Today we review where we've been in the last month, and add some observations we missed the first time around.
Springfield Baptist Church
July 7th 2024 - Pastor James Tyler - 1 John 3:16-24
So this is supposed to be a review Sunday and I don't mind admitting that not only did I struggle with whether or not I wanted to review, I struggled with whether I want to finish first John because I don't know if this is common to preachers or if I'm special but I get to the point where I just feel like I'm beating a dead horse and I don't want to drag you all through that with me and it's possible that you know God gives us great freedom in preaching and teaching to make decisions about where we divide the text like well there's nothing in Scripture that says you have to preach an entire chapter each time or I mean there weren't even chapter divisions until the 1500s so of course there's not that in Scripture but we have great freedom in autonomy to decide how we want to split these things up and there are times where I feel like ah I didn't plan this quite right because we're we're revisiting these themes too much and then I'm reminded that Jesus said on a number of occasions how many times do I have to go over this how long do I have to labor with you and he's talking to his 12 what would ultimately be his apostles and I think well we're not better than them so maybe we need the horse to be beat to death so that we actually comprehend and apply it so what I'm going to do is we'll we'll work from 16 through 24 and we're gonna go I think I ended up it ends up being on average two verses a chunk you'll recognize some of what I'm gonna talk about because it is a review of where we've been in previous weeks but some of it obviously will be embellishment and and and improvement on what we've talked about so let's start at 16 by this we know love that he laid down his life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers when we first visited this text what I pointed out was that we see love defined in the actions of Jesus Christ both in his life and his ministry and then ultimately in his death and here I put in my notes define it and then in all caps you have to because I don't want to keep doing this but I have to keep doing this until I feel like you could all say it back to me right or somebody comes to me and says this is why you're wrong I'll take either one of those you all start saying it back to me or somebody comes to me and says this is why you're wrong Jesus life ministry death and resurrection defines love as an act of the will the will of God was involved it's accompanied by emotion the redeemer wept tears over Jerusalem it's designed to do somebody else good and it's done at your own expense so this is how I believe the gospel would define love so when you hear the song what is love the next thing I want you to hear in your head is not baby don't hurt me I want you to hear it's an act of the will accompanied by emotion designed to do somebody else good at my own expense and I think if we get that into our mental repertoire we could really have a profound impact on the culture around us whether that's in the living room or in the break room at work or in the cafeteria at school there's a whole bunch of people really confused about what love is right like we love tacos and we love go cards and we love presidential candidates and it's like I don't think you do I mean it's you're I think you're very fond of those things but love is an act of the will accompanied by emotion designed to do somebody else good at your own expense I have to define it so what did Jesus do he demonstrated and defined love now let me set up this is where the review part will be helpful to you okay there is a difference I think between a template and a guide so when I think template I think I remember one time Lisa and I came home from I remember where we were but the kids were like just old enough to stay home alone I think we took Audrey with us or maybe she was a grandma and grandpa's but Sam and Kate were home alone and Kate was like I want to say she was eight seven or eight years old at the at the oldest and we come home we set our stuff down and it's kind of the evening and I'm looking on the table and there is a drawing of the dog I don't know which character it is Mr. Peabody or Sherman which one's the dog that's Mr. Peabody so there's a drawing of Mr. Peabody cut out fully colored and sitting on the table and I'm like oh no Kate must have decided to cut up one of her books or something and so I'm like oh where did this come from and I show it to her and she's like I drew that and I'm like no you did there's no way you traced it it's too perfect it was too good and I like I was blown away and she wasn't lying she in fact drew it because I made her do it again and show me that she could just the outline I was like all right I buy it but what we used to do most of us when we were kids is we would lay a piece of like more transparent paper over something and then trace the outline and the light is best we could like that's a template or to think gingerbread cookie cutter right that's a template it gives you this same thing every time you use it it's exactly to size exactly to scale Jesus didn't give us a template of love he made us the object of his love and in so doing accomplished something really really profound all right so another illustration when you're first learning to write letters or draw shapes you can look at the thing that you're trying to draw and you can try to just you know your two or whatever recreate what you see with your eyes but it's really helpful if somebody comes along and takes