Resource Detail

To Love One Another

1 John 3:11-24

Key Verse 23 

“And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, 

and to love one another as he commanded us.” 

Read verses 11-13. What did we hear from the beginning (11)? Who is Cain and why did  he murder his brother (12; Genesis 4:1-8)? What should be our response to the world if it hates us? (13) 

Read verses 14-15. How can we know that we have passed from death to life (14a)? Where does anyone remain if he does not love? (14b) What is anyone who hates his brother? (15a) What do we know about a murderer regarding eternal life? (15b)

Read verses 16-18. How do we know what love is? (16a; Jn 15:13) How then should we love our brothers? (16b) How can we love our brothers practically with our material possessions? (17) What is the genuine way to love our brothers? (18)

Read verses 19-20. How can we know that we belong to the truth? (19a) How can we set our hearts at rest in God’s presence despite our hearts’ condemnation? (19b-20a) Why? (20b)

Read verses 21-24. When do we have confidence before God? (21) If we obey God’s commands and do what pleases him, what can we receive from him? (22) What is his command? (23) What kind of intimate relationship with God occurs when we obey God’s commands? (24a) How do we know that God lives in us? (24b)

THIS IS HOW WE KNOW WHAT LOVE IS

1 John 3:11-24

Key verse 16

“This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.”

Last week, we learned how much blessed we are through our heavenly Father who lavished his love on us. Today we will continue to learn his love and what to do as his children. Throughout the passage one repeated pattern in his writing stood out to me: “This is how we know” in verses 16, 19, and 24. One day John asked Jesus to destroy some Samaritans because they didn’t welcome Jesus and his disciples. In such a way he had his own style and strong opinion. So he inevitably had hard time overcoming his hatred and anger in his soul. But he came to know who Jesus is in person and now he clarified what love is. I would like to divide this passage into 3 parts. 1st, our original condition like Cain. 2nd, our reversed condition thanks to Jesus. 3rd, our blessed life through prayer and the Holy Spirit.

Part 1. Our orginal condition like Cain (11-15)

John begins this passage in v. 11, “This is the message you have heard from the beginning: You should love one another.” So far this is the message that we have heard many times. Like a good teacher who always make the main point of his teachings clear, John likes to repeat this point. There's an old legend about him. John was the longest surviving disciple of Jesus. He lived up to his nineties, which was pretty unusual back then, especially if you were a Christian. Every week this old man was brought to the church meetings. Each time he said, "Little children, LOVE ONE ANOTHER." Every week, exactly the same message. One day, someone asked him, "John, why do you say exactly the same thing every week?" John replied, “because it is enough” Likewise if you want to know to live as the children of God, there it is in a nutshell. You don't need a degree in theology. All you need to do is to love one another. Like a good teacher who gives examples in his teaching, John came up with a negative example first. Look at v.12 “Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brother’s were righteous.” Cain offered God some of the fruits of the soil as an offering but God was not pleased with him and his offering. His brother Abel offered fat portions from some of the firstborn of his flock. And God looked with favor on him and his offering. Cain became angry and his face was downcast. Then God said, “Why are you angry? If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door, it desires to have you but you must master it.” John also pointed out in v.10 “Anyone who does not do what is right is not a child of God, nor is anyone who does not love his brother.” Nobody can do what is right all the time for the Bible says, no one is righteous not even one. However, we learned last week as God’s children, we should have a desire to please him by striving to do what is right. Cain’s anger toward God and lack of repentance showed he didn’t have such desire to do what was right. Cain knew very well that his brother’s life of obedience and love for God was better than his. As an eldest son, it could’ve been hard to yield himself and humbly accept his wrong doing. But he could’ve had a learning mind and asked God or his brother for wisdom. He could’ve given a better offering pleasing to God. But he invited sin and had been doing wrong and ended up murdering his own brother. We may think that Cain has nothing to do with us because he was a murderer. But his murder resulted from his lack of repentance and directly from outburst of his anger. Let’s think about the deadly consequences of anger. Many people born from dysfunctional families, anger is the well known problem like deadly virus passing through the generations, infecting and destroying millions of lives each day. Anger resulted in heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, low self esteem, stress, depression, suicide and homicide. So it is serious and most common hidden problem in many families. As God’s children we want to belong to Christ and be imitators of Christ, not the devil. Our children are observing us and learning everything like a sponge. We should walk in a manner worthy of the calling with humility, gentleness, patience and love so our children will learn and do the same. Let’s pray not to be infected with this deadly virus called anger, but to live as his children to transform our generation.

