Let's pray together. Father, I ask this evening that once again the Holy Spirit would be our teacher. Quiet our minds and open our hearts to receive the words of God. Help us, I pray, to come to a fresh appreciation for this marvelous attribute that we call love. Thank you for revealing yourself to us in all of your glory. Help us to get an ever increasing glimpse of the glorious attributes you possess so that we may worship you as we ought. I pray this in Jesus' name, amen.
So we read in our text tonight, God is love. It does not say that love is God, as some would phrase it, for that is not true. But it does say that God is love. In other words, love so fitly describes the essence of God's being that it can be said God is love. It also says in the New Testament that God is spirit. And once again, that very simple three-word phrase significantly gives us insight into God's essence. He is not a man as we are. He is not composed of material. He is not physical.
He is immaterial. He is spirit. So it is said God is spirit. And then it is said God is light. In fact, John says that in this very epistle. Light there being not physical light as we think of it, but rather moral light. It says God is light and in him is no darkness at all. That is, there is no moral blemish on God whatsoever. And that apparently manifests itself in glorious light. And so it says God is light. But here we have the statement God is love.
This is a truth that is known only by the revelation of God in the Word. This truth could not be known through creation. This morning we talked about natural revelation and how God reveals certain aspects of his invisible person to us through creation. But love is not something that comes to us through the creation. Love comes to us through the written Word of God. In this way we understand that God is love. Of course, this is in quite contrast to the heathen gods of the world.
The heathen gods are gods that are angry, who demand appeasement, to assuage their anger and wrath. But that is not the God of the Bible. It is true that there is the wrath of God, but that is not the same as the kind of anger that men imagine for their so-called gods. God has revealed himself as love. Let's think about a definition for that. What does that mean? Dr. Lehmann Strauss, who is a very fine Bible teacher and author, makes this statement.
I think of the love of God as that eternal and essential attribute, that principle of God's nature, whereby he is moved to communicate himself to man, regardless of any sacrifice on his part. It seems to me that there are several key thoughts there, but the one I want to point out is that his love is what moves him to communicate with us, even though we're sinners.
Richard DeHaan, in his book The Living God, says, there is in God a quality or attribute which moves him to self-communication or self-giving. Some people misunderstand the love of God and think that it is a kindly indulgence with sin, that it is some sort of weak sentiment, as though God were a kindly old grandfather. That is not the Bible's understanding of love when it says God is love. In Unger's Bible Dictionary, we find this statement.
Love is the highest characteristic of God, the one attribute in which all others harmoniously blend. The love of God is more than kindness or benevolence. The latter may be exercised toward irrational creatures, but love is directed toward rational, personal beings. God's love is the ground for which and upon which he deals with us. Love is the basis of all of his dealings with you and with me. Perhaps we can understand this a bit by comparing it to the love that a parent has for his child.
Parents love their children. That is just natural. There's deep affection and concern for each child. And God is the same way, only of course in a much more complete sense. Love as a parent protects his child, so God protects us. He's concerned with our safety. You and I need not fret and worry over our safety, for God is concerned about us. And as our parent, in the spiritual sense, as our heavenly father, he protects us.
The angel of the Lord camps round about those that fear him, and he delivers them, says the psalm. God protects his children. I personally believe in what are sometimes termed guardian angels. Now it's not that God has to have angels to do his bidding. He doesn't, but he chooses to. God doesn't have to have us to get the gospel out either, but he chooses to use us, doesn't he? And in the purposes of God, he has created spirit beings that we call angels.
And I believe that he has given angels to be charged, which are charged to guard us and to watch over us in our earthly journey. I believe that those angels are not present only in childhood, but that they are present throughout our life to protect us. They are stationed with us as official guards of God's children. Royalty guards its children, and it must in the world in which we live.
We're delighted to have our friends from England here this weekend, and we were talking this afternoon about England's royalty and about the marvelous events that have taken place there in the last year with the wedding of Prince Charles and Princess Di, and now her expecting a child and so on, and the excitement that takes place around royalty. That's hard for us to grasp, isn't it, in America?