your hand and guides you through the motions the movements to make the character or the shape you know that hasn't happened when somebody ends up being left handed right they didn't have anybody to guide them and how to make the motions they just had to figure it out on their own the master in this case guides you through the motions of loving by making you the object of his love here's how it works when Jesus laid down his life for you you got a feel for what it is to be loved the first time you discovered if you haven't I know some of you probably haven't but if you have discovered that Jesus loves you the first time you discovered that there was some mixture of emotions and it had to include a level of unworthiness and a level of astonishment right that I could be loved by the Son of God in spite of what I know I am I mean I can have all of you fooled but I can't fool myself and I certainly can't fool the one who knows the thoughts of my heart before I have them that is astonishing and amazing you did not feel like it's about time somebody recognized how wonderful I am when when you realize that Jesus loved you right okay so Jesus laid down his life for you it gave you a feeling for what it means to really be loved when he called you by name it gave you a feel for what it means to really be loved because it wasn't an accident you didn't get caught up in a net that was intended for somebody else and thereby come to know Jesus Christ he calls you by name writes your name in the book of life and will never erase it that gives you the feel for what it means to be loved yeah here's the outcome after the master trains you to love he sets you loose to love others and just like everyone's handwriting is different the way that we love one another is a little bit different it's not a template we've been taught by experience what it means to love and if you're in Christ you can't help but then go love people and john 13 12 it says when he had washed their feet put on his outer garments and resumed his place he said to them do you understand what i've done to you you call me teacher and lord and you are right for so i am if then your lord and teacher has washed your feet you also ought to wash one another's feet for i have given you an example that you should do just as i have done to you now the principle at work here is obvious do what jesus did right okay the part that i think we miss the part that that we at least lose sight of is the powerful motivation provided by jesus affection for us jesus did not take the disciples out of the upper room go out on the street and find some cripple and wash his feet and then go and then you want to get in between the toes and then do the tops of the feet and then go now you go and do what i just did that's not what happened he washed their feet so they could get a feel for what it meant to be loved by jesus christ to be cared for by him he gave them the sense the feel of love now when i say he died for you he called you out of darkness he heals what's broken in your heart by your sin i need you to understand how he does that at profound expense to himself at the complete expense of himself he has showed you love i don't know if shown is a word i keep forgetting to look it up so i'm going with showed second karantians three verse two if you're taking notes you yourselves are our letter of recommendation written on our hearts to be known and read by all and you show that you are a letter from christ delivered by us written not with ink but with the spirit of the living god not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts so paul's writing to the church at corinth and you know this is after he he gave him a severe beating in first karantians he writes them this epistle of second karantians in what he just did was he said you church at corinth are exercising you are manifesting you are practicing what jesus christ has done for you that we happened to teach you about but you are acting out what jesus did for you and so he says you are a letter from christ to who let's pretend we're the church at corinth for just a minute and those of you who are just visiting don't worry no pressure those of you who are members pretend we're a letter from christ who are we a letter from christ to think about it and this i mean i'll make it painful right off the bat moms and dads who are you a letter from christ to yeah your kids grandma and grandpa who are you a letter from christ to those grandkids right them grand babies so then we come in here and this is where the bible starts who are you a letter from christ to look around you're a letter from christ to one another and these things have to be in place and be being practiced and exercised before we can begin to move the focus out right you're a letter from christ delivered by us written not with ink but with the spirit of the living god not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human heart so understand these movements that we've learned from the master's hand guiding hours these like acts of love seem so trite but these acts of love which jesus accomplished were certainly redemptive in the first place so that's first what do we what do we call the work of jesus as a work of redemption most definitely and the experience of his love is redemptive it brings you out of the dark place the dismal place the dreary place the sorrowful place into the place where you go you know what if nothing about my cancer my tumor my ms or my crippledness or my blindness or my deafness or my inability to talk or the fact that my kids autistic or whatever none of that changes i know this i'm loved by god and i have a life yet