of 1st John. The book of 1st John, and if you will turn to chapter three, We will look at several verses in this chapter dealing with the subject of love and particularly of Christian love as evidence that we are truly in Christ. 1 John 3 verse 11, this is the message you heard from the beginning. We should love one another. 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 brothers were righteous. Then verse 14 and 15, we know that we have passed from death to life because we love our brothers. Anyone who does not love remains in death. Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him. 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 brother. And finally, verses 22 and 23. Well, let's read verse 21 too. Dear friends, 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. And this is His command, to believe in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as He commanded us. May God bless us with several short readings from this book of scripture. Now we're coming tonight to one of the most striking themes in all of the book of 1st John, the theme of love and a theme which you will readily recall we have touched upon at various times and in various different ways in the course of our studies through the book of 1st John. Love toward one another, a very powerful part of the teaching of John the aged apostle in this great book of scripture. Indeed you will probably recall that from very early on in the book in chapter one and chapter two he had touched upon this theme as in chapter two verse nine. Anyone who claims to be in the light wrote John and hates his brother is still in darkness. Whoever loves his brother lives in the light. And so on through this great letter the repeated refrain of love occurs and reoccurs again. Now as we saw in our studies it's the more remarkable in that the Greek word which John uses for love, the word agape, was not in common use at all among the Greek prior to the time of the New Testament, and it is indeed a word of distinctly Christian coinage, a new term, if you like, coined for an entirely new idea, because whereas the heathens wrote of loving one another, they spoke of it in terms of loving a worthy or a noble object. that was capable of returning and requiting that love in some way. But the way in which the New Testament and the Apostle John in particular uses the word, as we have recognised, is that here is a love that is otherworldly, a love that is for the unworthy, who cannot in any sense requite or repay that measure of love that is bestowed upon us. So as we've come to this subject this evening, we simply dare not escape the profound implications of John's teaching and indeed of the New Testament emphasis. And my reason for returning this evening in a summarising sermon upon this subject of love, a wrap-up treatment if you like of this subject, is that whereas previously we have dealt with John's teaching piecemeal as we came across it in the text, we have this great opportunity in a simple way tonight to try to unite together the different strands and themes that John deals with and to bring our thoughts in one single compass to bear upon this subject. Do we really love one another? As the purpose of this letter has set out to exhort us to do. Now there are four things that I want to do with you tonight. around this great subject of loving one another and the first of them is this, to impress upon you again that the burden of John's message is the message of loving one another. Now if you look with me at the first of those five or six verses that we read at our scripture reading this evening, I think you can see in a very clear way that this is indeed the burden of the apostle's message. Chapter three, verse 11, where we read these words. But this is the message you heard from the beginning. We should love one another. Now I think if there's any text of this whole letter of 1 John that makes it clear that the apostle's overriding concern in a real way is to impress upon us the message of love, it is here in verse 11 of the third chapter. In other words, it is the unfolding of the burden of his heart, this aged apostle as he longs for God's people who are bound toward one another in holy and Christian love. We've seen it of course again and again all through the pages of this letter. For instance, he declares that if we do not love one another, we live in spiritual darkness. As I quoted to you in chapter two, verse nine, anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in darkness. But whoever loves his brother lives in the light. Now I want to impress upon you this evening that this is not just some outer strand of the apostle's thinking. But by the very language that he uses in verse 11, He conveys to us that this is of great and fundamental importance. And the language that I refer to you is the beginning words of that verse. This is the message that you have heard from the beginning. Now, if you remember, John uses that term, this is the message. Only in this letter where he is seeking to lay down some fundamental truth, some absolute essential, some sine qua non that we cannot and dare not be without in our Christian lives. Such as in chapter 1 if you turn to it in verse 5. where we read the identical language of the great apostle. This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you. What is it? That God is light and in him there is no darkness at all. In other words, one of the great and fundamental planks of Christian doctrine in this epistle is that God is light. In whom there dwells no darkness whatsoever. This profound theological truth that John wants us to grasp with all its implications there in chapter 1. It's introduced with the identical language that he introduces the subject of love in chapter 3. This is the message that