What Love Is This?

Seventeenth Sunday Pentecost Sunday After Pentecost
Light of Christ Anglican Church
The Rev. Michael J. Moffitt September 15, 2024

SCRIPTURE: 1 John 4:15-18

As many of you know last week one of our dearest and closest friends went to be with the Lord. His name was Brian Zimmerman, and we had been friends for over 50 years.

At the beginning of 2021 Brian was diagnosed with stage four lung and esophageal cancer. The oncologist put together a plan of attack against the disease but that would only delay the inevitable, and he would likely die within 6 months. Up until that time he had been very healthy, so this diagnosis came as a shock to him, his wife and children, and his many friends. He fought the battle against the disease for 3 ½ years but a little over a month ago he found that he also had inoperable brain cancer. On Thursday September 5th at 11:04 Brian entered into the presence of the Lord; he was 72 years old. Over the years Brian and I had many conversations about that moment when we would pass from this life into the eternal presence of God. We both were living for that moment when the promise to those who were faithful followers of Jesus Christ would enter into his holy presence. That promise alone changed how we would live our lives now.

From the moment Brian heard the news of his cancer I never once heard him, or Karen express their anger with God or to question why this was happening. We drove to Roanoke to basically see them and those times we had such sweet times of prayer and reminiscing. We knew that we live in a fallen world where everyone will at some point be confronted with the fact of their mortality. I don’t think the question, Why me!” ever came up. Because the answer would certainly be “Why not me?” They never questioned the goodness or faithfulness of God because they understood the price that Jesus paid on the cross for our sins and the reality that one day they would behold him face to face. That’s the first thing that I thought of when I found out about Brian’s passing. “I wonder what he’s experiencing right now?”

I confess to being a little jealous. The point I’m making is that Brian’s faith in God and his word had grown over the 55 years since he had bowed down before the Lord in repentance for his sin. Embracing Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord changed everything.

I remember the many times when those of us who had encountered Christ in the early 70’s gathered to study God’s word and to sing praises to God. One of those songs was based on Romans 8:38-39,

“For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Brian’s love for God was not based on the Lord’s material or physical blessings. It was based on the truth that the Lord and King of the universe loved him enough to die for his sins. That fact still surprises me today, as I consider what kind of love would do that. Only God’s love. Actually, that promise rightly understood should be enough to carry us through whatever comes our way.

At some point we must seriously consider the promise of God’s word for those who come to him by faith in Jesus Christ, which is magnified many fold when we come to understand who it was that made the promise to us. Think about that. God Almighty, the Lord and King of the universe was concerned about you. Let that percolate for a while.

Today I want to consider what it means to “love the Lord our God with all of our hearts, souls, and mind” and how that enables us to love our neighbor as ourselves. We’ll see what kind of love can bring about a transformed life and for this to happen, even to those who struggle. This kind of love is not possible in our own strength, which is good news to those who have been unsuccessfully trying to do so on their own. Our primary passage will be our epistle reading from 1 John 4:11-18, but I want to lay the foundation upon which John was building in his epistle.

Our Old Testament reading this morning is from Isaiah 45:18-25. It gave Israel (and us) all the reasons needed to trust in God completely.

Throughout the writings of the Old Testament God declares who he is and why he is worthy to be praised, honored, and glorified. We can find these type of verses throughout the word of God over and over again. Our passage this morning is an example of God declaring his glory and worthiness to be praised and to be obeyed.

Consider Isaiah 45:18,

“For thus says the Lord, who created the heavens (he is God!), who formed the earth and made it (he established it; he did not create it empty, he formed it to be inhabited!): “I am the Lord, and there is no other.”

By sheer repetition, Isaiah virtually pounds it into our awareness — that God is our Creator, and we have obligations to Him as our Creator. Throughout the Book of Isaiah, and we could easily say throughout the whole of scripture, God reveals himself through his word and the illumination of the Holy Spirit. In verse 21God challenges those who put their faith and trust in wooden images who cannot save, by virtue of the fact they are merely wood. God reminds them that they should listen to him if for no their reason than he is the one who created the wood. And the second part of verse 21 again he reiterates, “And there is no other god besides me, a righteous God and a Savior; there is none besides me.”

I love the simplicity of salvation in the next verse. “Turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth! For I am God and there is no other.” It doesn’t require a seminary education or the need to read many books on theology. Actually, it requires but one thing and we find that in three simple words, “Turn to me”. That is all. It is the simplest, most basic thing any person can do, yet the most difficult to do in daily living because other things grab our attention and often end up having greater importance to us.

Even though Israel continually rejected God and turned to worship the gods of pagan nations and were sent into exile in Babylon for it, God would not reject them but instead he offered a way for them to return to the holy city, Jerusalem to rebuild the temple that had been completely destroyed. Why would God act in such a way towards those who had been so unfaithful? Why would the only true God who had openly moved before Israel in powerful ways be willing to forgive them when they preferred worshipping a piece of wood, stone, or metal? I have read these stories so many times and I still marvel at God’s patience and love. Truth be told, I marvel at his patience with me.

The Psalmist sings the same acknowledgement about God in Psalm 33:6–8,

“By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and by the breath of his mouth all their host. He gathers the waters of the sea as a heap; he puts the deeps in storehouses Let all the earth fear the Lord; let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him!”

In Isaiah and the Psalms, we find the reasons that we should love God and stand in awe of him. He is our creator and there is no one like Him. The question before us this morning is: what does it mean for us to love God in the way he is speaking of? Is it different than what we have offered him in the past? Let’s turn to our epistle reading from 1 John 4: 7-8,

“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.”