to come where there will be no more sorrow and no more tears redemptive but they were also training so what john would say is by this we know love that he laid down his life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers verse 17 if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need yet closes his heart against him how does god's love abide in him little children let us not love and word or talk but indeed and in truth so why have the elders of spring field baptist church chosen to focus on this need to develop in community because if we don't properly understand and apply this mandate to love one another and and we're not familiar with it and then we spring into community engagement what will we be deploying to the culture what will we be a letter of and from whom will it be written if we can't get it right in here then well let's ask the question this way does our culture need another community center or is the one that they've put over here good enough does our culture need another club does it need another co-op does it does it need another moose lodge or we squared away on that stuff i think we have enough what our culture needs is christ yeah so what we're supposed to do is be a letter from christ to one another so that once we've worked that out we can go be a letter from christ to the culture if we're not practiced and thereby skilled at loving others if our hands don't know the movements of christ if we're not fluent in and experienced in the extremely high cost of loving one another and then we happen to bring some really messy people in here into this place what do you think will happen happens at churches all the time we've heard the horror stories we've talked to people at work are really yeah i went to church once and they you know i didn't fit in i didn't know when i was supposed to stand up or sit down or i didn't know the words of the songs it felt awkward they only wanted my money like we've heard all this stuff right well that's what happens when a church has not first learned how to be fluent in loving one another and gotten familiar with the extremely high cost of loving one another and then tries to go engage with the world and fumble around and have no idea how to be a letter from jesus christ to the culture around her so my question is what do you think will happen if we don't learn those things and somebody shows up here all right so the next question is do you love your brothers and sisters in church okay i know you had the one of maybe three or four responses but let's say three of the four were yes and then you got to the person where you're like no my question is if you love the brethren how how do you do it what are you doing what actions are you taking and then my next question would be once you get that in your head you're like well you know what james i don't know if you're trying to trick me or what but the answer is yes and here's how then my next question is how'd that work out did you get it reciprocated did everybody notice did you did i take an article out in the paper to talk about how you loved somebody at church or did it just go completely under the radar all right and then if you got to the person who would they we were like well except for them yes i love people except for them whoever that is if you got to them in your head my question is what's going on in your heart and what will happen to the lost person who wanders in here on a sunday and they meet with that version of your heart the one that you keep shriveled up towards a brother or sister and let's say that lost person comes in and they remind you of that brother or sister what's going to happen now these things are not easy right we have to get this otherwise we will hardly be a church we'll be something but i don't think it'll be a church lack of action is evidence that a renewed appreciation for the love of god is needed that was another thing that we saw and i said so let me be direct at the risk of being heavy-handed some of us need to do better from where i stand i'll start with me i made it to one of the five nights of vbs the other four i was like ah too tired from work and i hope that whoever didn't make it to any is sitting there just shrinking down in your seat right now no i don't but i think we need to do better and i think there's a myriad of ways that us doing better at loving one another could be put on display like you would see it happening if if we were doing better you in in my imaginary magical world lisa never sends out another hey everybody we need food on sunday because the calendar is filled up for four years with people clamoring for the opportunity to love the brethren that's an example no i'm not saying that's nowhere in here okay that was just an example i'm not oh man we're gonna be quick to like the instinct upon the discovery that our hearts have been closed is to try to compensate and i just made the colossal potential mistake of giving you an example of how you might prove that your heart is open so now what the the instinct will be to like get busy with counterfeit religious activity or words now you know somebody will come up to me and go i i keep can you send me that link i keep forgetting i've been meaning to sign up to let me know that you really are spiritual you just hadn't gotten around to it yet right that let us love in word no no no let us love indeed and truth right don't come tell me i don't have anybody in mind i just see the messages that she sends out and it always cracks me up because she'll send it and then it gets buried by 14 things that have nothing to do with what you just said and we can all go oh that didn't happen