1 JOHN 4:7-12 - The Indispensable Mark

Walking In The Light - The Epistles of John  •  Sermon  •  Submitted   •  Presented   •  32:06
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The indispensable mark of the Christian is unconditional, sacrificial love

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Introduction

G. K. Chesterton was an early Twentieth Century British author and Christian apologist who is probably most famous for his “Father Brown Mysteries”—there is a long-running BBC series loosely based on the books that occasionally surfaces on PBS and online. In one of his stories, Father Brown (picture a short, shabby Sherlock Holmes crossed with a Roman Catholic priest) solves a mystery simply by hearing a series of odd-sounding footsteps running repeatedly down a hallway. At the end of the story as he explains his reasoning that led him to solve the case, he says that “every work of art, divine or diabolic, has one indispensable mark—I mean, that the centre of it is simple, however much the fulfillment may be complicated” (Chesterton, G. K. (2019). “The Queer Feet”, The Complete Father Brown Mysteries (Annotated). Independently published.)
The idea is that in any crime (as in any work of art), there is always an “indispensable mark”, always some distinguishing characteristic that identifies and reveals it. Think of how you can hear a song on the radio you’ve never heard before but you immediately know who wrote it. Or people who can look at a painting for the first time and immediately identify it as a Rembrandt or Picasso (or a Garfunkel).
You get the idea. That “indispensable mark”, that element about a song or a painting or a dish or a story that absolutely defines it for what it is—the “Spielbergian” quality of a Spielberg movie or the “Steelerish” quality of the Steelers’ offensive line. You flip the channels on TV and see a kitchen remodel all done in shiplap and immediately go, “Hey, an episode of Fixer-Upper! Chip and Joanna Gaines!”
I believe that this notion of an “indispensable mark” is what John is driving at in our text this morning:
1 John 4:7 (ESV)
Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.
So here is what I want you to take away from God’s Word this morning—I want to show you what John is laboring to demonstrate here:
The indispensable mark of the Christian is UNCONDITIONAL, SACRIFICIAL LOVE
I want to argue from God’s Word here this morning that whatever else a Christian is known for—whatever else you affirm, whatever else you claim, whatever else you believe or do, if your life is not marked by unconditional, sacrificial love you have no warrant for claiming to know God:
1 John 4:8 (ESV)
Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
Unconditional, sacrificial love is the indispensable mark of the Christian. According to the verses we just read

I. It is who YOU ARE (1 John 4:7-8)

Look again at verses 7-8:
1 John 4:7–8 (ESV)
Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
John says that love is an indispensible mark of a Christian because love is from God—and anyone who claims to be from God must by definition be defined by love! As one pastor puts it:“In the New Birth, this aspect of the divine nature becomes part of who you are. The New Birth is the imparting to you of divine love, and an indispensible part of that life is love.” (John Piper, Quoted in Akin, D. L., Platt, D., & Merida, T. (2014). Exalting Jesus in 1,2,3 John (Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary) [E-book]. Holman Reference.)
A life marked by the unconditional, sacrificial love of God is indispensable in your Christian life, because it
Shows that you are God’s CHILD (v. 7)
You’ve probably seen the TV commercials for a popular insurance company poking fun at the idea that when people buy a home, they suddenly “turn into their parents”, right? (“Who else reads books about submarines, Dave?” “My dad...”) When you were a kid you couldn’t figure out why your dad always followed you around the house turning out the lights as soon as you left a room, and now that you have your own house and your own kids (and your own electric bill!), all of a sudden you realize why your dad did that!
The TV commercials poke fun at the inevitability of “turning into your parents”, but John is saying something very similar here (we’ve noted it before:) As a Christian, you will grow up to resemble your Heavenly Father! As Matthew Henry puts it in his commentary on this chapter, “The new nature in the children of God is the offspring of his love” (Matthew Henry, Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible: Complete and Unabridged in One Volume (Peabody: Hendrickson, 1994), 2450.)
Sacrificial, unconditional love is the indispensable mark of the Christian because it is the evidence of your being born of God. This love ties you together with other believers in a “family resemblance” that goes beyond any other connection or division of society, ethnicity, economics or education. And if your life is not marked by that kind of love, then you do not bear a family resemblance to your Father—and so on what basis are you claiming to belong to His family?
Love is the indispensable mark of the Christian—it demonstrates that you have been born of God, and it
Shows that you KNOW God (v. 8)
Look at verse 8:
1 John 4:8 (ESV)
Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
John is putting his thoughts together in a very Hebrew way here—like a line out of the Psalms he makes his statement and then immediately repeats in in another way (this time by stating the opposite thought): Whoever loves, knows God. Whoever loves not, knows God not!
Another way of saying this is to say that you cannot come to know God and remain unchanged! If you really have truly come to know Him by faith in Jesus Christ, your life will be dramatically changed!
If you have received this kind of love from God--the forgiveness of your sins by the sacrifice of Jesus--then the Bible says that it is inconceivable that you would not then show that love toward others. This is part of why Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount
Matthew 6:14–15 (ESV)
For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
Jesus is saying that if you have experienced this kind of love of God forgiving your sins so completely, then it is inevitable that you will show this same kind of love and forgiveness to others. A spirit that refuses to forgive is a spirit that shows signs of never having received this kind of forgiveness!
This is why Jesus tells the parable of the unforgiving servant in Matthew 18—where a servant forgiven a million-dollar debt is thrown into prison because he wouldn’t forgive a fellow slave a one-dollar debt. It is inconceivable that someone who has received this kind of love should not be utterly transformed by it.
And this is why for John the notion of a Christian nurturing a spirit of bitterness or hate or unforgiveness is so shocking. To go back to the family resemblance metaphor for a moment, a “Christian” characterized by an unloving, unforgiving spirit is like finding a baby raccoon in a litter of puppies--you know it isn’t one of the dog’s offspring, and it’s a mystery how it got there! John is saying here, in effect: “Don’t be the raccoon in the litter! Love one another because that is who you are in God!
Unconditional, sacrificial love is the indispensable mark of the Christian. You love because that is who you are, and you love because