Verse 13 reads “Do not be surprised my brothers if the world hates you.” Again Cain is a representative of the world who hates believers. Jesus said in John 15:19, “If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.” Here we see that if we are of the world and enjoy the sins, then the world should love us but if we belong to God and obey him the world will hate us. So we can ask ourselves by saying, “Does the world loves me or hates me?” 

Verses 14 tells us that if we love our brothers we have passed from death to life.

Wait a minute! Wouldn't it be more accurate to say that if we love we pass from life to death for Abel got killed for his love for God? However do you remember in driver's training they teach you to keep your eyes on the road a half-mile ahead? Don't just stare at the back bumper of the front car. Likewise John is teaching like a "driver's ed. teacher." John is talking about the "long view." The "long view" better informs us of what we should do in the immediate future. In Biblical terms, what happens "on the path" here on earth is only the means to the end of the path. That’s why we must be on the right path. The end of the right path is this: "the man who does the will of God lives forever." (1Jn 2:17) In that way and eternal prospective we pass from death to life. 

Look at v. 15, “Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him.” Here John says, “anyone who hates his brother is a murderer.” It sounds harsh. According to John's words here, hating your brother makes you a murderer. You don't have to physically kill to be a murderer, but just hating in your hearts is enough to get that title. Hatred is a stronghold that Satan raises little by little until he gets it and then hold you captive. How does it begin? It starts with small conflicts that grow, that you do not resolve and over a period of time the seeds of hatred are planted, watered, fertilized, and grow until you become obsessed with hatred and are enslaved. Harboring hate inside of us will eventually leads to all kinds of negative or abusive words and outward actions against our brothers. So it is important to know how serious it is to hate our brother. Apostle John had struggled with his hatred for a long time because he liked his own way and insisted on his own style to quickly deal with the situation as he liked. So it came from his own personal experience. As an old man now, he helps us to secure eternal life by overcoming hatred because it is not worth to have hatred in our hearts to have lost eternal life. What a great loss! Again we all began in a state of spiritual death simply because we all have the blood of Cain contaminated by hatred and anger running in us. Practically if someone bothers us with certain behavior that we do not like or hurts us with abusive words, by nature we don’t like him or her and want to take action at once. The dreadful truth is that it is happening to close family members or fellow coworkers in the church where we constantly interact. According to the dictionary the meaning of hate is an intense dislike for someone that compels us to take action. Everyone has a certain type of person one hate no matter where he or she goes. So our first reaction would be that we simply want to avoid them. But by avoiding them, nothing change. The problem only gets worse. I ran into this story from a teenager. “I hate my brother so much I constantly wish everyday he would die. He embarrasses me in front of friends and is rude and selfish to me beyond words. I am not a horrible person and have never hated anyone so much in my life. But with him it is different. Moving out isn't necessarily an option and now I don't know what to do. I'm stuck in a house with him being constantly verbally and physically abused. My life isn't necessarily great the way it is.” Sound familiar? To some extent we have been there. But we have a good news. If we are truly children of God, we have hope in Jesus Christ!