we're good we don't have to worry about that and i wish it wasn't lisa doing it so that it wouldn't sound like i'm up here grinding an axe for my wife's sake i told her to quit sending them like six months ago and she's like i'm not going to quit sending them people need to be reminded they're forgetful because she's just got a better heart than i do the actual prescription for a closed heart is a fresh view of christ first john three nineteen by this we shall know that we are of the truth there we go by this we shall know that we are of the truth and reassure our heart before him for whenever our heart condemns us god is greater than our heart and he knows everything okay so the potential here is i just i'm pretty sure for the second time in almost three years said something a little bit nasty to you all a little bit uh direct right we need to do better so instead of being calo from the pulpit i was paul and and maybe you're feeling some conviction maybe you're feeling like oh man i need to do more and i immediately told you no you don't that's not the solution the solution for discovering that you have a closed heart it shriveled up kind of miserly heart is you need to get another view of jesus christ remember it's not a template he's the master who guides you and he guides you by loving you redemption was experienced by you he took you by the hand guided you through the motions you felt what it meant to be loved and then he said now what i've done for you i want you to go do for other people right so if you're not doing it for other people is it you need to try harder or did you lose the feel so you need to go back to jesus and you need to confess your miserly heart to him because he's the one that can love you right out of that you need to get your feet washed and you need to get your heart tended to and then you'll be able to actually reassure your heart now he says we we reassure our own hearts by loving indeed and truth john would argue that a doubting discouraged christian ought to be able to find some encouragement in the fact that they have been past tense engaged in acts of love or loving the brethren so um let's just talk about the fact that there are so many things that can discourage us right no okay i won't do it i find it hilarious that the cpi and the ppi came out this week and you've got um pal testifying to congress about the economy and the feds signaling they're going to cut rates in the coming months right but inflation has continued to increase uh oh for those of you who are get your news from the news you're not aware of this you're just hearing it for the first time inflation has continued to increase after the feds stopped uh hiking rates uh much to their chagrin and unemployment is rising which is what they want that's how you slow down inflation it's a long story uh but it's discouraging when you like i went i took uh adri and i went to family fair that's what it's called right it's my favorite grocery store it's exactly the caliber of grocery store someone like me belongs at i don't know if you've ever been there it's in bellview off of like harvall and galvin uh it's a frightening place to go and i love it and so adri and i were there and we're just walking around killing time and i'm looking at the price for like like a four pack of like knock-off egg McMuffins frozen thirteen dollars i don't go grocery shopping i at least a handle it so all the sudden my heart went out to her that she's got to go contend with this we don't buy that kind of garbage thankfully but you could imagine if somebody does eat that way they're going absolutely broke so then i was like looking at the produce and i'm like oh that's even worse like a thing of raspberries that i will eat in three or four handfuls is seven dollars it's crazy it's discouraging right my check which is bigger than i ever imagined it would be when i was 15 years old barely covers the bills that's where we're at it's insane it's discouraging Tim and i agreed before service that i would not bring up so consider this god has ordained that your love for the brethren serve as an encouragement or an antidote for the malaise created by not just the discouragements of life in this involving world but the malaise and the discouragements created by your own remaining sin and corruption and faults and failures that's what the passage is saying you're back up to 19 for me by this we shall know that we're of the truth and reassure our heart before so what he's saying is in the midst of needing some reassurance for your heart some some improvement of your heart's condition you should be able to recall something that's happened and use that to encourage your heart well what is it little children let us not love in word or talk but indeed in truth and in truth by this we shall know that we're of the truth and reassure our heart before so what happens is if you've been loving the brethren like you you do stuff to love the brothers and sisters at church and then you encounter something discouraging in the midst of your day to day life what you're supposed to be able to do is go yeah you know what though you know what though at least i've got them at least i've got these things that i've been engaged in fostering relationships growing the community of faith strengthening the bonds of fellowship right this was your supposed to or you discover oh my gosh my remaining sin is worse than i thought it was the thing that i just did or the thing that i just said or the thought that i just had is so far beyond where i thought i was on the sanctification scale that now i've got a demote my mental image of myself back down to the gutter but