II. It is why you MET JESUS (1 John 4:9-10)

Look at verses 9-10 with me:
1 John 4:9–10 (ESV)
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 propitiation for our sins.
Love is the indispensable mark of the Christian because it is through this love that you came to Jesus in the first place! You love others like this because
It is how you LIVE in His LIFE (v. 9; cp. John 3:16; 10:10; 10:28; Galatians 2:20)
This is the love that saved you:
John 3:16 (ESV)
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
This is the love that gives you abundant and eternal life
John 10:10 (ESV)
The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.
John 10:28 (ESV)
I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.
This is the love in which you live day by day, the love of Christ that empowers your joy, your holiness, your service and your peace:
Galatians 2:20 (ESV)
I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
In verse 10 John goes on to say that not only do we live in Christ’s life by His love,
It is why He DIED in your PLACE (v. 10; cp. Luke 6:27-28)
1 John 4:10 (ESV)
In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
In other words, God loved you first! He loved you while you were hating Him! Let this verse sink in for a moment: God loved you, in spite of the fact that you were His sworn enemy and a fit object of His wrath! His holy anger burned against you, He was set to destroy you, but somehow, some way--not because of what you did, but only by His own good pleasure!--He sent His own Son to be tortured to death by fallen men so that by His death fallen men could escape that wrath!
That’s what the word propitiation means—a sacrifice that takes away wrath. Beloved, you came into existence as a Christian because of the sacrificial, unconditional love of Christ for you when you were nothing but an enemy and an outlaw. And so Jesus calls you to love others the way He has loved you:
Luke 6:27–28 (ESV)
“But I say to you who hear, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.
This kind of unconditional, sacrificial love is the indispensable mark of the Christian. If you are filled with anger and bitterness and revenge and hatred for those who hate you, then you are no different from the rest of the world. But the Christian, John says, is to love the way God loves:
1 John 4:11 (ESV)
Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
The indispensable mark of the Christian is unconditional, sacrificial love—loving the way God loves you. It is who you are, it is how you met Jesus, and verses 11-12 tell us that