you have heard from the beginning. And what I'm seeking to impress upon you my dear friend in Christ this evening is that alongside the great theological truths are the ethical truths and both of them are necessary for one and the other together. Do you see what I'm saying? Are they both to be found in your life tonight? You know it's possible in our Reformed tradition to feel that we have almost the mind of John Calvin. We understand the great doctrines of the Holy Scriptures and of the Reformed faith in all its wonder and comprehensiveness. We believe that God is life. and in him there is no darkness at all. But alongside that doctrinal and theological grasp of God's truth is their lame. Alongside of that, the commitment to love one another are both to be found in your life tonight? Or are you simply theologically minded and no more? Jesus said, you remember a new commandment I give you and this is my commandment that you love one another. And all through the whole of the pages of the New Testament, you have the same emphasis in the great words of Jonathan Edwards, that New England theologian in his book, Charity and its Fruits. He says, the grace of love is insisted on in the New Testament more than any other virtue. It's mentioned scores of times, he says, by John. It crowds the pages of the Apostle Paul And Peter says of it, above all have fervent love for one or the other. And you see it is so important in the pages of the New Testament because it is the essential link in the proper relationship between God and men. You remember our Lord Jesus Christ summarized that link by saying, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and mind and strength and you shall love your neighbor as yourself. The whole of man's duty, the whole of the godly life as laid down in the sacred scriptures of God's word is summarized into brief and comprehensive commandments that comprise together the Christian virtue of love. This is the message that you have heard from the beginning, that you should love one another. My dear friend, in your Christian experience tonight is the burden of love, the same burden that lay upon the heart of the aging apostle Paul. Now the second thing that I would seek to impress upon you from the teaching of this epistle on this subject is that love is the evidence that we have been truly saved. Again look with me if you will at chapter 3 verses 14 and 15 where John writes, we know that we have passed from death to life because we love the brethren. He that does not love his brother remains in death. Whoever hates his brother says John is a murderer and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. Now John's point I think is made abundantly clear in this chapter as we saw earlier in our study of it. As he illustrates what he is saying by two great characters of scripture from the book of Genesis and you remember them I'm sure very well this evening. On the one hand there is Cain who murdered his brother and on the other hand is Abel who served God and loved God evidently with all his heart. But in the heart of pain was that anger and hatred toward his own brother that led him to commit the ultimate crime and cruelly and in a dastardly way murder this righteous brother of his. And you see in the context of these verses that I just read to you, John draws out the lesson that these two men represent in a sense all the families of the earth today. That there are two different families in effect among the children of men today. There are the children of God on the one hand, represented by Abel, and there are the children of the devil, on the other hand, represented by Cain. And the Cain-like spirit, says the Apostle John, belongs to the world of unregeneracy, to men who are outside of Christ, who know nothing of the glory of the gospel of God's grace, and who behave still in that same manner as their representative pain behaved in the book of Genesis. Because that pain-like spirit belongs to the old corrupted nature. Now what it says to us, beloved, is this. That certainly whilst we are still in the body, we wrestle and we struggle against the remnants of indwelling sin in us. We wrestle against feelings that set us awry with our Christian brothers, that tempt us to begin to move down the road that ends up in hate and even a desire for their demise. But what we are to do in a renewed nature is to wrestle down the remnants of that sin that would tempt us to behave otherwise. How we need, beloved, to keep those feelings under control. And when hatred and lack of love break out in our spirit, what are we to do according to this letter of John? Well if you turn back to first John chapter one verse nine, you read there, that if we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us and defend us from all unrighteousness. And you read again in chapter 2 verse 1, the second thing that we are to do, we are to come to Jesus Christ the righteous one who is the propitiation for our sins. And in confession of those sins, we are to find his forgiveness and his almighty and divine help to enable us to love as we should. Now you see, if we are in Christ, then this new life that courses through us leads us not to Cain-like behavior, but to able life behavior. Let us examine ourselves this evening. To which family do we fundamentally belong? God's family or Satan's family? There is, you see, no alternative to these two. Let me put it to you this way. If someone came to me tonight and claimed to be a carpenter by trade and profession, Would I simply believe him because he came to me with a bag of tools and grubby hands? I don't think so. If he were hired to do some work in my house, the evidence that I would like to see is some evidence of his ability and his craftsmanship. And if he came simply with a