what you're supposed to be able to do in that moment is go how about but you know what you know what i do love the brothers and sisters and encourage your own heart with that but the fact of the matter is most the time we get down in the dumps because of life and all the discouragements of the world in which we live or we get down in the dumps because of our own sin and we're looking for this thing that we're supposed to be able to know that we are of the truth and reassure our heart with them we're like oh man that's not there either because i ain't been doing anything for anybody now what are you gonna do now you're missing the prescription that the bible gives you for a discouraged heart think about this in terms of three tenses past tense first reflecting on your own past acts for your christian family is powerful evidence for your heart right now when the accuser comes and tells you how worthless and selfish and miserly you are you're supposed to be able to like push back against that with thoughts of of of the fact that god has loved you and you've loved other people presently if you're discouraged right now you can as a prescription engage in acts of loving the brethren to encourage your heart out of that malaise when you've been waylaid by the accuser and then future um i want to put this the right way look look all right yeah this will work whatever you're doing today whatever you end up doing today to love the brethren and by the way showing up to church is a giant act of love of the brethren in my opinion in our day and age like we have so many excuses why we could just stay home whatever you do today to demonstrate your love for someone in this church will be that thing upon which you can later rely to encourage your heart when it's discouraged so down the road come thursday or friday and you're like the world's beach it down or your own remaining sin has got you down you can be like you know what though i was at church on sunday and somebody shared that prayer request and i prayed for him and i've been praying for him every day this week or i'm signed up to bring food or whatever right you got a thing that you can take hold of look at verse 21 first john three beloved if our heart does not condemn us there we go our heart does not condemn us we have confidence before god and whatever we ask we receive from him because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him oof there's a difference between having a relationship and having the confidence that that relationship is healthy or good right so when you've disappointed your friend or your spouse or your parents you lose confidence in the relationship you're not going to go ask for a favor from somebody that you know you've let down unless you're oblivious right which oh by the way just on a on a side note this was very helpful to me to understand so i'm just going to share it with you it's not my notes has nothing to do with the servant but this is this is one of the narcissist's favorite tools you will go and ask for a favor and they will surprise you by letting you know that you've let them down somehow in that moment and you were oblivious to it it's one of their favorite tools so be on guard for that one all right so now back on track here there's a difference between having a relationship and having the confidence that accompanies knowing that that relationship is healthy when you look at Adam and Eve in the garden which is what we did when we covered this passage last time you see their action after they sin against the clear commandment of God their action was to go and hide well their action was to hide themselves and then go and physically hide themselves right so what sin does is it drives fear shame and guilt shame drives us into hiding as this fear generally speaking as does guilt generally speaking drives you into hiding and uh what you know right away is God comes walking through the garden and he engages with them at a level that they needed him to in that moment got knew where they were he didn't he wasn't like what happened while I was gone never the case but he says where are you and Adam says I heard you walk in the garden and I hid because I was naked and God goes we told you you were naked I mean right where Adam needs to be dealt with you see the father dealing with him tending his heart and what's the outcome well the fig leaf first of all gets replaced by the skin of an animal because without the shedding of blood there can be no remission of sin yeah so something has to die so God first deals with the fact that Adam and Eve are hiding by calling them out then he deals with the fact that they're guilty by giving them a good covering for their sin and then he gives them the promise of a redeemer who will undo fear shame and guilt which is what Jesus Christ does by hanging naked on the cross before all mankind to behold having done nothing sinful when you lose confidence in your relationship with God what John is identifying is that when our hearts condemn us when we have a guilty conscience we lose our confidence to ask God for what we need bad things happen James puts this in the inverse way John says we have what we ask for because we do what's pleasing and obeying James lays out the sequence for us a little differently he says we fail we have a guilty conscience our own heart condemns us we avoid the one whom we've disappointed we don't ask we don't receive we envy then those who do have it and we can't get it so we fight and quarrel and we've seen this happen in church before right and it begins with I'm not right with God and it ends with let me take it out on you or or we verse 22 whatever we