All right. Good morning. We're doing good. You guys ready to go? You awake? All right, let's get after it. Grab your Bibles. We're in the book of First John. We're going to be in First John for a while. So we encourage you to bring a Bible, bring a pen, bring a notebook, open up to First John. It's in the back. If you don't have your Bible, we'll put the verses up on the screen. But we would encourage you to bring one. I think it's always better when you got it in front of you to mark it up and see it. Just before the service, I was talking to Richard, and he asked, well, how's First John going? It's like, I don't know. Still trying to read the room a little bit. I think everybody loved Daniel. Like, let's talk about prophecy. But you get to First John, it's like, are you a Christian? Like, you sure. I don't know if people are loving that, but it doesn't matter. That's where we're at. That's what we're doing. That's where we're going. So we've been getting some tests. Like, there is this. Like, John's trying to make liars in the church feel uncomfortable, and he's trying to make Christians who may have some doubts be more confident and assured of their salvation. And both are happening. He's given us some tests to kind of test the genuineness of our faith. And we've gotten the obedience test of, like, hey, if you say you abide in Christ, like, do you follow his words? You follow his teaching? Because that kind of lines up together. So we got the obedience test, and today we're going to get the love test. So let me just. Let's just get right into the text. I want to read our verses today, and then we'll step back and kind of talk about what he's talking about and get back into it. So here we go. Chapter two, verse seven. We're going to go through verse 11. Here's what John says. Beloved, I'm writing you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word that you have heard. At the same time, it is the new commandment that I'm writing to you, which is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining. Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness. Whoever loves his brother, you can go ahead and underline that that's kind of the theme or what we're talking about. Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in him there is no cause for stumbling. Whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes. And you see the teaching of Jesus here because John said like, hey, I was with Jesus, I touched Jesus, I heard Jesus, I was there. And what I'm telling you, I heard from him, like, he's passing it along. And Jesus emphasized love for God and love for people. Like he said the whole law and prophets, you can hang on those two things. Love God and love people. And right in first John. We see John kind of saying the same thing. Last week we got this push of we need to love God. Like, if you need to keep his word in him. Truly, this is verse five of chapter two. The love of God is perfected. He's saying this. This love that we have for God is matured and it grows. And he's calling us to that. And now we get to this call to love others. Now there's a debate. Not that it doesn't matter that much. We don't have to get lost in, but there's a debate by what does it mean, this call to love your brother? Is it like your fellow human being, like, you should love your brother, or is it uniquely, you should love your Christian, your brother in Christ within the household of God? Now, here's why I don't think we should sweat that too much. The New Testament in the Bible promotes both of those. We're to love our enemies, we're to love our neighbors, and we're to especially love in the household of God. So does it apply to everybody or just Christians? Yes. Okay, so let's do good at loving people, especially those in the household of God. But John has given us this, this love test. He's like, hey, if. If you say that you're in the light and you hate your brother, you're in the darkness. Another way of saying is like, you're not where you think you are. You're kind of misjudging where you're at. And he gives us this love test and, and we want to give ourselves this love test as he presents it to us. So here, here's my, my question to push onto you guys a little bit myself as well. Would the way that you love others say that you're a Christian? And what is the way of loving others that says that? Let me say it Again, would the way that you love others say that you're a Christian? And what is the way of loving others that says that? That's what we want to get to. Because there's no disputing the fact that love is a big deal in the Bible. That we could go. We could be here all day kind of making that case. Let me go to one chapter. You guys are familiar with it. First Corinthians 13. This is how that chapter ends. Says, so now, faith, hope, and what love abide. These three. They're a big deal, right? Faith, hope. Like, these are big things, these three. But the greatest of these is what? Love. So he's saying, love's a really big deal. It's the greatest of these things. In fact, at the beginning of this chapter, he says this. If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I'm a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I'm nothing. If I give away all that I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. So he's saying, listen, you can be the most generous person, the most knowledgeable person, the most gifted person, the most impressive person, but if you don't love, it's nothing. Love's this really big deal. It's like, all right, I'm with you there. But what does it look like to practically love somebody? What does love look like lived out? Well, that's a great question, because he's gonna go into defining it. You guys are familiar with this. Love is patient and kind. Love does not envy or boast. It is not arrogant or rude, does not insist on its own way. It is not irritable or resentful. How many of you guys had this read at your wedding? Okay, how are you doing in it? No, I'm just kidding. Well, that's a conversation for another time. It is not irritable or resentful. And then here you go. It does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. So you get this definition of, like, here's what love looks like, practically lived out. And this brings about a conflict. So the Bible really promotes love, and