 Part 2.  Our reversed condition through Jesus(16-18)

In part 1 John pointed out that we’ve been taught since the beginning to love one another. But we had a diagnosis that it was impossible to love others with our original condition. So in this part we have a good news to reverse our condition through knowing what true love is thanks to our Lord Jesus Christ. Nothing is more important than knowing what love is because there are so many wrong concept of love out there. They say that love is that feeling you get when you meet the right person. When people think about love today they automatically think about relationships, dating and marriage. So they believe that this is the only type of love out there with the possible exception of their parents’ love. Our contemporary definition of love is also generally caring for the other people, respecting their rights and living in peace with each other. But inevitably nation continues to rise against nation, neighbor against neighbor because the world does not know true love, much less the true source of love. Just we’re holding on to a pragmatic value system. Especially after Noah’s flood, man and other creatures became fearful for their physical survival (Gen 9:2). So the world believes the driving force of man for survival with limited resources is to kill and use everything in his environment. It’s considered normal and good. To kill a weaker person means I survive. It sounds merciless. But it is exactly happening in our dogged dog society and this world. But that’s not all. Here I like to share my own story. I personally never saw or experienced another kind of love until I was a student in college when I met a Bible teacher. I had been wandering with romantic love, demanding parent’s love, and competing with my college class mates to survive. But I was amazed by this man because he got absolutely nothing out of serving me such as inviting me to his church, teaching the Bible, tutoring free of charge, and even buying me meals. At that moment he was the weirdest person I had ever met in my life. Though I didn’t personally know God at that time, from him I came to realize that there was definitely another type of love out there, one which I wanted to know and have. I personally believe that apostle John had gone through the same experience. He had hatred and anger in his heart although he was the disciple of John the baptist. But he met Jesus and learned what love is and overcame his legalistic attitude and became an apostle of love, whose speciality was to encourage others to love one another.

Here John came up with a positive example through Jesus Christ. Let’s read verse 16a “This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us.” Hebrew 12:24 reads, Jesus' blood "speaks a better word” than the blood of Abel. Abel was in a sense an early model of Jesus. But he didn’t die willingly. If it is such unwilling case, he may have cried out for vengence. So the message of Jesus’ willing death is a better, nobler, and more gracious message. We can only come to know what true love is through Him. Jesus’ love is different from any kind of love in this world because he truly seeks the benefit of others and not himself. The world tells us to be careful whom you love for they might not love you back. When the people of this world love, we expect something back. I found that by showing love to my wife, I can have at least a peaceful time at home. If I don’t, I may expect misery one way or another. So I better be careful or show her my love positively. It is also beneficial for us to love our classmates or colleagues; if we do then we can have a good environment in which to study or work. For instance they can help us with a project to keep the deadline. However, Jesus who was the very creator and the eternal ruler of all creations set aside his glorious position and came down to this sinful world and became flesh to dwell among us. Throughout Jesus’ life on this earth there were many times where it wasn’t beneficial for Jesus to show love. Jesus showed his love to a crippled woman by healing her on the Sabbath day despite the fact that the religious leaders were ready to kill him. He could have easily waited at least till Monday to heal and perhaps saved his own life but out of his love and compassion he healed her when she were in need. Because Jesus lived for others, he was always ready to help. Many people came to Jesus in need of help. Indeed the most helpless and hopeless people imaginable such as a 38 year old paralytic, the demon possessed, a woman who had been possessed with 7 demons, the lepers, the blind and the greedy tax collectors were welcome and helped no matter how miserable their situation was. Likewise Jesus loves us as we are. Even when we were still sinners and when we still hated him, Jesus laid down his life for us. Jesus came to this world so that we may pass or reverse from the state of sin and death to the state of eternal life by believing in his name. That’s the only thing he lived for and what he ultimately died for. He came to save us from death by laying down his life for us. 

