Jesus Loved Us to Death

What Did Jesus Do?

In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us
and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
1 John 4:10

If you have ever taught a class for more than ten minutes there is a good chance that you have heard a student say in response to a question, “I know the answer, I just don’t know how to say it.” Uh-huh, right! If they can’t say it, they don’t know it. Similarly, John, whose intent in his first letter was to instruct the Church how it was to live in the love of God, came to a place where, in so many words, he said, “If we don’t show it, then we don’t know it.” Or, more precisely, we don’t know Him. The “it” is love, the “Him” is God, who is love (1 John 4:8). Having just explained to the Church how it was to “test the spirits” (1 John 4.1-6; see WDJD for 1/10/12), John immediately gave a simple way to test those who claim to be Christians, “Anyone who does not love does not know God.” Of course, surveying our world where there is precious little love in evidence, but much hatred and hostility, one could ask, “Where are we to look for, and how are we to know, God and his love?” John’s answer to the Church, then and now, was to look to the cross, and to Jesus who loved us to death.

The search for love anywhere but in the person and nature of God is ultimately a fruitless search, a quest that must ultimately end in disappointment. Oh, the world offers no few definitions and examples of “love.” But only in God is love to be found that is totally, sacrificially, committed to others. Incredibly, the totally committed love of God was given to those who were, and to we who are, totally unlovable. You see, the Father did not send his Son to love those who had been showing any kind of love to God, but to those who had been in rebellion, who had been rejecting God, and chasing endlessly after idols. It is utter foolishness for the world and for us to look for love amongst ourselves, love is not to be found there! True love was only manifest in the Father’s sending of his one and only Son for the sole purpose of offering himself as the one acceptable payment and sacrifice for the sins of the world by his death on the cross. It is the deepest mystery of the divine will that grace and mercy are expressed in the Father’s love through the death of his pure and sinless Son, the result of which is life for those sinners for whom the Son died (1 John 4:9).

For John there is but one possible response to the all but unimaginable love of God manifest in Jesus, and that is to love one another in the same way that he has loved us (1 John 4:11). In this John echoes the very command which he and the other apostles had received from the Lord himself (John 13:34). John had heard, had seen, had touched and been touched by the very love of God manifest in the life of Jesus the Son (1 John 1:1). And having been “so loved” by God, John in turn loved his “little children” (the Church) with that very same love. This is the very heart of the letter. The Church was called forth and formed out of the love of God manifest in Jesus Christ, and manifest most sublimely on the cross. Having been so loved by God, the church is called to live in that love and to manifest, to show it, in and through the love of believers for one another. In this way, the world, more particularly lost sinners, may see God in and through those in whom his love abides and is perfected (1 John 4:12).

The one place where the love of God has abided eternally is the Trinity itself, in the mutual love of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit for one another. Now, God having sent his only Son, that love abides in the Church as its members love one another, and, amazingly, as we love one another, the love of God is made perfect in us. Like some PowerPoint presentation to the world, God has chosen his Church to exhibit his love to the world through the fellowship and love of believers. Jesus loved us to death, so that we might have life. As God pours his love into the life of every believer, so the Church should be filled and overflow with love for God, and for all those God so loved.

S.D.G.

Jim
www.jimwilkenministries.org
Marion, NC
PS 37.4