We have the children of presidents or of other leaders, and we sort of set them apart, but if we had the mindset of those who live in a system of government that had royalty, we would have even a deeper respect for royalty and for the children of royalty. Well, not only is the queen protected, but her children are protected. They are guarded and kept, for they are very important. And you see, we are the royalty of God. God in His love has destined us to sit on the throne with Jesus Christ.
I can't explain to you why He has chosen to do that, except that it pleases Him to do so. And because we are the eternal royalty of the universe, God, our Heavenly Father, loves us and out of His love comes protection for us. He guards us. And then parents provide for their children, don't they?
We provide in love for them, and sometimes that means we withhold things that we know would hurt them or things that they may not appreciate fully at this particular point in life, but we provide for their needs, and we delight to do that. Would we not be disappointed if our children had something they truly needed and yet feared to come to us or if they felt that we would not provide for their needs? That would be alarming to us. Well, it's alarming to God when He sees our lack of faith.
You see, if a father knows how to give good things to his children, doesn't God know how to even give the Holy Spirit to his children? God will care for us and provide for our needs spiritually, physically, in every way. He will provide for us, and He delights to do that, and He loves to see us trust Him to provide those needs. And then we play with our children.
That's an important part of a parent's relationship to his children, to play with them, to nurture that kind of intimacy that comes only by the informal playing. I would suggest to you that God delights in knowing us in a similar way. Not that He plays with us in the earthly sense, but God delights for that kind of intimate fellowship with us, whereby there are times when we draw very near to Him and address Him not as Father, but as Daddy.
You see, that's the meaning of the word Abba in the New Testament. And it says that you and I have the privilege of addressing Him as Abba, Father, that term that a little child would use for the one that He loves and respects and knows so well. God wants us to draw near to Him in the same sense and know that intimacy of fellowship and communion because He loves us. And then because we love our children, we discipline them.
We spank them or stand them in the corner or send them to their room or any variety of ways. I suppose most parents are always looking for new ways, more meaningful ways, more effective ways in which to discipline children and to get the point across that obedience is very important to learn. We see God, because He loves us, disciplines us too. For whom the Lord loves, He disciplines. There's a Father, His Son, in whom He delights.
Boys and girls, children, your parents discipline you because they love you. Now, I know sometimes that doesn't seem to fit very well, does it, with what happens? You wonder how someone can spank you or ground you for a week or whatever and still love you. But the fact is because they find such delight in you, because they love you so thoroughly, they want you to grow up to obey so that you may enjoy life to its fullest.
They discipline you because they love you, and likewise, God disciplines us because He delights so very much in us. And so whatever the situation may be, God's love is the ground for all of His dealings with us as His children. Love must have an object by its very nature because you see this kind of love, agape love, is love that gives because it delights in the object. That's the whole point of agape love. It gives out of delight. God has expressed agape love toward a number of objects.
Let me just suggest them to you quickly. In the first place, God has said that He loves His Son, the Lord Jesus. When He was baptized, when the Lord Jesus was baptized, God spoke from heaven audibly so that people heard Him. And what did God say? This is my what? Beloved Son. The Lord Jesus is the eternal object of God's love. John is sometimes called the apostle of love because he writes so much about this.
I'm going to ask you to turn back to the Gospel that he penned and look in chapter 17 at the words of Jesus as he prays. In John chapter 17, as we look at the chapter, it's almost ground that a sensitive person fears to tread upon because in this chapter we have recorded the intimate prayer of the Lord Jesus Christ to the Heavenly Father. And among the other things that he says, I want you to notice verse 24. Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am and to see my glory.
By the way, isn't that a wonderful prayer? That's a prayer for you. Two thousand years ago, the Lord Jesus Christ prayed that one day you would be with Him in heaven. And why? So that you could see His glory. Isn't that tremendous? And do you think that it's possible for God the Father to deny the prayer of His Son? One of the reasons I so strongly believe in the security of the believer is because of the prayer that Jesus prays here.
He says, I want those you've given me to be with me that they can see my glory. And God will answer that prayer for every single one who belongs to Christ. And then he goes on to say, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world. You see, even before time began, the focus of the love of God was upon God the Son. But not only so. I would have you notice in chapter 16 verse 27 another word from the Lord Jesus regarding the object of the Father's love.