In verse 7 John uses two words when speaking about love, “agape” and “agapao”. The difference isn’t huge, and both are translated love. The Apostle John is the only one who tends to make the distinction, with the exception of the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 2:4; 5:2. I wanted to bring it up because I believe that it makes a helpful way to think about agape love. The Greek word “agape” is a noun and “agapao” is a verb. In essence the noun form Agape is the motivation behind the verb form Agapao. God’s love within us is the source of love that compels us to move through that love into the lives of those we come in contact with.

If this has proven true for you as you grow in Christ then that should be an encouragement. If that is not true of you then that’s a cause for prayerful concern.

We are not commanded to love one another to earn or become worthy of God’s love. We love one another because we are loved by God, and have received that love, and live in light of it.

“Let us love one another, for love is of God”: John’s emphasis on love among the people of God is to be the result of God’s love being poured into them. Listen to 1 John 2:9-11,

“Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness. Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in him there is no cause for stumbling. But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.”

Here, he shows why it is so important. If love is of God, then those who claim to be born of God, and claim to know God, must be able to love one another in the body of Christ. Again, John insists that there is something that is given to the believer when they are born of God; a love is imparted to their life that they did not have before. Christians are not “just forgiven” — they are born anew by God’s Spirit.

Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5:17,

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.”

In verse 7 John writes that those who are born of God “know God”: There are several different words in the ancient Greek language translated “know” into English. This specific word for knows (ginosko) is the word for a knowledge by experience. John is saying when we really experience God’s saving faith in Christ it will show by our love for one another.

Obviously, this love will never be perfected in the lives of a believer this side of Heaven. But, though not perfected, it must be present, and it should show signs of growing as we live into an intentional pursuit of Christ. We should be always longing for more of Christ within us through the Holy Spirit. If we are not growing in our love for one another John writes, “Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.” I have seen this lived out in situations within those we’ve been close too. I want to share one of them with you this morning.

My mother died in June 1981 leaving my father as a widower. The next year Dad went to his 33rd High School reunion at Jefferson High School in Roanoke. This is also the Alma Mater of our own Constance McDearmon, although many years later. At the reunion my father met a woman that he went to high school with but didn’t know her then. She was a widow of around 5 years I think. They started dating and one day Dad wanted to talk with me because he was planning on asking Marcia to marry him. Of course it felt weird, but I gave him my blessing and she accepted his proposal. She lived in Martinsville, but they would live at Dad’s apartment in Roanoke. The wedding came and they were off on their honeymoon to Myrtle Beach. They returned having had a wonderful time and life returned to normal for about 6 weeks. I received a phone call from Marcia telling me that Dad had a massive heart attack and wasn’t expected to live through the night. The cardiologist told me that there had been severe damage, and he was left with 15% heart function. Actually, Marcia had insisted on taking him to the hospital and that’s where he went into cardiac failure. They were keeping him comfortable although he was having severe pain. Marcia was so scared that Dad was going to die, and I think it was in some ways reliving what happened with her first husband who died of brain cancer. I went into CCU to see Dad and although he was in pain he wasn’t afraid. Seeing Jesus face to face was a favorite topic of his. One of Dad’s best friends came in and anointed him oil and prayed for healing. Praise God he not only lived through the night, but he lived another 27 years and never had more than 15% heart function the rest of his life. God really knows how to make things.

While he was recuperating he complained that he had lost his peripheral vision on the right side. An MRI showed that he had a tumor on his pituitary glad that would need to be removed. They would go in through the side of his head and remove the tumor. Marcia was simply livid and expressed her furious anger against a God who would treat one of his faithful servants like that. She vowed that she would never again go to church, She was done with God. I saw a calmness come over my father who had the wisdom to be quiet. As it ended up she was true to her word and would never accompany my father to church or any of his Full Gospel meetings. However, every morning after breakfast Dad and Marcia would sit in the living room and he would read scripture to her and make whatever comments he felt the Lord laid upon his heart. Then he would pray for her, asking God to let her know of his love. This went on from 1984 until 1998 when she died. She found out that she had cancer in her throat as she woke up and couldn’t swallow. She had surgery so that she could swallow and they removed the tumor but the cancer had spread. My father took care of her every need, even those things we would prefer paying someone to do. Approximately a month before her death my father lead her in prayers of repentance, and she publicly confessed her anger at God. She wrote letters to both of her children letting them know that she had been foolish but God in his mercy lavished her with his love. I was there when she breathed her last. My father was crushed because he knew that Marcia had been the love of his life. I saw him cry out to God, not in anger but in thanksgiving. He knew where she was and someday he would join her before the throne of grace. I wanted to tell you this story because my Dad was the greatest example of faithfulness to God that I could remember. I believe that the difference between him and Marcia was the strength of their relationship with God. My Father passionately loved the Lord, and you couldn’t be around him for 5 minutes until he wanted to know if you knew Jesus or not. As it ended up wasn’t finished going through medical crisis’ but he never ever failed to thank God for whatever was going on. I’ve often wondered if Marcia knew Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord until shortly before her death. I know she was a faithful member of her church and had been for most of her life. But her faithfulness was conditional. If God did something that made her mad she turned away from him. My father would not have dreamed of such a thing. What God had already done in his life was reason enough to praise him no matter what happened. I’m very grateful for that legacy.

One of the most serious problems within much of the church today is the misunderstanding that God isn’t like us and has no reason to live up to our views of who He should be and how we believe He should act. Our prayers should be that His love through Christ in us would reflect his glory and his love to those around us. That’s really the gospel story.

Yesterday I saw a picture that was supposed to be the Apostle Paul sitting at a table. The caption was, “The Apostle Paul entered heaven to the cheers of those he martyred. That’s how the gospel works”.

Let’s pray.