the world really promotes love. The world loves some love, right? And you're like, well, what's the conflict? It seems like there's some common ground there. It seems like a place of agreement. But what if we're not talking about the same thing? What if we're using the same terms with different understandings and different definitions? Because that'll create some conflict. See, when the world talks about love, it often talks about love as a feeling. The heart wants what the heart wants. You can't help who you love. Like, it's just a powerful emotion that's kind of directing you. Or love is reduced down to just kindness and civility. You see so much hostility in our world, so much division in our world, and the solution is just love. We just need more love and that would fix it. Or love is seen as this unconditional affirmation and support of others. Like, to really love somebody, you have to support them and affirm them no matter what. Recently I was at a high school basketball game and I walk into the gym and there's this big sign at the end of the gym that says, no room for hate. And then it had some other symbols underneath that sign that represent things I hate. So now I'm feeling like. Well, I feel like there's no room for me. Now I'm feeling hated. And if I'm feeling hated, maybe there's no room for you. I'm like, can anybody be in this gym? Like, it creates some, some problems and some tension. In fact, we'll see in a couple weeks. This command that John gives us, don't love the world. And genuine love must involve hate. Well, we'll get into that more. But. But to genuinely love someone involves some kind of hate. Because if you love people, there are things in this world that are leading people astray and lying to people and deceiving people. And if you don't hate those things, you don't really love people. But it's tough when the world gets to define the terms. This is what it means to love and this is what it means to hate. And there has been a crafty distortion of love in our culture. And I say crafty because I think it's like this genius move on the part of the enemy and his schemes to kind of like deceive us. Because who's going to be against love? Like, everybody, everybody loves love. But if you can kind of twist the definition of love, if you kind of change what it means, well, you can deceive quite a bit of people. And this worldly idea of love has completely removed God. When it comes to love. God is seen as unnecessary. Seriously, think about it. Does somebody need God to love? And you might be like the knee jerk reaction, like, well, no, now, in one sense, you need God to breathe, okay? But in a lot of people, it's like, well, I have a lot of unbelieving friends that are very loving. They're very nice people. They're very kind, they're very patient, they're very respectful. They may be very generous. In fact, some people feel like I got non Christian friends that seem more loving than my Christian friends. And in one sense, there's this idea of like, yeah, you don't. You can show patience and you can show kindness and you can. You can be generous like that. That can exist. But. But let's go back to the definition of love in First Corinthians 13. How does someone not rejoice over wrongdoing without God? And how does somebody rejoice with the truth without God? Like, without God who decides what is wrong and what is true? And what if you get that wrong? Because if you get that wrong, do you get love wrong? Isn't that what he's saying? But this idea of not rejoicing in wrongdoing and rejoicing at truth, those are elements that the world wants to leave out of the definition of love. So in our world, we talk. You hear people talk, like, well, love is love. And it's like, bricks are bricks. I don't. Chairs are chairs. Like, that's just. I'm gonna. I don't know where you're going with that. But. But it's this idea of like, well, just love is love and what. What has happened. And we'll see a contrast here as we progress in first John, because John's going to tell us this. God is love. But. But here's what happened. There's been a twisting, and our world is twisted to think that love is God. Like, it's the highest thing. And here's how it flushes itself out. We see our world is broken. But what does the world think the Savior is? Is God going to fix our world? No. What our world needs is just more love. And if our world had more love, then it would fix everything. They've made love the Savior, not God. But John clearly says God is love. He's the Savior. And if you really want to understand what love is, it is seen in God. It is defined by God. And it is so connected to God that apart from him, you don't really love. Like, not in its authentic, genuine form that it's been commanded to us to do. So. There's a love test. There's a love test that John has given us. Say, hey, this is what Love is and what should look like. And if you're a genuine Christian, this is a part of your life and we want to kind of take this test. So what kind of love should exist in the life of a believer that supports genuine conversion, that supports there a new creation in Christ, that heart of stone has been taken out and a heart of flesh has been given and new affections and new desires and kind of transformation has happened in their life? What kind of love supports that? Because listen, church, there are a lot of people that want to claim Jesus in a way that supports their understanding of love. You know what I mean when I say that? It's like, well, my God would never do that. My God would never say that. My God is a loving God. How can you call yourself a Christian and not love? Right? You don't, you don't really know Jesus. Like my Jesus is this, this loving Jesus. And there's a, an attack on anybody that kind of claims that Christianity that doesn't have a love that fits their definition. But this is the problem. They started with a secular understanding of love and then they brought God underneath that because God is love and God's a loving God. Well, this is my understanding of love. So therefore God goes underneath that. But what if we started with God? What if we started with God's word and said from that? How do we better understand love and the love that we're called to? So that's what we want to do. Let's go back to our verses that we read