9th February 2024

9th February 2024


Pray (ACts)


Read (1 John 4:7-12 focus v11-12)


Message (Alan Burke)


If we are honest it is hard to love especially as Christ has loved us. We fail at it time and time again but John doesn’t point the finger at us reminding us how much we fail, no he instead takes us back to the love that has been shown to us. Knowings Knowing God’s love for us, his love towards us his enemies, those who are unloveable should be our motivation to love one another. 


The love that he has shown us that is applied to us by the Spirit of God, and the example of what Christ has done for us should spur us on to love him and to love one another. We are able to love even when someone is unloveable, of course that doesn’t mean it will be easy but we know what the Lord has done for us and we seek in our lives to live accordingly, to mirror the love that he has shown to us. For each and everyone of us the motivation to live as a christian, to love as a christian comes down to what Christ Jesus has done for us, if we fail to comprehend that sacrifice for our sin then every error in our lives can be traced back to that, but when we understand the riches of what Christ Jesus has done for us then we will be willing to love even when there is a cost, even when there is a risk of being hurt. 


We love not because it is a condition on the salvation that we have received, no our salvation is already secure in the Father’s love, in the sacrificial death of our saviour Christ Jesus who was our propitiation, our atonement and that as the Spirit has applied to us. No, we love not because it is a condition of the salvation, or because we fear losing that salvation, no we love because it is a byproduct of the Love of God towards us. Since God loves us we are to love, that isn’t that surprising a concept or least I hope it’s not but John has acted like a broken record because we need to get it, we need to be reminded about this because it is hard. Are you doing what you can to love others, or are you trying your best at self love and forgetting those who have wronged you, forgiving, being reconciled? Are you willing to love as God has shown his love towards you?


As we do this, as we love one another, as we love as we have been loved then God’s love is made complete in us, to put it another way, when we love one another we are showing God’s love, it is being fulfilled, shown forth its intended result. As we mimic, as we mirror God’s sacrificial love, it may be hard for us, we may be rejected for it but we continue to do it because of just how much love we have been shown in Christ Jesus. There were those who in John’s day had claimed that they were from God, there are many today who claim the same but the ultimate proof of that is that we love, we love one another. As we do that God reveals himself in us, and while no one has seen God as he is, his presence is discernible here amongst his people as they love one another and it shows them for who they are. 


In the Christian life we are not passive participants in it all we are active, we will desire to mortify our sin, put it to death and as the Spirit works within us so we become more and more conformed into the image of our saviour, more and more into the likeness of Christ. The longer we walk the journey of faith the more and more we should be conformed into the likeness of our saviour, ever increasing amounts of love we should have, as we reflect the character of God in our lives. Let us be those who love even if there is great cost, love as we have been loved. 


Pray (acTS)


Sing


WSC
Q64 What is required in the fifth commandment?
The fifth commandment requireth the preserving the honor, and performing the duties, belonging to every one in their several places and relations, as superiors, (Eph. 5:21) inferiors, (1 Pet. 2:17) or equals. (Rom. 12:10)
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