Like our Lord Jesus who seeks the benefit of others we can ask ourselves, such as: What do you live for? Do you live for the day of seeing new technology and getting ahead of others? Do you live for finding the best job? Do you live for the day you get married or have children? Do you live for your next raise and for the day you retire early with savings? As children of God we should learn from our Lord Jesus who laid down his life for others. So v. 16b continues “and we ought to also lay down our lives for our brothers.” If we belong to Jesus then we should do as Jesus did. My sons do some of the same things I do. Likewise the children of God we should have the same attitude of Jesus. We should be willing to die to our own sinful desires and deny self centered ways in order to help our brothers. To lay down your life could mean to die physically, especially in the first century and extreme Moslem territory in our times. When they live as a witness, they laid down their life anytime for Jesus. Laying down our lives also means to live for other person by dying to our own selfish desires. One Bible student said to me that he liked to stay here in UBF because he has seen real love of our Bible teachers actively laying down their lives for their Bible students and each other. He’d been to other churches but he had hardly seen same quality sacrifice that shepherds and missionaries in UBF have made toward helping their brothers. He’d heard about a couple who shared a common life with 7 students in the basement. They gave up their comfortable family life and privacy in this individualistic society in order to practically show Jesus’ love to these 7 strangers. So recently this students has moved into this house with the new vision in his life to follow Jesus only and be a source of blessing for others because he joyfully set the goal to learn of Jesus’ servant leadership. After listening the first message of 1 John 1 on Sunday, common life brothers prayed together to form the love fellowship based on Jesus’ love. I have seen their joy and friendship building up accordingly. I have visited the place recently and found out that it became a heavenly fellowship already. So I could see great vision to reverse any old condition in and through our Lord Jesus Christ. Also in our ministry, many servants have given up their lucrative careers and comfortable lives in their home country to suffer abroad as missionaries for the sake of sharing Jesus’ word. In this upcoming African Bible conferences, we will see the real stories of sacrificing for Jesus and brothers in Africa. Also in our church we have CSULB coworkers who give up their free time after work or school to join Wednesday fishing journeys and Bible studies. Nobody likes to lay down their life and give up things for others, we just want to lay down on the couch and relax. If you try to teach people to lay down their life for others, they may hate you.  Even your own family members may hate you and your reversed new condition in Jesus. But the truth is, when we lay down willingly and joyfully to follow Jesus’ beautiful example, we have confidence to do what is right. 

Look at verse 17. “If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him?” Here John challengs our real practice of love in daily lives. He knows the nature of our hearts and its close connection to our wallets. My wife pointed out that if I do not repent on this verse, it is not a real message. She knows me better than anyone else. I pray that I may grow as a man of real love. It could be mere lip service with lots of beautiful words of love. But loving involves real sacrifice including our possessions, time, even health and life. I saw many God’s servants losing their health and life because of their passionate devotion to world mission and shepherding. From a worldly point of view it was not wise. But from God’s perspective, it’s very glorious and meaningful. So this verse does not necessarily apply to rich people who have material possessions. Rather when we have a life and are living in America, we are already known as rich people. As children of God, we should always look out and take care of those in need. In this way we can participate in practicing God’s love. 

Verse 18 also shows us that we should love in action and not with words and tongue. Again John is stressing that the love of God in us must be manifested in our actions. I pray that God would help each of us to overcome ourselves and sacrificially love at least one person by giving them the word of God.

Part 3. a blessed and dynamic life through prayer and the Holy Spirit(19-24)

In this last part, John comes up with a practical way for us to live a blessed life. In v. 19 and 20 John brings up the point that sometimes as children of God our hearts may condemn us. Sometimes we may feel totally unworthy and doubt whether we belong to the truth or not. But in these verses John reminds us that God is greater than our hearts so we shouldn’t focus too much on our feelings but on the truth of God. The man who focuses on his feeling is unstable in all he does. It may not always feel good or even right to love some brothers and it certainly doesn’t feel good to lay down our life for our brother. But the Bible teaches us that we should love our brothers and we ought to lay down our lives for them. In this way we come to know we’ve passed from death to life. 

