ton of material and I’ve just picked out five very obvious facts really nothing real new in any of this for you I’m sure but we want to go over and we look at some of the implications of them a little bit just by way of exhorting each other and encouraging each other to love in the context of the church and our families in terms of the familiar relationships outside of the husband wife relationship basically.

You see the outline there we’re going to go through five points the love of the brethren brotherly love is a necessary evidence of salvation, that it is a commandment, that it involves deeds, it requires sacrifice, and it’s to be nurtured in the family. And the last point really is more of an inference. The others are directly taught in these texts.

We’ll go through those now. And at the last point, it’s really kind of an inference from some of the verses. First, love of the brother, brethren, brotherly love is a necessary evidence of salvation. And I’ve listed there from the text we read the verses that indicate this. Verse 10 of chapter 3. By this the children of God and the children of the devil are obvious. Anyone who doesn’t practice righteousness is not of God. Nor the one who does not love his brother. So he says, “If you don’t love your brother, well then it’s obvious you’re a child of the devil. You’re not a child of God.” Very point blank.

Verses 14 and 15 he repeats this. We know that we passed out of death into life because we love the brethren. Now what First John does, he sets up several tests in this book to determine where people are coming from. And for self-evaluation purposes, as well as valuing other people. And one of the big tests he’s going through here, we’ll look at a couple more verses, is one of the tests of true believers who have been born again is you’re going to exhibit like we just prayed, you know, reveal something of yourself, father, through the scriptures so that we may then understand and walk in obedience. God reveals he’s a God of love.

If you’re born of God, you’re going to love. If you don’t love in terms of brotherly love, then you’re not born of God. Okay? So, he puts this down as a test. Verse 15, And everyone who hates his brother is a murderer. And you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. Same point. Verse 19, we shall know by this that we are of the truth and shall assure our heart before him. And again saying that we should love in verse 18.

Love is seen as an indicator of whether or not we know the truth. Chapter 4 verses 8 and 20. The one who does not love does not know God for God is love. Again very point blank sort of statement. If someone says in verse 20, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar. For the one who doesn’t love his brother, whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. I think that’s a very important verse. We’ll be referring back to it conceptually several times this afternoon.

The point is that if you don’t love your brother who is a manifestation who is the image of God to you and a restored redeemed image at that in the context of the church and that’s the context of all this loving your brother. If you don’t love who’s the image of God, the redeemed image of God that you see. How can you say you love God if you don’t see?

See, it’s related to the fact he gets he gets to this. He sort of sums it off in chapter 5. Whoever is born of God will love what else is born of God. And another child of God manifests God. And if you love him, you got to love the offspring of him. You got to love the son and you got to love those who are in the son. So the point is, it’s an indication to yourself, do I love God? And if I have a hard time being around believers, and I really don’t like the manifestation of God that they carry to me.

Well, you don’t love God. That’s what it says real plainly. So, brotherly love, love for Christians, love for other members of the church, your local church, and other Christians outside of the local church is an absolutely necessary evidence of salvation. These verses pointed out strongly. This isn’t the only place. There’s other verses as well. In John 8:44, Jesus said to the Pharisees, “You’re of your father the devil, and the lust of your father you will do.

He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there’s no truth in him.” Whenever he speaketh the lie, speak up of his own, for he is a liar and the father of it. Two scenes just as we read in first John, children of the devil, children of God. Children of God love, children of the devil manifest themselves by hating. The devil is a murderer from the beginning, it says. And so if you have hate and murderous thoughts toward your brother, you’re certainly of the devil.

1 John 2 earlier in chapter 2:9 and 10, he that saith he’s in the light and hateth his brother is in darkness even until now. He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling in him. These are interesting verses because, you know, you may well be thinking, well, okay, so I don’t love my brother. I don’t love this other fella or this other gal in the church, but I don’t hate him.

I don’t have murderers. thoughts toward him. Well, see what he seems to be saying here is that it’s one or the other. And we’re going to come back to that. In fact, I should have read this verse before. We’ll look at it right now. Malachi, turn to the book of Malachi. Talk about definitions and how God’s definitions are a little different than ours. And his expressions of love are a little bit different than our expressions of love.

Malachi 1 verse. How do you spell love? Let’s see how God spells love. Book of Malachi. The book of Malachi is structured around several questions. And whether or not the question implies that the person asking the question really doesn’t know the answer, I don’t know. but these first five verses are a unit. Verse six starts a different question. Okay. So this is a unit. Verses 2 through 5. Verse two of Malachi 1.

