What Manner of Love

Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God! Therefore the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure. (1 John 3:1-3)

Six decades after first hearing of the new birth, the aged Apostle John is still utterly blown away that God should call us His children.

A Verse Worth Knowing by Heart

I cannot read 1 John 3:1 without hearing a little song in my head—"Behold what manner of love the Father has given unto us." Some of you know that tune. I'm grateful I know it, because it means I know this verse by heart. If you don't know this verse by heart, I'd encourage you to memorize it—put it on a 3x5 card or record yourself reading it—because it is an important passage you should hold dear.

The verse just prior, which Pastor Jason preached last week, ends with these words: "You know that everyone who practices righteousness is born of Him." The practice of righteousness indicates that a person is born of God, because they are inheriting characteristics of righteousness that come from the Father. And in writing about being born of Him, John now exclaims in the very next sentence: "Behold what manner of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called the children of God."

John, Still Amazed After Sixty Years

John had previously written the Gospel according to John, where in chapter 3 we have the famous conversation with Nicodemus, one of the leading teachers of Judaism. Nicodemus came to Jesus by night with questions, but he never got to them—Jesus interrupted him and said, "You must be born again if you're going to see the kingdom of God." That tripped Nicodemus's circuits; he could not comprehend it.

John was taught this concept of the new birth from the very early days of walking with Jesus. Now some sixty years have passed. John is probably about seventy-five years old as he writes this letter. And even though six decades or more have gone by, John is still utterly blown away by the reality of the new birth, by the Fatherhood of God, and by the fact that we are called the children of God. This concept is still blowing his circuits.

A Love We May Not Fully Comprehend

I love my children very much, with a love almost hard to articulate, from the moment they came into this world. I'm not entirely certain we fully comprehend the love described in the New Testament under the Greek word agape until we become parents. There is a sacrificial component, a kind of love between parent and child that you only fully understand when you become a parent.

I believe God created us this way so that we would begin to comprehend this kind of love. There is an instant connection when your children come into the world, and it is very hard to break, even when they do things that bother you—and they do, pretty much from day one. But God has loved us with a love far greater. Ephesians 2 says we were children of wrath, sons and daughters of disobedience. And yet, while we were still in that state, God loved us.

This is exactly what Jesus told Nicodemus: "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." Paul picks up on this in Romans 5: "For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us."

God's Great Love Overshadows My Sin

So here is our first point: God's great love has overshadowed the greatness of my sin. That's a good thing to meditate upon this week. Some of you grew up in church and never had a clearly prodigal, wayward season. But a significant number of you came to faith later in life after experiencing prodigal living, and as a result your sense of the greatness of God's love in spite of your sin may be especially vivid. There is a conceptualization of God's love that seems greater when a person has seen the distance they ran from God and how He took care of it.

If you're not amazed by the love of God today, do exactly what John says: behold what manner of love. Take time and consider it. Pray, "God, would You reveal to me the greatness of Your love?" What kind of love gives the ultimate sacrifice for one who is no better than an enemy—indeed, one who is an enemy? "Christ died for the ungodly" (Romans 5:6). This is the demonstration of the love of God.

Not Just Called—We Are

I love how the HCSB translates this verse: "Look how great a love the Father has given us, that we should be called God's children. And we are." Why is that little addition "and we are" there? It comes from different manuscripts—there are over 25,000 document evidences of the New Testament—but it is important because it speaks to a vital truth. We are not merely called the children of God as a title; we are the children of God by adoption, by God's grace.

Paul writes in Ephesians 1 that we have received every spiritual blessing in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, and one of those is adoption—to be fully fledged members of the family of God. When you put your trust in Jesus, you are not merely called a child of God; you are a child of God. What kind of love makes an enemy a child? Only a divine love can do that.

As an important side note: if you have not put your trust in Jesus Christ, then according to Ephesians 2 you remain a child of wrath, a son or daughter of disobedience. That is a frightful thing. There is a clear separation. But if you have trusted in Jesus, you are a child of God, and this speaks to identity—one of the most fundamental questions every human must answer. There are five questions we philosophically need to answer: identity, purpose, origin, destiny, and morality. We are living in a culture that for a long time has raised an entire Western society without a good basis for identity, and you will always wrestle with that question until you come to the reality of identity in Christ.

God's Great Love Separates Me from the World

This identity presents a challenge, which John identifies: "Therefore the world does not know us, because it did not know Him." That's our second point: God's great love separates me from the world. When we become the children of God, there is a separation. You are estranged at a certain level from this world, which creates tension—you are still in this world, yet Jesus says you are not of this world.

This is a challenge because a certain part of us doesn't like being estranged. I believe that part is what the New Testament calls our flesh, our old nature, which wants to fit in. Abraham Maslow identified this in his hierarchy of needs—human beings have a need to belong to an in-group. This is fueling identity politics in our nation today, with many groups catering to that part of our nature. From our youngest days we want to be part of the crowd—this is why some of you hated kickball or dodgeball, because you didn't get picked.

As the Scriptures see it, there are really only two kinds of people: those who are of this world and those who are of the kingdom. There is no in-between. And because we still carry this flesh, John knew his readers struggled with this too. That is why he wrote in 1 John 2:15, "Do not love the world or the things in the world." You only exhort people not to love the world if there is an inclination in them to love it. "If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him... and the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever."

