What It Means To Love

I posted a few days ago that I would be talking about each part of the tagline of this blog.  Today we will be looking at “love”.

John 3:16-21 (For God So Loved the World)

¹⁶ “For God so loved the world,^[i] that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. ¹⁷ For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. ¹⁸  Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. ¹⁹  And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. ²⁰  For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed. ²¹ But whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God.”

Part of life is not only living but loving.  One can live life but not really live life if you cut out love.  We see the fullest version of that in a verse that even football fans know, John 3:16.

There are a few key points within this text that not only show us what looks like but also how its lived out.  It of course starts out with the verse that everyone knows.  The verse that says that God loved us so much that He sent his son but also that this son makes it possible to “not perish”.  We found out that later in scripture “not perish” is a nice way of saying escaping the wrath of God for or sins (Romans 1:18; Ephesians 5:6).

Along with this we see throughout this scripture not only a demonstration of love but how we are to, as Christians, live it out. One of Christ roles is as an example.  In verse 17 we see that Christ came into the world “not to condemn it” but so that we could be saved through Him.  This can also easily apply to how we present the Gospel.  We are not to condemn, God’s law has already done that (vs. 18-20).  We are to point to Christ, our savior, and simply say, “He is your salvation”.  How many times have we not let the Holy Spirit do what He does.  Let the Holy Spirit convict and condemn them.  In the end only His conviction will truly crush a sinners heart, your words will only scratch it.  Point to Jesus.

Lastly, verse 21 points us to an amazing truth about who God is and who we are.  Though at one point we were lovers of the darkness (sin), He has saved us and brought us to Himself.  In doing so He shows us that its His work that saved us not ours!

Is there a place for rebuke? Of course!

Is there a place to call sin what it is? Of course!

Should we love like Christ has loved in all areas (family, friends, church, work, etc) of our lives? Absolutely!