I have loved you says the Lord. That’s what he says. First thing, but you say How hast thou loved us? And now what I’m saying is I don’t know. A lot of commentators say this indicates a lack of belief and love on the part of Israel. I don’t know. I’m not sure of the structuring device. The point is it doesn’t really matter for our purposes. Let’s look at how God shows them the positive answer to this question.

How does God express his love for Israel when they say, “How hast you love us? How did you spell love to us?” Well, listen what God says. Was not Esau Jacob’s brother declares the Lord. Yet I have loved Jacob, but I have hated Esau, and I have made his mountain a desolation and appointed his inheritance for the jackals of the wilderness. Though Edom says, and Edom is Esau, Greg pointed that out a couple weeks ago and he preached, Edom is Esau.

Though Edom says, we have been beaten down, but we will return and build up the ruins. Thus says the Lord of hosts. They may build, but I will tear down and men will call them the wicked territory and the people toward whom the Lord is indignant forever and your eyes will see this and you’ll say the Lord is magnified beyond the border of Israel. That’s the end of the little answer to how has God loved him.

Well, it’s an odd answer, isn’t it? I loved you because I chose you. I loved you and I’m going to show my love to you because I hate this other guy and I’m going to I’m going to bring him down. I’m going to destroy him when he tries to build. I’m going to tear it down. Well, now you know that’s not exactly the way we know. when we think of the expression of love is it but it has to do with what I’m talking about here in terms of hate and love in this I think one of the bottom lines of biblical love transcending through love of husband wife or love of the brethren is that it is a selective love it is an evaluation of whom God says that he loves as opposed to other people whom he does not love and God says here that the way I’ve demonstrated love to you is my hatred toward those who reject me toward Edom.

And so and so in First John, he says, well, you know, you either hate your brother or you love your brother. You’ve either got to conform yourself to my definition of love and realize that I have set my pleasure, my delight, my love upon this brother of yours and conform yourself to that. And if you don’t, then you hate him. You hate him. One or the other. Cuz that’s my attitude. He says, you’re either Jacob or you’re Esau.

You’re either beloved or you’re hated. And this person I’m showing to you, your brother here, is either Jacob or Esau. Now, I’m saying he’s Jacob. And if you don’t say he’s Jacob, then you’re saying he’s Esau. Love is a necessary evidence that we have been born again by God and conform our thoughts and attitudes and what we do to people in correlation to what God has done.

Well, I have some other verses there, but we uh you can look them up later perhaps. Maybe I’ll just read one more. Matthew 5:20-22. But I say unto you that whosoever is angry with his brother without cause shall be in danger of the judgment, and whosoever shall say to his brother Raka, shall be in danger of the council. But whosoever shall say, “Thou fool,” shall be in danger of hellfire. Kids, context of your homes, watch what you say one to another. The whole point to this first point.

If God so repeatedly throughout scripture tells us that if you don’t love other Christians, you’re not you’re not saved. Then we had better attend to the way we treat other believers. It is a very important thing. Love, as I said in terms of the Malachi passages, is prioritization. It is a conditional term. It applies to some and not to others. It is a term of election or choice. And so when God defined his love for Israel in Malachi 1, he talked about election.

He talked about his sovereign choice. And our call to love the brother in terms of obeying God is to have our elections, our choices conform to God’s elections and God’s choices. It is a covenantal term and acknowledges the covenant that God has made with his people and with those who are beloved in Jesus Christ. God has made a covenant with Jesus. And if you’re in Jesus, you’re in that covenant. And if you’re in that covenant, then you must treat other people who are in Jesus Christ in the same way that that God treats them.

And that is that they are beloved in the Savior. So love tells us to set our priorities straight. It doesn’t anticipate that we’re going to do that originally. It tells us to do it. It informs us to do it. Calvin, I’m going to be quoting several times here from Ronald Wallace’s book, Calvin’s Doctrine of the Christian Life. And Calvin said this about this concept of brotherly love and the importance of it.

We must cultivate brotherly love within the church. Whether or not we do this is the sure test of whether or not we love God. For though God from Wallace and he quotes from Calvin. I won’t tell you who’s quoting who. I won’t bother to separate the quotation marks, but essentially this is Calvin’s thought. this is the test of whether or not we love God. For though God is invisible, he presents himself to us in the brethren and in their persons demands what is due to himself.

Therefore, we should dread any dissension that might estrange us from the fellowship, realizing that whoever cuts himself off from the brethren is alienated from the kingdom of God. It is particularly within the church that we must cultivate this unity with our fellow men. For we are bound to those within the household of faith in a closer relationship than any we have with other men. Therefore, if we ought to love and serve those who are still aliens in the flock of Christ, how much more care should we give to those with whom God has already united us?