He says, no, the Father Himself loves you because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God. So the second object of God's love I would point out is you. God loves you just as much as He loves His Son. Can you imagine that? How much do you suppose God the Father loves God the Son? Is there any limit to that love? Could words ever describe the extent to which God the Father loves God the Son? I think not.
And yet it is that very same love that God has for you and for me who have loved Jesus Christ and have believed in Him. Again in chapter 17 verse 23, Jesus says, I in them and you in me, may they be brought to complete unity, to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. That conjunction there even as means to the same degree. Just like you have loved me, you have loved them. And He prays for the unity of believers.
And I'd like to say that that is not a prayer for the fulfillment of the ecumenical movement. That is not a prayer for organizational unity. In fact the prayer that Jesus prays for unity in John chapter 17 has been fulfilled. It was fulfilled on the day of Pentecost. No prayer that the Lord Jesus Christ ever uttered could ever be unanswered. If Jesus were praying for organizational unity then His prayer is unanswered. What He is praying for is for the essential unity of believers.
And that occurred on the day when the Holy Spirit came and united all of us in the body of Christ. And so don't be fooled into thinking John chapter 17 is a prayer for ecumenical unity. It's not. It's a prayer that has been fulfilled in the unity that is ours through the Holy Spirit that dwells in each one of us who belong to the Lord Jesus Christ. And then there is another object of God's love. And we see this in Romans chapter 5.
If you know the Romans road you know where I'm heading and what stop I'm looking at. In Romans chapter 5 verse 6, these words, you see at just the right time when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love for us in this. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. The third object of God's love is the world of sinners.
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. And so God loves His Son. That's the first object of His love. Secondly, God loves the saints. And thirdly, God loves sinners. While He hates their sin, He loves them and desires for them to be saved, according to Paul's writing to Timothy. His love of God is uncaused. It is free according to God's own purposes.
Now what I mean by that is that there is nothing in us that provokes or occasions God's love. God loves us because it delights Him to love us, not because we are worthy of His love. In fact, you remember what John said in chapter 4 verse 19. We love Him because He first loved us. He did not love us because we evidenced love toward Him. Rather, we evidenced love toward Him because He first loved us. Now the manifestation of His love is seen in several ways. Let me suggest three very quickly.
God's love is manifested first in the cross of His Son. No man can ever say, God doesn't love me. God loves all men, and He gave His Son for the ungodly. It is hard for us to imagine what must have gone through the mind of God as the Lord Jesus Christ hung upon the cross. Because God loved His Son, there had to be some sense there of grief, I suppose. It would seem that way. But the most amazing thing is that the Bible records that God's chief emotion at that time was not grief, but delight.
That seems strange, doesn't it? That God the Father would delight in the suffering of His Son if pleased the Lord to bruise Him. In Isaiah 53 we read that. Why could that be so? Because God saw that through the suffering, through the death of His Son, you and I would be saved. God's love is manifested in the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. If you want to see love, then think of the cross. Dr. Lehmann Strauss again says this.
There never has been a man in all the world who ever knew anything experientially about the love of God apart from the sacrifice of Jesus Christ at Calvary. There is no word in all of human language for that kind of love. The soul of man is so precious to God, he could not stop at any cost to have it for himself, going even to the extent of self-sacrifice. Man may hate God, curse Him, deny Him, and defy Him. Still he pursues the vilest enemy in order that he might do him good.
This is God. This is love. He is the God of love. God's love, secondly, is manifested in the calling of the Christian. I invite your attention again to 1 John chapter 3. God's love is manifested first in the cross of His Son and now in the calling of the Christian. In 1 John 3, verse 1, it says, 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. Isn't that a great statement?
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. An amazing statement. God has called us to be His children. We have a high calling. We have a holy calling, since we are granted this title, children of God. A rich inheritance is ours as His children. Indeed, in Christ we are the heirs of all things. Our inheritance is so rich that someday even our bodies will be changed to be like Christ's body.
It says in verse 2 here, Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. Did you know that? You look at yourself in the mirror and you will know it. He says, But we know that when He appears, that is, when Christ appears, or is made known, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. Our calling is to be just like Jesus Christ. Someone has said, God so loves the Lord Jesus Christ that He wants a whole heaven full of people just like Him.