ask we receive from him because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him and everybody goes well of course yeah if I could do that I'd be fine I can't keep his commandments I've tried are you kidding me James no I'm not kidding you and thank God the very next thing John says lest you think I'm just ripping this out of its context the very next thing he says is what commandment he's talking about this is too good so hold on hold that thought this is why I need to pay attention to my notes you begin to see why it's absolutely essential that we cultivate our own walk with God and then fellowship with one another right you also begin to see why love of the brethren is diagnostic you can't love somebody for whom you have a heart filled with envy you can't you're consumed with wanting what they have so then what you'll do is not love but love and hypocrisy to get what they have Romans 12 hypocritical love is an act of the will accompanied by deception designed to do yourself good at their expense this has to be right and then this can happen so the hearts of the people of God are supposed to be captivated by him then you will engage in commandment keeping with right motives and then get to work serving one another so John closes the chapter with this reminder the most important commandment that we should keep 23 and everybody look look right at it verse 23 this is his commandment that we believe in the name of his son Jesus Christ and love one another okay in John 6 it happens this way the Jews say all right Jesus what are the works of God so that we can do them and Jesus says I'll tell you what they are the works of God are to believe on him whom he has sent and then John puts it this way this is his commandment that we believe in the name of the his son Jesus Christ and love one another just as he has commanded us I'm not making this up this is the commandment what do I have to do to be saved first John 3 23 believe in the name of Jesus Christ now elsewhere there is a second piece which is repent which means turn right turn away from your sin turn now if you do that guess what you'll be turning towards because I've told you before and I really do believe this no matter how far down the path of disobedience you get the moment you turn Jesus is right there you turn you're facing him you are believing in the name of Jesus Christ and then love one another just as he has commanded us whoever keeps his commandment subides and God and God and him by this we know that he abides in us by the spirit whom he has given us we'll deal with that just a second the fellowship this fellowship will be healthy as long as each of us is obeying the commandment to believe in Jesus Christ guess what I can't do guess what I can't I can't make anybody believe in Jesus but if we start to get like weird and unhealthy it won't be because I failed to make you do something it'll be because we're not individually in relationship with Jesus Christ so then I asked you like three sermons ago what's your prayer life like what does your time in the word look like because like how much believing do you think you're going to be able to do if you aren't talking to Jesus and how much believing do you think you're going to be able to do if you're not listening to Jesus and what he has to say to you we need to feel the master's hand guiding us in the script which means we've got to confess sin to him first and then to one another as necessary we need to take our burdens to him and lay them down and we need to get lessons from him and learn new words and new letters and new expressions of how we can love one another believing in Jesus listen this is it this is extremely important believing in Jesus is not something you did believing in Jesus is not something that you did believing in Jesus is day by day hour by hour moment by moment you can't do it by praying this inner's prayer once a few years ago today if you hear his voice don't harden your heart so first believe second obey the commandments and the one in view here is love the brethren this fellowship will be healthy so long as each of us is engaged in loving the brethren that's second what was first this fellowship will be healthy so long as we are engaged in loving Jesus and trusting Jesus and believing in Jesus second this fellowship will be healthy so long as we are engaged in loving the brethren what's love acts of the will accompanied by emotion designed to do somebody else good at your own expense so if we're doing those two things this fellowship i think will be healthy you can't do it if you aren't doing the first thing like the second thing doesn't work it'll be hypocritical love if you're not doing the first thing you'll be doing things to try to ingratiate yourself to people you'll be doing things to try to project strength to other people you'll be doing things to try to control other people but you won't be doing things to try to love other people unless you're doing things that Jesus taught you to do by his love for you right finally we know by this he abides in us the spirit of christ is always with you you're never alone you're never dealing with life by yourself we heard it this morning in the scripture reading he was 13-5 he will never leave you nor forsake you course we struggle with love our hearts are too small all right well mine is so why do you suppose he promises to always be with you because in reality we never stop needing the master's hand guiding us in the script the moment never comes where he's like okay thank you got this nope now so he gives us his spirit to indwell us to guide us day by day moment by moment in acts of love let's pray