Though we must love and care for all men, our first duty in serving God aright is nevertheless to endeavor to do good to his holy servants, realizing that God since our good deeds cannot extend to him substitutes the saints in his place towards whom we are to exercise our love. Therefore, Calvin said that we must in no way despise anyone in the church for love must be connected with respect. The church then must be the chief concern of all its members.

If we do not prefer the church to all other objects of our solicitude, we are unworthy of being accounted among her members. Strong words, biblical words based upon what we just read. God says this is a big deal. The community of people that he has brought you into relationship with the church that you are in the context of that you know and this church are particularly the ones you are in covenant with.

This is a big deal. This is not just going to church on Sunday. This is the concept of the extended community that we’ve taught here for eight or nine years. And it’s important to recognize that God says minister to him by ministering in the context of that church. Now in this regard, Calvin also said something very useful to helping us understand this the way this works out in relationship to God’s demand for us that we love him with our whole mind.

Again, reading from Wallace. According to Calvin, our response in love and gratitude to the word of God must include in a preeminent place a response of the mind and thinking to the word of God. We must love the Lord with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. In this response of our faculties to God’s grace, the mind must play the leading part. And we must discipline ourselves to constant, true, and deliberate thinking about God’s word.

A true response to the word will mean not only obeying it with hands and feet, but also giving it the chief place in the minds and affections. Only if the word of God is allowed first to dominate all our thinking, is it possible for us to love God at all or to respond to him with our heart and strength? Do we know God with our minds as we ought? This matters much. Otherwise, it is impossible to love him with all our strength and with all our feelings.

For knowledge comes before love. If our knowing God is only partial, if there should still be much haziness surrounding us, our love will also be very weak. Now, I thought of this as I was reading John 17 where Jesus prays that the disciples might be unified and might have love one toward the other as the demonstration that he came forth from the father. And it is interesting because just before in John 17, just before he starts praying in terms of their being united together in love, he prays sanctify them in their truth.

Thy word is truth. As thou did send me into the world, I also have sent them into the world and for their sakes I sanctify myself that they themselves also may be sanctified in truth. And then he goes on to pray for the unity and love of the church. The importance of this is that if you find yourself having trouble loving the brother, loving brothers in the faith and sisters, that probably the first place you want to begin to look is, have you conformed your mind to the word of God?

Have you sanctified yourself in truth so that you might be united in love with the rest of the body of Jesus Christ? That comes before and we’ve called in this church again for a wholehearted commitment to do both things. To conform our minds to the word of God, to God’s law word as a command word upon us, and to then extend that we learn in that into the context of the covenant community.

Another book I’ll be quoting from a little bit this afternoon is this book that has various Puritan quotations in it. And Thomas Watson said this. He said, “The saints are the walking pictures of God. If God be our father, we shall love to see his picture of holiness in believers shall them for their infirmities, but love them for their graces. It may justly be suspected that God is not father of those who love not his children. Though they retain the communion of saints in their creed, they banish the communion of saints out of their company.

Very important, this first point, love of the brothers is a necessary evidence of salvation. Secondly, love of the brothers is a commandment. It’s a commandment from God. We’ve talked about this a little before in the last few weeks, but it is important for us to recognize that again helping us to understand that love is a conditional term. It is something not that is not necessarily just springs full forth from who we are, but it is a commandment from God and therefore can be acted upon as such.

It can be a result of the volitional act of the believer. And this is pointed out in the scriptures that we’ve just read in various places. the relationship of the love of believers to the commandment of God. Verses 11 and 23 of chapter 3. this is the message which you have heard from the beginning that we should love one another. And that’s by way of command. You should love one another. Verse 23. This is his commandment that we believe in the name of the Lord of his son Jesus Christ and love one another just as he commanded us.

I could go on. You’ve probably seen these verses lots, but if you’ve never gone through first John, it’s a good exercise for you if you want to think through the relationship of love and law, go through first John and circle all the occurrences of the word love and then circle all the occurrences of the word commandment or commandments and you’ll see that those are the two big elements of what John says in his first epistle there.

So love is a commandment from God. There are other verses as well. I list them on the outline. Leviticus 19:16-18 of course is the case law where we read of brotherly love. And it’s very important we just make one application of this we read in Leviticus 19 this is the law that related to the brother love of the brothers. Thou shalt not go up and down as a talebearer among thy people. Neither shalt thou stand against the blood of thy neighbor.