III. It is how you REVEAL God to the WORLD (1 John 4:11-12)

1 John 4:11–12 (ESV)
Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.
Now, of course it’s true theologically that no one has ever seen God, since God is a Spirit and does not have a body like men. But remember that in this letter John is fighting the heresy of Cerinthus and others (who taught that God was essentially an impersonal spiritual force). And so part of what John is doing in his letter is emphasizing the truth that God is not just an impersonal spiritual force, He is love! He is a Person, and He reveals Himself to the world by His love demonstrated in Christ and in His people!
When John says that no one has ever seen God, part of what he is saying is that no one has ever seen love like this! The world needs to see this love! Love that sacrifices, love that puts another heart ahead of itself, love that spend itself for others. And when the world sees love like that in you, the world sees God in you!
Sacrificial, unconditional love is the indispensable mark of the Christian because this love reveals God to the world—this love is revealed to the world
By your love for ONE ANOTHER (John 13:35)
Jesus said it plainly in John’s Gospel:
John 13:35 (ESV)
By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
We are fond of saying here that the church is God’s object lesson about the Gospel. God places us here at the corner of Main and Fugate and says to the world: “Look at the way these people love each other—this is the way I love!
What does the world learn of the love of God by watching our church family in action? Does the world around us—do our neighbors down the street and around Sykesville see a church family that loves one another, that sacrifices for one another? Do they see love that reaches across all the dividing lines that this sorry world has laid down—we love one another despite whatever differences exist between us? Our unconditional, sacrificial love for one another shows the world what God is like—and shows the world what happens when the Gospel transforms a group of people!
Sacrificial, unconditional love is the indispensable mark of a congregation, because the world sees God in your love for one another, and it is also revealed
By God’s PRESENCE in your life
At the end of verse 12, John says
1 John 4:12 (ESV)
...if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.
The old radio preacher J. Vernon McGee used to say that there were two ways to make preserves—with vinegar or with sugar. And it’s the same with people—you either get sweeter or more sour the older you get. (And right now you are probably thinking about people you know who are examples of each side!)
So the question before you today, Christian, is: What is being perfected in you? Is the indispensable mark of love growing in your life, making God’s presence in you more and more clear as the years go by? Or are you slowly getting pickled in your bitterness and unforgiveness?
Do you see the abiding presence of God in your life by the way your heart naturally bends towards loving those who hate you, or does your spirit lash out in hatred and defensive anger towards those who oppose you because they have never known God or His love?
Are you growing in the sweetness of unconditional, sacrificial love for others? Or are you constantly pouring the vinegar of lovelessness and spite and selfishness and criticism into your life, fighting the sweetness of the love of Christ in you with the bitterness of your lack of love? Are you seeking to cultivate this kind of love in the way that you speak to your family and friends, or are you a raccoon in a litter of puppies, demonstrating by your harsh and cutting words that you really don’t resemble your Father in heaven?
John says that there is no way a person can consistently demonstrate a refusal to love and be born of God. It is inconceivable that someone who has received the love of Christ that saved them while they were sinners to then turn around and refuse to show that kind of love to others.
If you have been nurturing anger and hostility instead of compassion, you need to repent. If your speech has been full of criticism, complaining and put downs instead of lovingkindness and encouragement, you need to repent. If you have been harboring resentments and grudges against a fellow member of this church family, you need to repent before God, and then go and repent before them. The eternal and authoritative Word of God cannot speak more clearly than this:
1 John 4:8 (ESV)
Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
And as clearly as God’s Word calls you to repentance today, it calls you just as clearly to hear the Gospel:
1 John 4:10 (ESV)
In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
That bitterness that you harbor? Jesus drank a sponge full of bitter gall on that Cross as He bore God’s wrath toward your bitterness. Those cutting and critical words you hurl at your family and friends? Jesus bore the curses and scorn and abuse of those who passed by Him on the Cross while He bore the punishment for your harsh words. The heart of hatred and anger and hostility that wells up in you when your enemies curse you and spitefully use you? Jesus’ heart was pierced by a Roman spear while He absorbed on that Cross the condemnation for your sin of hatred.
So take all of that sin—the bitterness, the cutting and critical tongue, the anger and hostility—and lay it down in repentance at the foot of that Cross. Demonstrate by your repentance that you truly are a child of God, and that the love that saved you is the love that is transforming your life to perfect in you the indispensable mark of the Christian: The unconditional, sacrificial love of your Savior, Jesus Christ!
BENEDICTION
Jude 24–25 (ESV)
Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy, to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen.

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION:

What is the difference between the world’s idea of love and the love that God reveals in Himself? Why does John say that someone who does not love does not know God?
What is the difference between knowing about God and knowing God as Father? Why is love a good test for whether someone knows God?
Why is it so important to remember that a church is an “object lesson” of God’s love? How can our church family grow in God’s love to one another and to our community?
What does it mean that God’s love is “perfected” in us? Pray this week that God would reveal places in your life that are characterized more by the vinegar of lovelessness than the sweetness of God’s love!
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