I Love God, I Ain’t Lying

If someone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also. Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God... By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and keep His commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome. For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. Who is he who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? (1 John 4:20–5:5)

Genuine love for God cannot be separated from active, sacrificial love for the people He made in His image.

"I Love God, I Ain't Lying"

Have you ever had a brief interaction with a stranger that lingered in your mind for years? Most of our encounters with strangers—the cashier, the barista, the person scanning your gym card—are forgotten within the hour. But occasionally there's an encounter you still remember fifteen years later.

Such was the case about sixteen or eighteen years ago. I was out to lunch with a friend, another pastor, on the east end of town. As we finished, an interesting character in his mid-forties walked up and said, "Hey guys, I have a magic trick for you." He did a trick, and my friend said, "Oh, I can do that trick"—and did it. The stranger, increasingly frustrated, tried another, and another. Finally he sat down and said, "I've got a trick you can't do." He picked up a butter knife and started tapping his left eye—a glass eye. Clink, clink, clink.

Within minutes he asked for a ride home to Valley Center. If you're a Valley Center native, you know this man's name is Left Eddie. As we pulled out of the parking lot he asked what we did for a living. When we told him we were pastors, he said, "Really, man? I love God, I ain't lying." He told me that probably eight or nine times. To this day I cannot read 1 John 4:20 without thinking of Left Eddie. And honestly, I think Left Eddie probably does love God.

Professing Love That Doesn't Match Life

Left Eddie isn't the only person who would profess a love for God. In John's day and in ours, many make professions, declarations, statements of devotion to God. But not everyone who makes such a profession follows it up with the action of their life. The book of Acts is addressed to a man named Theophilus, a name meaning "lover of God"—yet there are people who profess to be a Theophilus and turn out to be the awful-est people you've ever met.

That is exactly what the writer of this letter has been dealing with. This short letter was written near the end of the first century by the Apostle John, probably the last living apostle, the last who had seen the risen Jesus. Looking at the church, he saw precisely what Jesus had foretold: false professors, false prophets, false teachers, false christs gaining prominence among Christians—people whose profession sounded Christian but whose lives did not align with it. Such counterfeits lead people astray, so John writes to expose and oppose them.

Mutually Exclusive Things

John insists that certain things are mutually exclusive—incompatible, like oil and water. You cannot be turning right at the same time you are turning left. You cannot be in Los Angeles at the same time you are in Washington, D.C. (I know there are amateur physicists ready to email me a workaround.) Logically, some things simply cannot coexist.

In this letter John puts forward several such pairs. Last week we saw one in 1 John 4:18—"There is no fear in love." Fear of punishment and love don't go together. Here he gives another: one cannot at the same time be a lover of God and hate that which God made in His image. We are the image-bearers of God. So in 1 John 4:20 he says it as clearly as it can be said: "If someone says, 'I love God,' and hates his brother, he is a liar." There is no gradation, no nuance. John loves clear contrasts—light and darkness, life and death, good and evil, love and hate.

John's Tests for Authenticity

John returns here to what we might call his tests for Christian authenticity—the vital signs of the new birth. These fall under three categories: obedience, love, and faith.

The test of obedience appears in 1 John 2:3–6: "Now by this we know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments. He who says, 'I know Him,' and does not keep His commandments, is a liar." We can assess the way a person lives and see by their obedience that they truly know God.

The test of love appears in 1 John 2:9–11: "He who says he is in the light, and hates his brother, is in darkness until now... but he who hates his brother is in darkness." And the test of faith appears in 1 John 2:22: "Who is a liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ?"

These three tests recur over and over—in chapter 1, chapter 2, chapter 3, and again here. Why? Because John is seeking to expose and oppose those who had a profession but no life to back it up, because they were leading people astray. How do we know if a person is born again? Obedience, love, and faith.

Point One: If I Love God, I Will Love Others

That brings us to the first point: if I love God, I will love others. And by loving others we are not simply talking about heartwarming affection. As I looked back over recent weeks, I think I may not have developed this point as fully as I could have. The love John calls us to is not merely a warm-hearted, sympathetic feeling, not a mushy sentimentality. A lot of modern thinking on love falls into exactly that—people just feeling good about something. That is not what John means.

