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Love is Action!

February 1, 2025, 12:00 AM

Love is Action!

John, in 1 John 3:11-18 says, “For this is the message you have heard from the beginning: We should love one another, unlike Cain, who was of the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his deeds were evil, and his brothers’ [deeds] were righteous. Do not be surprised, brothers and sisters, if the world hates you. We know that we have passed from death to life because we love our brothers and sisters. The one who does not love remains in death. Everyone who hates his brother or sister is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life residing in him. This is how we have come to know love: He laid down his life for us. We should also lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. If anyone has this world’s goods and sees a fellow believer in need but withholds compassion from him ​— ​how does God’s love reside in him? Little children, let us not love in word or speech, but in action and in truth.”

In six verses John gives the fundamental difference between life in Christ and the lost world. The one distinctive thing we should possess, that makes us different, is love. Notice three (3) things John says about love. (1) The evidence of Christian life is love. How do you know if you have passed from death to life? If you are saved? Do you have eternal life? What kind of evidence do you look for to substantiate your claim to be a Christian? Verse 14 says, “We know…because we love our brothers and sisters.” The evidence of the life of God in us is the love that flows through us. No love, no life. It is that simple. Verse 15 says, “If you hate your brother (or sister) you are a murderer and you don’t have eternal life dwelling in you.”

How do you know what love is? How do you define it? What kind of love is scripture talking about here? (2) The knowledge of love is Christ. 1 John 3:16 says, “This is how we have come to know love: He laid down his life for us. We should also lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.” We know what love is because Jesus demonstrated it when He laid down His life for us. More than words, more than feelings, love is a determination of the will which manifests itself in concrete action. Paul in Romans 5:8 says: “But God proves His own love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us!” John 15:13 says, “No one has greater love than this, that someone would lay down his life for his friends.”

Lastly, (3) the practice of love is sacrificial and tangible! 1 John 3:17-18 says, “If anyone has this world’s goods and sees a fellow believer in need but withholds compassion from him ​— ​how does God’s love reside in him? Little children, let us not love in word or speech, but in action and in truth.” The love of Jesus was sacrificial; He laid down His life for us. Even as Jesus laid down His life for us, we must do the same for others. This kind of love is not stingy, selfish, cold, uncaring, and it does not seek its own. It always looks out for others. One of the reasons many Christians do not help others in need is because they consume everything God gives them on personal, selfish desires. If we have eternal life, we will practice sacrificial love. But it must also be tangible. Verse 18 says, “Little children, let us not love in word or speech, but in action and in truth.” When we claim we have the love of Christ, but that love never expresses itself tangibly, we invite the criticism that we are hypocrites…talking the talk but not walking the walk. In John’s day, even as in ours, there were many filled with spiritual platitudes that lacked practical action. James 2:15 says, “If a brother or sister is without clothes and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace, keep warm, and eat well,’ but you don’t give them what the body needs, what good is it?” Real love always expresses itself both sacrificially and tangibly. When we see the evidence of life…love in consonance with the love Jesus showed us…expressed sacrificially and tangibly, it brings assurance and confidence to our hearts that we belong to Him!

James