“First John 4:7-12”

Tuesday, October 24, 2017

“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love. By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him. In this 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 also ought to love one another. No one has seen God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us.”

--- End of Scripture verses---

“Love is from God” (verse 7). Of all the marvelous gifts and blessings that God has bestowed upon His creation, love is the greatest (1 Corinthians 13:13). It was God’s love that prompted Him to create mankind in His image, to produce a “very good” living environment that abundantly provides for all human needs (Genesis 1:31), and to sacrifice “His only begotten Son” for when we frequently refuse to reciprocate that love and sin—“so that we might live through Him” (verse 9). It was not our loveliness that motivated the Father to offer up His beloved Son for us. He loves us because of what He is, not who we are.

The love of God found its ultimate “manifestation” (verse 8) in the loving person and the perfect sacrifice of Jesus. The Father “unveiled” the depths of His love through sending Jesus to die for us and be the “propitiation” (verse 10) that satisfied His divine wrath which our sins incurred and we deserve. The Father also “revealed” His nature to us through the life of the Son of His love. “No one has seen God at any time; the only begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained Him” (John 1:18). To be in the presence of Jesus was to see God “manifested in the flesh” (1 Timothy 3:16). While it is impossible for any person to see God in all His radiant glory and survive (Exodus 33:20), to be in the presence of Jesus was to see the “glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14)…and love.

“God is love” (verse 8). Love is not merely an attribute of the Creator or something that He feels or does; love is God’s very nature and essence. Everything that He does is governed by this overriding, pervasive quality of divinity. “To say ‘God is love’; implies that all His activity is loving activity. If He creates, He creates in love; if He rules, He rules in love; if He judges, He judges in love. God’s love has its ultimate issue in bringing men to live in his eternal life: ‘that we might live through him.’” (Paul W. Hoon, “The First, Second, and Third Epistles of John, Interpreter’s Bible”)

“Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (verse 11) The love of God should prompt us to not only love the Lord in return, but also love our fellow participants in the human experience that have been created in His likeness. We who have been born again by the Gospel of Christ, and recreated through His sacrificial blood have been called to emulate our gracious Father, and follow the example of our loving Savior. “Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children; and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.” (Ephesians 5:1-2).

Please read 1 John 4:13-17 for tomorrow.

Have a great day!

-Louie Taylor

Share