profession, I would want to see some work of his that he had done to show me that he was capable of living up to the profession that he made. If someone else came to me and said, oh, I'm an airline pilot, I can fly you from airport B to airport A. The fact that he wore a nice uniform, the fact that he made a good profession, the fact that he came to me with some aviation manuals in his hand would not necessarily convince me that he was what he said he was. And beloved, what John is saying to us this evening is equally serious. We make a very serious claim to be saved, to be born again, to be converted, to be under the powers of the world to come. Well, if we proclaim this, says John, what evidence does the world expect to see? If I'm a carpenter, I need evidence to prove it. If I'm a pilot, I need to be able to take the airplane off the airport and fly it and land it again at destination A. And what John is saying to us here is that if we love one another, it is the evidence beyond all other evidences that the world desires to see. You know we're living in a day, aren't we? when so many of the non-essentials of Christianity are so much in evidence. The external, men with great eloquence who stand in their tuxedos and are so persuasive by the words that they speak, men with the mind almost of John Calvin. who can articulate theological points with great preciseness. Men of great gifts and abilities appearing in the church. Men even who are willing to give their lives as martyrs for the Christian cause. But these, beloved, are not of the essentials of Christianity. Though they may be so much in evidence. And what John says is essential is so often today lacking in the midst of the Christian church. John is very clear, if we love God, we will love each other as proof that we are born of God. Everyone that loves, says John, is born of God and knows God. How do I know that you are what you say you are? Because if you are born of God, you will love in a new and in a different way. Oh my friend, what severe teaching this is in a certain sense. No eternal life abides in that person who does not love his brother. Not to be loving is to be hating. and hated, he says of murder, and no murderer shall inherit the kingdom of God. The evidence that I am what I say that I am is there. Now the third truth that he would bring to us tonight is that this love is supremely revealed in the sacrifice of Christ. There's just one verse here that we should read, verse 16. Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he, that is the Lord Jesus, laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives. for the brethren. It's rather interesting that in John's Gospel, chapter 3, verse 16, you have that great and well-known text, For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, and so forth. And here in the first letter of John in chapter 3 verse 16 we are invited to contemplate the love of God in that Christ laid down his life for us. It's something of a coincidence because of course in the original the Greek manuscripts were not divided up into chapters and verses at all. But it's interesting that there is an identical reference chapter and verse in the letter and in the epistle as well. Now what John is saying to us here is that he presses brotherly love from another and a new angle. And it is the example of the Lord Jesus, who being God as well as man, laid down his life for us. And in that atoning work, says the great apostle, we see the supreme love of God manifested for us. And this argument has a threefold application. Let me remind you of it again this evening, though we touched on it some weeks ago. But he tells us that if Christ's example in living and dying for us is to be taken to heart, then for one thing, our love must be sacrificial for one another. Do you notice what he goes on to say? We ought to lay down, verse 16, our lives for one another. There's no question that this is involved. At times it may be a literal requirement of sacrificing our lives in martyrdom as many Christians have had to do in this century. It may surprise us but this present 20th century may go down in the annals of Christian history as the century of Christian martyrdom. with those who have lost their lives in countless numbers in China, in the lands controlled by the USSR and in many other places of the world in South America and in the great continent of Africa. We may be called upon to make that supreme sacrifice but at all times the spirit or willingness, says John, to do just that should be the characteristic of our love that springs from the example of the sacrifice of Christ. For the sake of the gospel and to glorify him, I should be ever ready to lay down my life for the brethren. But the second implication is that this love should be unconditional. Do you remember in the words of Jesus in John's gospel? He said, as I have loved you so, you must love one another. How did Jesus love his disciples? Unconditionally. He did not say concerning Peter, because he's a pleasant and a lively fellow and he and I get on well together, I will love him. Or I will love John so long as he is faithful. Or you don't find him saying in the Gospels, I will love Andrew so long as he congratulates me and doesn't disagree with me or misunderstand me. We make those kind of conditions but Jesus never does. And the love that John exhorts us here is not only sacrificial but unconditional as I have loved you So must you love one another. And you notice that from this example of Christ there is a third thing. But it is a love that is very practical in verse 17. He who has material possessions and sees his brother have need and has no pity on him. How does the love of God dwell in him? And in this lovely and eloquent two-man illustration, John's question is very