When someone says, "I love you," the natural reply is, "I love you, too." If you're in a loving relationship with someone, you expect those words in response. Our passage from 1 John today tells us that this is the kind of relationship God has with us. It's not just about saying the words, though. We heard John telling us last week: "Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action" (1 John 3:18). This week he says it like this: "We love because God first loved us" (1 John 4:19).
Anyone who has ever started at Genesis and tried the read the Bible all the way through will tell you that it's not easy. It can be very confusing if you're trying to figure out the nature of God. In some places, God is loving and nurturing, providing for all of his people's needs. And in other places, he's so angry that he wipes out entire cities with the snap of his fingers. In some places he's a rock that can't be moved and in other places a conversation with a mortal can change his mind. In some places he's insisting that people must follow his laws if they want to live, and in other places he's merciful and ready to give people another chance when they stray.
You see, what we have in the Bible is the story of a relationship. It's about the relationship between God and his people. It's told from the perspective of the people, with the only thing they have to go on being their own limited experience. From their experience they do the best they can to figure out who God is. We do the same thing. We all try to make sense of God according to what is going on in our lives. But we have added information about God that people in Old Testament times didn't have. We don't have to wonder about what God is like; we know. John's gospel explained it this way: "No one has ever seen God. It is God, the only Son, who is close to the Father's heart, who has made him known" (John 1:18). If we want to know what God is like, all we have to do is look at Jesus. In his epistle, John is able to elaborate more on what he means by this.
Lest we miss his point, he cuts to the chase and spells it out in three simple words: God is love. Of all the ways we can describe the nature of God, this is the most fundamental. God is love. It's not just a theory; it's a fact. How do we know?
God became a human being and lived as one of us. He embodied compassion by his actions and his teachings. He healed the sick and touched the untouchables. He embraced those who others turned away. He spoke on behalf of those who had no voice. He taught us to serve one another in humility and even love our enemies. He stood up to those who put following the rules above mercy and compassion. His entire life was given in love, and it didn't end there. In death he gave himself in love, as well. He went to a cross because he could only be who he was. He stretched out his arms in love for the world, and they nailed his hands to a wooden cross. Let there be no doubt about what God is all about. Look at Jesus and you know. God is love.
Now, that's not just a nice thought that you could put on a greeting card. It changes everything for us. "Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another" (1 John 4:11). Our lives are given in response to God's love given for us.
A lot of times we miss this. We may live in the way we think God wants us to live out of fear. That's living by the law. Or we may live in the way we think God wants us to live out of love. That's living by grace.
When I was a teenager having a physical exam so that I could go to college, I was in the restroom filling a specimen cup and I overheard my mother, on the other side of the door, talking to my family doctor. "Should I run a pregnancy test?" he asked her. And I will never forget the words my mother spoke. She said, "No, that won't be necessary." "Are you sure?" the doctor asked her. "I am as sure as any mother can be," she answered. Wow! "I am as sure as any mother can be," she said. I was overwhelmed with the love and trust that had gone into that statement. I made up my mind right then and there that I would never do anything to hurt or disappoint my mother in any way. It was a silent promise I made to my mother. It was offered in love, in response to the love she had shown me.
How different that is from the young woman who lives in fear of a parent who lays down the law saying, "If you ever get yourself in trouble you will not be welcome in this house." The result might also be a life on the straight and narrow, but it is motivated by fear and not by love.
As God's beloved children, he expects us to love one another — not because he will stop loving us if we don't do what he tells us to do, but precisely because he will never stop loving us no matter what we do. That's why John can make the bold assertion: "There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love. We love because he first loved us" (1 John 4:18-19).
Do you remember when Jesus was quizzed by a Jewish expert in the law who wanted Jesus to tell him what the most important law was? Jesus couldn't identify the one most important law. He had to give two. " ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself' " (Matthew 22:37-39). For Jesus, these weren't two separate laws to live by. They are two parts of the same law. The way to love God is by loving your neighbor. It's not just a matter of saying "I love you, God" over and over again. It's about showing our love for God in the way we love other people.
This sounds so easy, doesn't it? And yet, as Christians, our failure to love because God first loved us has caused untold problems throughout history. In the name of God, we Christians have fought countless wars, we have burned people at the stake, we have closed our ears to the cries of the poor and the hungry, we have locked our doors and our hearts to people we deem unworthy of our community, we have hung men from trees because we don't like the color of their skin, we have prospered materially from the desperation of people we don't even know. We do all these things and more, in the name of God. And God is love? Why don't we get it? If John had said, "God is hate," our actions would make more sense. But God isn't hate. God is love.
We love because he first loved us. Those who say "I love God," and hate their brother or sister whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen. The commandment we have from him is this: those who love God must love their brothers and sisters also. — 1 John 4:19-21
Why is it so difficult for us? How is it possible for us to know and experience the love of God in our lives and withhold that same love from others? Maybe the key for us is opening ourselves up to receive the love of God in our lives. So often we're closed off and God's love doesn't stand a chance. It's like putting a lid on a cup and expecting someone to pour water into it. When we open ourselves up to God's love, it's like removing the lid and filling our cup underneath a waterfall! The writer Annie Dillard says, "You catch grace as a man fills his cup under a waterfall."1 Imagine what that would be like. Our cup is filled and spilling out all over the place. We can't possibly contain it all. That's what happens when God's love fills our lives. He fills us to overflowing and his love spills out on everyone around us.
Our God says to us, "I love you." Through Jesus Christ we know those are more than just words alone. "I love you," he says. And we respond to his love. Not just with the words alone, but with lives that say, "I love you, too." Amen.
1. Annie Dillard, "Pilgrim at Tinker Creek" in Three By Annie Dillard (New York: HarperCollins, 1990).