Verses 21 and 22 says “If our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God and receive from him anything we ask, because we obey his commands and do what pleases him.” Although we are rich in the Lord beyond measure, we often times live in our "self confined world," rather than live in the joy, peace and security of the blessings of our loving God. What a waste to be a child of the King, and live like a poor beggar. We are given great privilege in Him. In and through powerful means called prayer, we have confidence that we will receive from him anything we ask. It is like free access to the heavenly bank account of our eternal Father. We are literally God’s "Channels of Blessings." That’s why God had hope for us to be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation to be a source of blessing for all nations and to share God’s blessings through obeying his commnads. Look at v. 23. And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us. Here we also learn that biblical love is based on faith. We cannot please God apart from faith. It reminds me of an old man named Abram in the book of Genesis 12:2, “I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great and you will be a blessing.” He could have ignored God’s word of blessing like nonsense. But he put trust in the Lord and believed him wholeheartedly. As a result he became a source of blessing for all nations. Likewise when we have faith in Him, he molds us into his powerful vessel through which God can use us to bless all nations on earth.

Verse 24 concludes “Those who obey his commands live in him and he in them. And this is how we know that he lives in us. We know it by the Spirit he gave us.” From verses 22 through 24, “command” or “commands” or “commended” are repeated four times. Again John pointed out that it is not a matter of our natural way or feeling or heart, but a matter of obeying his command to please God. When we obey him and his command willingly, he pours out his love and His Spirit into our hearts. It is the Holy Spirit that enables us to love our brothers and sisters. The right order is to first obey and trust in Him and then live a dynamic and blessed life in Him. We can now love because he has given us His empowering Spirit.

Usually I am known as a gentle person. But at home I was often times very emotional and hot tempored. The reason for this was due to the way I learned to transform my family members. When I was young, my father who had been unable to achieve his own dream of success tried hard to change me by making me go to Tae Kwon Do, piano lesson, many church meetings, and good schools. I was relatively obedient to him but there was invisible side effect in my heart. I ended up holding tons of anger and hatred toward him. Instead of supporting me and encouraging me to be myself and explore my own talents and interests I was forced to make my childhood acceptable for him. Don’t get me wrong. My Father is great. But for a long time my father used to be emotional and abusive to me because of his own frustration and stress. Often times I found myself to be like him. I was frustrated and depressed for my unchanged old self especially when my son shockingly said to me that he liked to go out of state college because of my habitual anger and authoritative management. Through preparing this passage, I came back to my own senses and admit my sin of anger before God. No matter what situation or background I had,l  I must let go of my habit to control my family to my own end and my anger so that my sons may not be infected with such a deadly virus. I must stop by repenting and relying on God’s love. I am very thankful to the Word of command today from Jesus Christ who laid down his life for me and accepted me as I am. This is the best remedy of God for me. I am like Cain by destroying my life and others. I repent of my sin of hatred and anger before my family and my God. In Jesus I am being reversed into a new creation. May the Lord help me to live a life of vision to grow in faith and spirit until I become a man of love like Apostle John. Rom. 6:2 reads, “We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life” 

In conclusion, without Jesus we are all like Cain. But thanks to Jesus who came to save us, we’ve passed from death to life. Laying down our lives to love our brothers is very possible thanks to Jesus Christ. Jesus is not just a mere good example of how we should love but he is the ultimate reason why we can love our brothers. The true message of Christian love is to make ourselves and all our resources be truly available to the Lord, and to be at the disposal of others. What a truly dynamic, new, and completely reversed life in Jesus Christ! When I was preparing this message, I could also see God’s clear will and vision in our church. It is easy to love our Bible students but it’s not easy to love our coworkers. When we’re getting bigger, inevitably we’re running into problems and conflicts. Rather than blaming or hating each other, we can lay down our own rules and even our lives and confess our sins to each other and forgive others to demolish such barriers and be a dynamic love fellowship in Jesus. The same principle can be applied to our families where our children are growing. May the Lord help each of us grow in His image and be a channel of blessings for all nations. May we come to Jesus as we are and ask him for strength and the Spirit to carry out His love command. 

One word: Love one another