I've called this series Fullness of Joy, and I'm convinced you cannot experience fullness of joy without understanding what loving God and loving others with an alive and active love actually looks like in practice. So what does this alive and active love look like?

The 1 Corinthians 13 Definition

Virtually every time the New Testament writers describe this quality of love, they use a specific word, most clearly defined in 1 Corinthians 13. Reading from the New Living Translation:

Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance. (1 Corinthians 13:4–7)

This is what God's love is to look like practically in my life. This is what ought to be exhibited in the person who says, "I love God, I know God, I follow God." If you are walking in the light, this kind of love will be evident in your life toward other people.

Point Two: Increasingly Evident

So the second point: the attributes of God's love should be increasingly evident in my life toward others. "Increasingly" is important. On day one, is this love perfectly evident in a child of God? No. But it should be increasingly evident over time.

Trust me, I'm not there yet. Try reading it with my name: "Miles is patient and kind. Miles is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. Miles does not demand his own way. Miles is not irritable; he keeps no record of being wronged." It's laughable, because we all recognize we don't live up to that. The only one who's allowed to laugh is my wife. Yet this is the love that should be increasingly evident in my life as one born of God.

Why? At the very least because of 1 John 4:21: "And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also." This is not a suggestion—not "if you get around to it, try to be patient with people." He commanded us to love in this way: to be patient, kind, not rude, not boastful or conceited.

The Command to Love

When did He command this? In John 13:34: "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another." And again in John 15:12: "This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one's life for his friends."

Paul picked up this teaching in Romans 13:8: "Owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law." The commandments against adultery, murder, theft, false witness, and coveting are all summed up in this: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

"Who Is My Neighbor?"

If you're anything like me—and you are, because we're both sinners—at this point you start hedging. Just like the lawyer who came to Jesus and, seeking to justify himself, asked, "Who is my neighbor?" We want to specify exactly whom we have to love, because surely there are some people we don't have to.

That was precisely the mindset 2,000 years ago. In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus noted, "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.'" Many of us would gladly sign up for that, because then we get to be the arbiters of who's a neighbor and who's an enemy. "I don't like that guy—don't have to love him, can be rude to him."

We won't even get into Jesus' follow-up—"love your enemy" (Matthew 5)—that's for another day. Right now we're talking only about loving the children of God, which is hard enough.

Point Three: I Will Love All His Children

So let's specify. 1 John 5:1: "Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who loves Him who begot also loves him who is begotten of Him." That brings us to the third point: if I am born of God, I will love all His children. Not perfectly on day one, but increasingly, progressively, as God works in my life. By this alive and active love we demonstrate that we are God's children. There's no gray area: if I am a child of God, I am to love everyone who is also born of God.

You might say, "Pastor, I'm not sure I can do that." I'm with you—we should be challenged by the Scriptures, because they set forth God's standard. But our concern is answered by at least three truths. Galatians 5:22 says "the fruit of the Spirit is love," so the evidence of God's Spirit in me is this love. Philippians 2:13 says "it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure." And Philippians 4:13—a favorite verse for many—says, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." God's Spirit is in me, the evidence is love, and He empowers me to love this way.

The Apparent Circular Argument

How do I know I'm actually loving the children of God? 1 John 5:2: "By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and keep His commandments." If you're not a little confused, you may have missed what looks like circular reasoning. The argument runs: if you say you love God but don't love His children with 1 Corinthians 13 love, you're a liar. If you love God, you'll love His children. And we know you love His children because you love God—and keep His commandments.

How do we draw this together? Like this: if I am born of God, then I will love God and others. In John's view of the new birth, love for God and love for others are united as one thing. We love in response to His love—"We love Him because He first loved us" (1 John 4:19). John sees no difference between loving God and loving His people, because the church is called the body of Christ. In loving the people of God, you are loving God; in loving God, you are loving His people. All of it is expressed in keeping His commandments—and the greatest commandment, Jesus said (Matthew 22), is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself.

Point Four: Known by Obedience to the Law of Love

So eighteen years ago Eddie told me, "I love God, I ain't lying." The fourth point: the true child of God is known by their obedience to the laws of love. How do we know a person truly follows God? They are seeking, by God's enabling power, to love God and to love others—both the people of God and (in a study for another day, because it's hard for us) even their enemies, with love that is patient and kind, not irritable, not rude, not conceited.