Joined to Him as a Child

Because we have this inclination, we need this reminder: "Beloved, now we are the children of God." That's our third point: by God's great love I have been joined to Him as a child. It's not that we will be children of God. Some of you came from a background where you were taught you must perform a series of things—be baptized a certain way, partake of the sacraments correctly, observe certain rules—and then you might be called a child of God. You lived your whole life hoping that one day you'd become His child. But that is not what the Scriptures say. We are not merely called—we actually are the children of God, right now.

Present Standing, Future Glory

Since we are joined to Him as His children presently, we are given a wonderful guarantee. "Beloved, now we are the children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is." Here is the fourth point: my present standing in His love guarantees my future glory in His presence.

Paul writes about this in Romans 8: "You did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, 'Abba, Father.'" That may not mean much until you go to Israel and hear little children calling their daddy Abba. We don't relate to God as a cosmic judge we must appease in fear of destruction; in Christ we cry out to Him as Abba, Father—Daddy. "The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ."

The Mystery of What We Shall Be

This world is passing away, and every one of us is well acquainted with that. I'm reminded of it more than ever—my eyes don't work like they once did, my hearing isn't what it was, and for the first hundred steps every morning it sounds like every bone in my body is falling apart. But the child of God is promised a life beyond this life and a world beyond this world.

Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 15: "Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed—in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality... then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written: 'Death is swallowed up in victory.'" A biblical mystery is like a Christmas present—you don't know what it is until it's revealed. We don't grasp all the particulars of our future state. John said, "It has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when we see Him, we shall be like Him."

Paul says in Philippians 3:20, "Our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body." That sounds glorious. We don't know the exact specifics, but because of our identity as children of God, we have this destiny.

The Most Coherent Answers

This is supremely important, because every person you know is wrestling with these issues—identity, purpose, origin, destiny, morality—whether they articulate it or not. The theology presented in the Bible gives the most coherent answers to these questions. "If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away, behold, all things have become new" (2 Corinthians 5:17).

We live in a culture full of people struggling to find their identity. People say things like, "I've got to discover me," or "You just have to be you." What on earth does that mean? People are dying to find identity and a place to belong, yet they have no hope of destiny, because we've been educated by a secular, humanistic, naturalistic, materialist mindset that says this is all there is—when you die, nothing. So why do we wonder that people have a crisis of meaning? They chase meaning through mindfulness, meditation, apps that clear the mind. But your meaning is found in your identity in Christ, from which flows a guaranteed destiny that alters your purpose and your morality.

Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5: "For we know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." This body is going to die—we all know that. But the Christian knows we have a house not made with hands. Jesus said, "Let not your heart be troubled... in My Father's house are many dwelling places." You are made up of more than a body—body, soul, and spirit. The soul resides in this tent, and someday the soul departs and the body dies. But Paul continues: "In this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven... that mortality may be swallowed up by life. Now He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who also has given us the Spirit as a guarantee."

"So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord... We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord." And the psalmist wrote three thousand years ago, "In Your presence is fullness of joy; at Your right hand are pleasures forevermore" (Psalm 16:11).

Future Glory Compels Present Purification

Knowing our identity and our destiny gives us a new purpose and morality—not merely doing right and avoiding wrong, but living in line with the new nature God has given us. John says it like this: "And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure." That's our fifth point: His promise of future glory compels my present purification. The absolute certainty that I will be with Him and transformed stirs me to purification right now. The very next verse after "to be present with the Lord" says, "Therefore we make it our aim to be pleasing to Him."

Here is the difference between the Christian faith and the religions of this world. The Christian faith says that by Christ's grace and God's love you have been given a new identity as a child of God and a guaranteed destiny to be with Him forever—therefore live according to that new identity. Religion says you must work hard to become a child of God, and maybe, if you do it just right, you'll be accepted. A big difference.

Work Out What God Has Worked In

This brings me to my favorite verses, Philippians 2:12: "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure." We are the children of God now, guaranteed an inheritance—so what do we do? We live as His children in this world. Work out what God has worked into you by His grace; put effort into it, knowing He is working in you.

What does that look like practically? "Do all things without complaining and disputing" (Philippians 2:14). We have PhDs in complaining and disputing—we're scholars at it—and we do it while living in a nation more blessed than perhaps any other in history. But as a child of the kingdom, assured of a destiny beyond this world, you ought to live differently. Why? Verse 15: "that you may become blameless and harmless, children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world."

Beloved, now we are the children of God. If you have placed your trust in Jesus, your identity has been transformed—you are a child of God, and you shall be glorified in His presence one day. Right now you are called to work out the nature He has given you, so that people would see it and ask how. God will work in you both to will and to do His good pleasure. Therefore, let us live as His children.

Closing Prayer

God, thank You for Your grace that has entitled us. Sometimes we have a hard time with that word "entitled" in our day—we don't want to live as entitled people. But Lord, You want us to live as those who have received this great grace and this ultimate destiny. So God, would You work in us both to will and to do Your good pleasure today and this week, that our lives would represent in this world Your perfect will. Do a work in us, that we would shine as lights in a dark world that is in such desperate need of Your grace. We thank You for the identity we have received from You, and for the destiny we have been given because of Your grace. And we pray, God, that we would live according to Your purpose, according to the new nature, bringing glory to You. We praise You, Jesus. Set our hearts to worship You today. We ask this in Jesus' name, and all those who agree said, Amen.