powerful and poignant, isn't it? Such a person knows little of the love of God, who when his coffers are full by God's abundant blessing, he sees another brother in need and will not open the bowels of his compassion to minister to him in a practical way. and love is nothing if it is not only sacrificial and unconditioned but also most eminently practical as well. You see it is no idle sentiment which ends just in soothing words but it is the love that Christ exhibited and showed to us upon the cross, his example. Now fourthly, as I draw to a close, this kind of love, says John, issues in effectiveness in Christian living. Look again at verse 22 and 23. And you notice that John said, Whatever we ask we receive from him. And because we obey his commands and do what pleases him, And this is his command, that we should love one another. Well there are a number of matters really under this issue of effectiveness. Let me touch upon them quickly as I finish. The first one is there in verse 22 and 23. That if we are loving one another, the promise, the gospel promise, the New Testament promise, is that our prayers will be effective. In other words, loving one another is a true foundation for effective prayer. Let me ask you this evening, are you experiencing a period when your prayers are not being answered? One possible reason may be that you are not living in love with a fellow Christian. We have whatever we ask because we keep his commands and his command is, says John, to love one another. And just as prayers may be hindered according to Peter in his letter when a husband is out of a right relationship with his wife, so prayer according to John may be hindered when our relationships in a broader context have gone awry. with our fellow Christians. This is a true foundation for effective Christian living in the life of prayer. And if yours is barren and ineffective this evening, examine your heart, my dear brother and sister, in the light of this scripture. You know, another area of Christian living that this touches is that our fellowship will be without fear. In chapter 4 verse 18, if you look at it quickly, there is no fear in love but perfect love casts out fear because fear has to do with punishment. The man who fears is not made perfect in love. And surely John is indicating there that in true Christian fellowship There is no fear of one another as believers. If we both love the Lord, there should be no barrier, no dread of meeting other Christians. And yet if you're honest and I am honest, there are occasions in our life when we're almost afraid to speak to one another, to share fellowship with one another, because we're conscious that we are not living in love with one another as we should. And so not only is prayer made effective but fellowship is made effective because it is without fear. Oh may the love of God tonight bind us together in true unity of spirit in that way. We find again that witness will be empowered. By this said Jesus all men will know that you are my disciple. And you see what unsaved person will take notice of us if we are living in unlove toward one another. But how the world looks, and looks in amazement, when in the words of Tertullian in the second century, the world says, see how they love one another these Christians. See how they are ready even to die for one another. It makes our Christian witness effective. But you know, finally, and with this I close, it makes believers more like their God. Because God himself is love. All his attributes, in a sense, are summarised and comprehended in that beautiful statement of John that God is love. And when we love one another, it makes earth more like heaven. It makes this earthly fellowship more like the fellowship in Gloria Barth. Where there are the three persons of the blessed Godhead, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, loving one another with infinite love. A love that goes out to the hosts of angels. and to the company of redeemed men and women. And the response of those hosts in heaven flows back again in a holy love to God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. And what a beautiful thing when that fellowship above is replicated here upon the earth. When it makes believing and the fellowship of believers, more like the fellowship of their God and his church in heaven. And it shall come to pass, my dear friend, even here upon the earth, that we shall say from sorrow, toil and pain, and then we shall be free and perfect love and friendship reign. to all eternity. John's teaching then calls us to examine ourselves. Do we really love the Lord? It was issued in love for every brother and sister in the body of Christ. Do we pray for one another? It was issued in that practical service for one another that expresses Christian love. The only alternative is that we find ourselves in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniquity. I plead with you this evening, confess your sins, put those things right that may have gone wrong between brothers and sisters in the Lord. We have a great enemy, Satan, seeking inroads into his church, seeking to disrupt and destroy to sow seeds of this harmony, to build up jealousy, to lead to barrenness in Christian service, so that the world, looking on, says the church, why it is just an irrelevance. And the answer is here. To return to Calvin, to experience his love, To contemplate the Saviour's dying exhibition of divine love for us. And to see from his head, his hand, his feet, sorrow and love flowing down to return to our knees. And be under the command that we should love one another for God is love. Our Father, may the Holy Spirit apply all these truths and make this fellowship indeed a loving fellowship, still more loving in Christ our Lord. For his name's sake.