But all this talk of obedience puts us in a challenging place, because we must ask: how do I become a child of God in the first place? Many believe we become God's children by keeping His commandments. But John puts it the other way around: you become a child of God, and then you fulfill these commandments by His enabling power at work in your life.

Point Five: By Faith I Become a Victorious Child of God

How then do you become a child of God? 1 John 5:3–5: "For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome. For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith." When you're born again, you become an overcomer—and the victory that overcomes the world is faith in Jesus the Son of God.

So the fifth point: by faith in Christ I become a victorious child of God. We must be careful not to think we earn our place as God's children by keeping the commandments. John 1:12 says, "As many as received Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God." When you become a child of God by grace through the work of Jesus on the cross, God then works in you, and that is evidenced in your love for Him and for others.

Nicodemus and the Bronze Serpent

I stress this point because of a very religious man who came to Jesus one night—Nicodemus, recorded in John 3. He was a leading rabbi, a Pharisee who sought to keep all of God's law and Judaism's traditions perfectly. He was probably a morally good man. He came with formalities, and Jesus cut him off: "Nicodemus, unless you are born again, you cannot see the kingdom of God." His brain popped like a grape. "I'm the teacher in Israel—of course I'm going to heaven. What do you mean, born again? Go back into my mother's womb?"

Jesus, full of grace and truth, brought it down to his level. "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness..." Now Nicodemus understood the language, because Jesus was quoting Numbers, which he knew well. In the wilderness, venomous snakes came into Israel's camp in judgment, and God told Moses to make a bronze serpent on a pole: anyone bitten had only to look at it to be healed. The scientifically minded said, "That's stupid; it won't save me." But God said, "Trust Me, look to that, and you'll be saved."

So Jesus said, "Even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." Twice He says it: whoever believes. This is how you're born again—by faith, Nicodemus. Not by morality, not by law-keeping. Look to Him.

A few years later Nicodemus saw Jesus lifted up on a cross, and something clicked. He was one of the two men who took Jesus' body and prepared it for burial. I have a feeling we'll see Nicodemus in heaven—not because of his good works, but because he trusted in Jesus as the Christ.

Love That Confronts—and Endures

How do we know someone has trusted Christ? It's evidenced in their life, in their love for God and for others. Jesus said, "By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another." It distresses me that in 2019 in America, the perception of many non-Christians is that Christians are characterized by hate. Jesus said we would be known by our love.

Yet love does not mean we overlook or blindly ignore sin, because Jesus didn't do that. He confronted corruption, sin, and wickedness—but always with grace and truth and love. Would to God it be increasingly evident in our lives that we are patient and kind, not jealous or boastful or proud, not rude, not demanding our own way, not irritable, keeping no record of wrongs, not rejoicing in injustice but rejoicing when truth wins—never giving up, always hopeful, enduring through every circumstance.

I recognize I am not sufficient in myself to accomplish that. I need God by His Spirit to enable me to love this way. So let's pray and ask Him to help us today, because there may be someone in your life you're having a hard time not keeping a record of wrongs with—and they might be standing right next to you.

Closing Prayer

Father, we need Your help to love in this way, because there are people in our lives—maybe in our own homes, certainly in our neighborhoods, workplaces, and campuses—whom we find unlovely. But Jesus, every one of us here was unlovely, and You demonstrated Your love toward us: while we were still sinners, You died for us. You promised that if we trust in You and Your love as shown on the cross, You would make us Your children, born again, and we would begin to inherit Your nature. Your love would compel us to love You in response, and to love others—first those who are part of Your body, and then even those we might consider our enemies.

So I pray You would enable us this week to keep no record of wrongs, to not be irritable or proud, to be kind and patient, tenderhearted, forgiving one another just as You have forgiven us. Do that work in us. I praise You, Jesus.

Perhaps today you have been religiously trying to earn God's favor, and for the first time you recognize that's not how it happens—but you want to receive His grace and His love, to become His child. If you would like to receive God's grace and be born again, pray with me: Dear Jesus, I know I need Your grace. I've been trying to fix myself, but I can't. I recognize my failures today. I pray that You would come into my life, forgive me of my sin, and help me to follow You by faith. In Jesus' name, Amen.