Genuine Love

Reading: 1 John 3.1-24
Some time ago I read an article about the uncovering of a big art fraud. Someone had been doing paintings in the style of seventeenth-century Dutch painter Jan Vermeer and selling them on the international art market as genuine originals.

The paintings were apparently quite good - done by someone who might well have made a name in his own right. Meticulous care had been taken to "age" the canvas and paints. For many years they had been bought and displayed by some of the world's major art galleries. Art critics wrote approvingly about them - what fine examples of Vermeer's work they were!

Then someone suspected a fraud. Extensive tests were done, with the conclusion that they were frauds. Suddenly these same art critics changed their tune. The paintings were obviously not Vermeer at all - just a shoddy attempt to make money out of the famous painter's name!

A young woman went to a magazine editor. She was wanting to become a writer.

"And what sort of things would you write about?"

"I would like to write about love…" she replied.

"And what is love?" asked the editor.

With that, the young woman got a far away misty look in her eyes. "Ah, love…" she said, "love is the moonlight shimmering on the surface of a lake. Love is soft lights and sweet music…"

"You have some more living to do," said the editor, "before you can write about love. Love is caring for an elderly relative when communication is all but gone. Love is getting up to a sick child before your spouse is woken. Love is caring and giving…"

An earlier song-writer said that "what the world needs now is love, sweet love." But the love songs of the past are getting replaced by the plea, "Please let me go - I don't love you any more!"

Truly God's Children

Today's reading begins with God's genuine love. "How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!" (v.1).

John has a sense of marvel about it. The Father has made us his children, his family! This is something that the world at large doesn't understand or recognise. Of course we have come through a long period in which church membership and attendance have been regarded approvingly. We cannot understand how it could be otherwise. Yet all that has begun to change. The Church, particular Christians and Christian beliefs and values in general are openly attacked in the media to an extent that we would never have thought possible. These days some latest guru is more likely to get approving media exposure than a significant Christian leader.

Yet it is not a question of what is popularly accepted but what God in his great love has truly done. And our present status as "God's children" is only a beginning of his work in us - "…what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is" (v.2).

All too often we do not look like, feel like or act like God's children. Yet God, in his great love, has made us his children. And when Christ appears in glory in the end time, we will be transformed to be like him. Seeing him as he is, we will be changed into what we were meant to be. Our status will become our character.

Now that's something to anticipate confidently! And "everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as he is pure" (v. 3). It is true that we face the reality of sin in our life, yet we can never rest contented with that, simply looking for change in eternity - we can never be comfortable about the presence of evil in our life. No! We recognise that even now we are to be involved in the cleansing of our lives.

And that is essential if we are truly children of God! "Sin is lawlessness" (v. 4b). The very purpose of Christ's coming was "to take away our sins" (v. 5). In his gospel, John records the Baptist's description of Jesus as "the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world" (Jn 1.29). The death of the sinless Son of God was the unique means by which forgiveness of sins and new life were made possible for all who would trust in him.

"No one who lives in him keeps on sinning…" (v. 6a). Sin is alien to the Christian life, though it is common enough in Christian experience. The key to overcoming sin is that "God's seed remains in him; he cannot go on sinning, because he has been born of God" (v. 9b). We do not pretend to be sinless, but the reality is that the nature and character of God are going to become more and more visible in us.

Genuine Love

And when we think of the nature and character of God, we immediately think of - Love! So the expected nature and character of God within us will be marked by love!

Already in the previous chapter John has put this in explicit terms - "Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness. Whoever loves his brother lives in the light… But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness…" (2.9-11). And now he has slipped it in again! "… anyone who does not do what is right is not a child of God; nor is anyone who does not love his brother" (v. 10b).

Family relationships provide the environment in which the genuineness of our life is tested. The family is where we can see the greatest love or the greatest bitterness! John gives the example of Cain and Abel - the first recorded murder (Gen. 4.1-17). Cain's action showed that he "belonged to the evil one". He murdered his brother "because his own actions were evil and his brother's were righteous" (v. 12) - a further illustration of v. 10.

But, while love was to characterise the Christian life, they were not to expect instant love and acceptance from the people about them. "So do not be surprised, my brothers, if the world hates you" (v. 13). That reminds us of the words of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount - on the one hand, "… let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven," yet on the other, "Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you" (Mt. 5.16,11-12).

So Jesus himself has given us the warning. Our lives are to express continually his genuine light within our community to the end that others will be drawn into faith. The reality is that many will reject God's light and we ourselves may become the target of that rejection. That was certainly the experience of the early Church. Active persecution is still experienced in a number of countries today.

The reason for that persecution or hatred is not to be because of funny mannerisms or dress… but the genuineness of God's life within us, a life expressed in love. John says, "We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love our brothers" (v. 14a).

And love must be expressed in the practical giving of ourselves. "This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us." This is the standard of true love. "And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers" (v. 16).

In the early church this love was conspicuous. "No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had… There were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need" (Acts 4.32,34-35).

"Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth" (v. 18). The genuineness of love will be seen in the action to which it leads.

Confidence before God

John has written about the less-than-enthusiastic response we can expect from people who reject God. He now writes about the confidence we can have in the presence of God.

It is because we are truly God's children that we can "set our hearts at rest in his presence whenever our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything" (vv. 19b,20).

Do you have that problem, an overwhelming feeling that you are never good enough? God knows. He is greater than your conscience. Yes, there are many things about all of us on which he is still working! We've still a long way to go - all of us! But God knows. He knows that at the heart of us we believe in his Son Jesus Christ - the one who gave himself as "the atoning sacrifice for our sins" (2.2).

"Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God" (v. 21). This quiet conscience doesn't mean that we believe ourselves to be perfect but that we are consciously relying on Christ our Saviour.

Confident faith leads to confident prayer - "we receive from him anything we ask (Jesus had promised that "my Father will give you whatever you ask in my name," Jn 16.23) because we obey his commands and do what pleases him" (v. 22). It is a confidence that comes, not from our high spiritual and moral achievements, but from our trust in Christ our Saviour. "And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us" (v. 23) - it is the redemptive work of his Son that brings us forgiveness and it is by continuing in the fellowship of his people that we are "purified from all our sin" (1.7-9).

In the Christian life we "live in God and God lives us." He does this through the Holy Spirit whom he has given us (v. 24).

Put simply, the Christian life is the life of God lived out in the life of the world through ordinary people who believe in him. It will be characterised by love and practical service.

Yes, the world needs love, real love. There is a desperate drought of genuine love all around us. But the world needs God, the real God. He is the source of genuine love and life. Those who want to continue to reject God may not like the genuine article when they see it. And too often our lives are flawed and the genuine article is partly hidden!

But God hasn't finished with us! Let's keep going forward together with him!


© Peter J. Blackburn, Home Hill and Ayr Uniting Churches, 21 May 2000
Except where otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from the New International Version, © International Bible Society, 1984.

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