I am the Lord. Thou shalt not hate thy brother and thine heart. Thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbor and not suffer sin upon him. Thou shalt not avenge nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people. But thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. I am the Lord. Now what he says in Leviticus 19 in terms of loving your brother, he says two things. He says one, don’t bear a grudge. Don’t bear false witness.

Don’t plot his blood have his blood upon your hands. Don’t in other words seek his ill. Don’t do evil to your brother. But he says the other thing too which is he says you shall rebuke your neighbor in terms of sin. And so those are the two sides of loving your brother as defined in God’s case law in Leviticus 19. Be kind toward him. Don’t be evil toward him. But on the other hand, rebuke him and help him correct the sin that lies in his life.

Now this may seem like a little deal, but it isn’t. It’s a big deal because what it does is it says that love has as a necessary component of it justice. It takes God’s justice and his love law and links it up with the love that we’re to have one for the other. And in terms of the definitional problem we have with love in our society, you’ll probably think about a little bit. You’ll recognize the great importance of that.

Even within the church, love is seen as opposed to law, opposed to justice. Okay? Instead of as Leviticus 19 in 1 John 3 and 4 says, linked to justice as defined by the commandments. And so love is not violation or an overlooking of justice. It relates to justice and comes together. Very important.

Well, I’ve listed some other verses. I don’t want to take the time to go through them, but we’ve talked before about these verses, many of them. the fact that love is the to love God is the first commandment and Jesus said the second is like unto it to love your neighbor as thyself like unto it springs forth from it say to love the Christian is to love God we’ve talked about how Romans when it talks about our continuing obligation one to the other is the debt we have to love each other says that love is summed up in the commandments and it goes to the second tablet the last five of the ten commandments for the definition of what love to our neighbor is all about out says, “Thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal,” etc.

It put curves upon us and protects our neighbor in terms of love for them. And so love is related to lawkeeping in that way. I wanted to uh at this point make two more comments. The first is a passing comment on verse 17 of chapter 4. But by this love is perfected with us, that we may have confidence in the day of judgment, because as he is, so also are we in the world.

There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love. Okay. Now, without making a big deal out of this, I believe that what this verse may be talking about that perfect love casts out fear is not the traditional way we think of this. In other words, that God loves us perfectly. We just realize that enough that we won’t have fear.

That’s the way it’s normally applied by people that I know. I think what this is saying though in the context is he’s saying that perfect love and by that the perfect means the end of love. Love as it develops and matures and comes to its completion casts out fear because fear has to do with torment. Torment is a term used for judicial punishment upon somebody who deserves a lawbreaker. And I think what he’s saying is that it’s love of the brothers, the keeping of that commandment, which is the summary commandment in relation in conjunction with loving God, that drives out fear in our own lives when we love Christians because it assures our heart before God that we are in the faith.

And so when you don’t love your brother, fear is going to be there is you haven’t let love had its perfect result, the exhibition of that love, the manifestation of that love toward other people within the church, then you’re going to have fear because you’re guilty and you’re a lawbreaker. And torment is what you’re going to think of punishment, just punishment from God. And so because love is a commandment, the way to attain the lack of fear in one’s life according to this verse, one of the main ways we do that is to love each other.

And if we love each other, then we have clear hearts before God. Our heart doesn’t condemn us and indeed the spirit testifies that we are indeed of God and therefore removed and in Jesus Christ the beloved and removed from all punishment. The second thing I want to do is read a definition of agape versus eros is found in the theological dictionary of the New Testament. Now I know that this thing is kind of liberal and you don’t want to rely on this very much but it was interesting as I worked through the Old Testament and New Testament verses and the correlation of the two.

Agape is a New Testament. It’s a Greek term. But it was used in the Septuagent also as a translation of the Old Testament, one of the Old Testament words for love. And in fact, some people think that the Hebrew word that is most common for love in the Old Testament is the basis for the very Greek word agape. whether or not that’s true, I don’t know. But it is interesting that the word agape is used so frequently in the New Testament because really it was a very misused term almost in classical Greek prior to the scriptures.

And I’m just going to read this A short paragraph from this dictionary. The specific nature of agape becomes apparent at this point. Eros is a general love of the world seeking its satisfaction wherever it can. Agape is a love which makes distinctions choosing and keeping to its object. Eros is determined by a more or less indefinite impulse or impulsion toward its object. Agape is a free and decisive act determined by its subject.