And that is what He is going to have in you and me who belong to Christ. For someday we are going to be conformed in every aspect to be just like the Lord Jesus Christ. What a calling is ours. The poet has written, We can only see a little of the ocean, just a few miles distant from the rocky shore. But out there, far beyond our eyes' horizon, there is more, immeasurably more. We can only see a little of God's loving, a few rich treasures from His mighty store.
But out there, far beyond our eyes' horizon, there is more, there is infinitely more. Do you know that it is God's pleasure to show how much He loves you, not just in this world but throughout eternity to come? Read the second chapter of Ephesians and rejoice in that truth. That in the ages to come, the unnumbered years of eternity, God is going to continue to show His love for us by doing one kind thing after another for us. He is going to lavish us with His love. What is He going to do?
I have no idea, except to say that He is going to do kind things for us, because that is what the word says. And so His love is seen in the calling of the Christian. How should we respond to God's love? Well, first we must receive it. Perhaps the worst sin in the world is to reject love. Recently I read, and perhaps you did as well, about the several children who were found, I think on the West Coast as I recall, who had never known love. Do you remember that?
They had been locked in a darkened room for all the years of their lives. Their mother was mentally incompetent. The one child, the oldest child I believe was eight years old, six years old, thank you, had never known the arms of love about his neck. Was like a wild animal. When another person approached him, he hissed and drew back. Because he has never known the tender touch, because he has never heard the words, I love you, doctors say he is probably permanently retarded, will never develop.
I think there are three younger children and they have some hope for them. The worst sin is the sin against love. Dear friend, God loves you so much. I wish it were possible for us tonight to grasp how much God loves us. If it did, it would break our hearts. It would change the way we act. It would transform the priorities that we have set and by which we live. If only we could understand how desperately, how utterly God loves us. The greatest sin is the sin against love and to refuse it.
If you have never received God's love and the person of his Son Jesus Christ, I trust that you will tonight receive him and be saved. And then we ought to love him back. Not only should we receive his love, but we should love him. And we should serve him out of love and be bond slaves of love, as was Paul. And then our response to God's love thirdly should be that we should love our brothers. Here in 1 John 3, there are some words that are striking along this line.
In verse 13, he says, Do not be surprised, my brothers, that the world hates you. We know that we pass from death to life because we love our brothers. Anyone who does not love remains in death. Anyone who hates his brothers is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him. This is how we know what love is. Jesus Christ laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.
If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need, but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue, but with actions and in truth. Love is more than a syrupy, gushy statement. It's even more than a hug, although there's a place for that too. But love takes action by its very nature. It takes action to meet needs, and we ought to love our brothers.
And then finally, because of the love of God, we should respond by loving sinners as he has. God has loved the world and has given his Son for the world. What have we given for the world of lost men that they might be saved? Do we see them through the eyes of God, or do we see them through eyes of complacency and self-righteousness?
Do we see that person who is undeserving, cruel, or blasphemous, and despise him, or do we see him as a truly needy, lost, dying sinner who needs the good news of Jesus Christ? How can we respond to God's love by loving the same objects that he loves? D.L. Moody said, I know of no truth in the whole Bible that ought to come home to us with such power and tenderness as that of the love of God. The enemy of souls, Satan, tries to persuade men that God does not love them.
And the message that you and I have the joy of declaring is that God does love them and desires men to be saved. As we come tonight to the Lord's table, this is the agape feast in a sense. There's a time when we celebrate the love of God, the love that he has for us. It's also a time for us to remember our love for one another.
As we prepare ourselves for the Lord's table, I'd like for us to take our hymnals and to sing together number 325, which is a hymn that I hope you can sing with real passion and meaning. Jesus, I am resting in the joy of what thou art. I am finding out the greatness of thy loving heart. This is a hymn that expresses the thoughts of a person who is communing with the Lord Jesus. And I hope tonight that it expresses your thoughts as we come to the Lord's table.
It was John, the apostle, whose book primarily we have looked at tonight, who was the apostle of love and who leaned upon Jesus, upon his breast there at the Last Supper in the upper room when this feast was instituted. And it's he that I think of as I think of these words, Jesus, I am resting in the joy of what thou art. Let us stand as we sing the first verse, as we prepare ourselves for communion.