Eros in its highest sense is used of the upward impulsion of man and of his love for the divine. Agape relates for the most part to the love of God to the love of the higher lifting up the lower elevating the lower above others. Eros seeks in others the fulfillment of its own life’s hunger. Agape must often be translated to show love. It is a giving act of love on the other’s behalf. And you see I guess that kind of and I know that summations are not really accurate.

But in many ways, our culture when it uses the word the word love, it really is talking of eros. It’s talking of the impulsion, the romantic ideal or the sexual drive, whatever it is that just sort of happens when you look at somebody you love or with somebody that you’re real good friends with. But the biblical term is a term of choice, selection, covenant, prioritization, of seeking the other’s well-being.

And that’s the difference. And that’s why God can’t command us to this kind of love. It’s not a love that springs from the heart autonomously. It is a love that God commands us toward others that he has brought us into covenant relationship to in Jesus Christ. Okay. So, love is a commandment. Now, in this regard, Hebrews 10:24 tells the tells us that we’re to provoke one another to love and to good deeds.

And I wanted to read John Brown’s commentary on that. And again, this is I’m sorry, I’ve gotten ahead of myself. I’m now moving on to point three. The love of the brethren involves deeds. Love of the brethren involves deeds. And I’ve listed some verses there. He talks about how if you have your if you have possessions and see your brother in need and don’t share with him, then you’re not really loving him.

So love involves the active uh involvement of deeds one to the other. And those deeds are commanded that we participate in these deeds in scripture. And also in Hebrews 10:24, we are actually told to stimulate one another to love and to the doing of these deeds. And I wanted to read John Brown’s commentary on that particular portion of scripture.

As members of one body, they are to seek to promote each other’s best interests. They are to consider each other. They are to attend to each other’s wants, infirmities, temptations and dangers and to administer suitable assistance, advice, caution, admonition, and consolation. In this way, in this way, they are to stir up each other to love. The word provoke or stir up is ordinarily used in a bad sense, but here it is just equivalent to excite. They are to act the part which is calculated to call forth in one another’s bosoms the workings of that peculiar affection which all Christians have to each other by doing offices of Christian kindness.

They are to excite Christian love in return. They are required to excite each other to good works. In other words, I apprehend to the labor of love. They are to do good unto all as they have opportunity and especially to those of the household of faith. Such a course was calculated at once to confirm their own faith and that of their brethren.

And so, since love is a commandment, and since love involves the doing of deeds, as these portions of scripture point out, we can then provoke one another to fulfilling the commandment and to doing these deeds by the very doing of the deeds ourselves. And so you can have a double effect from your own deeds of love one to another. And we are also then to encourage and stimulate each other to these deeds as well.

Now I would continue to put before you the model of 1 Corinthians 13 in the terms of the doing of these deeds. Now we in verse in the verse where it talks about these deeds in first John 3 he says in verse 18 of chapter 3 little children let us not love with word or with tongue but in deed in truth. Now he’s not saying there that you can’t love in word what he’s saying is don’t love just in word but love in truth and with deeds as well in other words don’t just tell your brother well I hope you can get along okay go your way I’ll pray for you but I won’t share anything thing of substance with you.

He says that is not love. Love it certainly involves words as well. We talked about that last week. But it involves words that take action then into deeds as well. And I wanted to just put before you as I said the model of 1 Corinthians 13. After all, it is an extended discussion of what love is. And I just want to read these things. I know we’ve done this several times in this in this series, but I think it’s important.

1 Corinthians 13 says that charity suffers long and is kind. Charity or love in Not. It vaunteth not itself. It’s not puffed up. It doesn’t behave itself unseemly. It seeks not its own. Is not easily provoked. Thinkketh no evil. Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth. Bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

And I think that the summation there of chapter 4, the first or verse four of 1 Corinthians 13, that first phrase is the summation of all the rest. Charity suffers long. Love is patient. And because love is positively patient, it doesn’t allow itself, remember these are commandments, these are things we can be provoked and commanded to do. Love is patient and it doesn’t allow itself to be provoked. It doesn’t allow itself to suffer when someone wrongs it to take tally of those wrongs. It’s patient. It bears up under even when the other person that we’re seeking to love does things that hurts us legitimately or even when the circumstances are such that it’s hard to continue to do good to somebody, we are patient in well-doing and so patient.

And when you analyze the way you interact with your brother or your sister in your home or your extended family or your brother or sister here at Reformation Covenant Church, those are two excellent summations of what I think the rest of these things in 1 Corinthians 13 is telling us to do. Ask yourself how patient you are with that person that you sit next to in the pew or with the person maybe you sit across.