and look at what John is saying here because there's some insights that we need to see. Verse 7. Beloved, I am writing you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word that you have heard. At the same time, it is a new commandment that I am writing to you. Well, what's the commandment? I mean, the whole section, it's like he's talking about this, but he never actually says the commandment. He hints to it when he talks about hating your brother or loving your brother. But he doesn't really define the commandment. But if you look at John's writing, it becomes really clear. In the second letter that he wrote, this is second John 5, he says, and now I ask you, dear lady, not as though I were writing you a new commandment. So you get this language again, but the one we have heard from the beginning, had from the beginning that we what, love one another? So there you go. Okay, this is what he's clearly talking About? He's talking about loving your brother, loving one another. And he calls it both an old and new. Like, well, which one is it? Is it old or is it new? But maybe a better question is, why does he refer to it old and new? Well, what is he. What's the point? He's trying to communicate by saying it's an old commandment and it's a new commandment. Well, I think a couple things. One is a reference to Jesus that we'll get to a little bit. But also another reason is he's confronting false teachers. So second John 9, he says this. Everyone who goes on ahead and does not abide in the teaching of Christ, which is being referenced here in this new commandment, does not have God. Whoever abides in the teaching has both the Father and the Son. You're like, okay, what does that have to do with this? That phrase goes on ahead means progresses. And this is what the false teachers were doing. They were progressing or going ahead of the things of Jesus. Notice this. They're not rejecting the teachings of Jesus. They're just adding to them. Like, oh, yeah, that was great. But also, have you read this? And have you seen this? Now you need to watch out, because this happens today. I don't have a problem with Jesus. Jesus is great. But you also need to read this and you also need to get in this. There's just kind of this adding to Jesus. Well, John is saying, I'm not doing that. I'm not adding to it. If you go back to verse five of chapter one, this is the message we have heard from him, Jesus, and proclaim to you, I'm not adding. I'm just telling you the things Jesus told me. I'm not giving you a new idea or new teaching. This is the good old stuff that he said that he's proclaiming that I'm sharing with you. And it's a reference even back to Jesus's teaching on this new commandment. Because Jesus uses these words. Go to John 13. What does it say right away? A new commandment. I give you that you love one another, just as I have loved you. You also are to love one another. And you're like, well, Jesus, that wasn't new then either. I mean, Leviticus 19:18 says, Love your neighbors yourself. Right? This isn't really. This isn't really that new. So why do you call it a new commandment? Well, there's two words for new in Greek. One communicates like new in time, and the other communicates new in quality. John and Jesus are talking about new in quality. Because he says, this is a new commandment I give you. You are to love one another. And then what does he say? I have loved you. So here's a new standard to that old commandment. Here's a new perspective to that old commandment. Here's a new directive to that old commandment. Here's a new example for that old commandment. You're to love, but I've given you how you are to love. I've given you this picture of how you are to love one another, and it says, I have loved you. So John is saying, if you're a Christian, you gotta love like Jesus, which isn't different from what he said in verse six before this section. Whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walks. So the same thing. If you say you abide in Jesus, you ought to love like Jesus. That's the expectation he gives. So how did Jesus love? If we're to love like Jesus, how did Jesus love? Now, you might be tempted to go right to the cross, which isn't wrong. That's the apex of the love of Christ. The love of God shown through Christ that he gave his life for us. He took our punishment. He gave us his righteousness. Like, that's this amazing display of love that God, while we were yet sinners, shows his love for us, that Christ died for us. Right? So, yes, this is a great display of love. But what about practically in life, day in and day out, relating to people? How are we to love like Jesus? Well, this is kind of tricky because you could use different examples to kind of support whatever you want to support. Because there's stories of Jesus having lunch with Zacchaeus, who's this crooked tax collector. And there's examples of Jesus stopping people from stoning this woman caught in adultery. And there's examples of Jesus talking at the. To the woman at the well, who is, you know, on her fifth husband and living with a guy that's not even her husband. And you got all these, like, the friend of sinners kind of examples of Jesus. Then you got all these examples of Jesus, like flipping tables and calling people names and saying hard things. So it's like, which example do you use? And you can kind of use whatever example to kind of support the point you want to make about love kind of be confusing. Jesus doesn't have good moments and bad moments. He's the perfect son of God. So what's the heart behind Jesus that kind of gives us the motive that drives Christian love. Because if we can understand the common motive, whether you're having lunch with Zacchaeus or you're flipping tables, what's the common motive behind that? That is the essence of Christian love. That's what we need to understand. Because if we understand that, I think we could better understand what we're called to. And if we understand what we're called to, you'll better know when to invite a sinner over for dinner and when to flip a table over. And you'll both be driven by love in doing that. So either. Let's go to the Gospel of John. Flip over to John, chapter 11. We're going to look at a story or an account. You know, it's just the story, it happened where I think we get a clear window into the motive of Jesus Christ behind his love. So. So John, chapter 11. Love. Hearing the pages turn. That's where we're going. It's like music, those thin Bible pages. It's flipping. Love it. You guys there? You ready? All right. John, chapter 11, verse 1. Now, a certain man was ill. Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. It was Mary who anointed the Lord with ointment and. And wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was ill. So the sisters sent to him, saying, lord, he whom you what is ill. So Mary and Martha and Lazarus, brothers and sisters, Jesus has an affection for them. He loves them. They have shown love to him. He gets word that he's ill. But when Jesus heard it, he said this. This illness does not lead to death. It is for the glory of God, so that the son of God may be glorified through it. Now, Jesus, what, loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So how many people does he love there? Do some math. Three, right? He loves all of them. He has this affection for them. So when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he went right away to heal him. Oh, you guys didn't read that? Here's what it says. So Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was. That doesn't make sense. Why does he do that? Like what. What's. What's going on here? I mean, he clearly loves him. He's clearly ill. He clearly doesn't care. Or does he? Let's keep reading. You go down to verse 11. So Lazarus dies. Verse 11 says, after saying these things, he said to them, our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I go to awaken him. The disciples Said to him, lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover. Like, he'll. He'll wake up like, we don't need to go now. Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought that he meant he was taking rest in sleep. Then Jesus said plainly, lazarus has died. I love kind of the honest interactions between Jesus and disciples. It's like you didn't get it. He's dead. That's what I meant. Right now check this. And for your sake, I'm glad. For your sake, I'm glad that he's dead. I'm glad that I was not there so that you may believe, but let us go to him. So Thomas called the twin, said to his fellow disciples, let us go, that we may die with him. He's like, yeah, let's go. They didn't want to go back to Jerusalem. He's like, let's just do it right now. When Jesus came, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. Bethany was near Jerusalem, about two miles off. And many of the Jews had come out or come to Martha and Mary to console them concerning their brother. So when Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him. But Mary remained seated in the house. Martha said to Jesus, lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. Ouch. If you would have come when we called you, when we sent word to you, if you would have just come because you say that you love us. If you. If you would have done this, then he wouldn't have died. We wouldn't have been in this mess. Not as she checks herself, but even now, I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give it. Give you. Jesus said to her, your brother will rise again. Martha said, I know he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day. Like, I know I have hope someday. Jesus said to her, I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live. And everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this? She said to him, yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, coming into the world. And you think it was hard for Mary and Martha and Lazarus to go through the pain of the death of a loved one, to call out to Jesus and not get the answer you were hoping for, where their minds might have gone? Does he not care about us? Does he not love me? Has he forgot about us? Is he too busy? And then to sit four days, lose hope? You wrestle with those emotions of anger. And Jesus could have. He could have left right away and healed him. We've seen him do it. In fact, he didn't even have to leave. There's examples of Jesus healing people, and he's not even in that location. He could have just been like, send word, he's good, he's fine. And he could heal him from a distance, but he doesn't on purpose. In fact, he says he's glad about it. And it clearly emphasizes he loves Lazarus and he loves Mary and he loves Martha. And we have a hard time fitting this into our bucket of love. So what's going on here? Well, we're given the motive of Jesus. Look back at verse four. But when Jesus heard it, he said, this illness does not lead to death. It is for the glory of God. So that the Son of God may be glorified through it. Or go down to verse 15. And for your sake, for your sake, I'm glad I was not there. I'm glad he died so that you may believe. So he's saying, here's the motive of Jesus behind this. A loving motive. I want you to get a load of me. I want you to get a load of the Son of God. I want you to have a better understanding of who I am so that you believe. I want to be glorified. Glorified. Made much of, highlighted, celebrated. By who? Them. Because he loves them. Us. Everybody around there like this is driven by love. They're going to see and they're going to experience how awesome Jesus is, how powerful Jesus is. Even if it meant pain to get there. Even if it meant pain to get there. Even if it meant pain to get there. In fact, the pain might be giving them the best perspective to see it. And he wants them to rejoice in the truth. He is the truth, the way, the truth, and the life. And he wants them to rejoice in the truth. Why? Because he loves them. That's what love is. That's what love does. So here's what love looks like. Love is the sacrificial work of helping others find satisfaction in God through Christ. Love is the sacrificial work of helping others find satisfaction in God through Christ. Because that's what Jesus does. That's what he did. He left the comforts of heaven in the incarnation, put on flesh, came to earth, lived a life, was misunderstood, mocked, beaten, killed. Why? So that we might be reconciled back to God. So that we, through his forgiveness, might find our satisfaction in God. That's love. That's what he did. And to someone you love, you want to give them the greatest, longest lasting happiness possible. Possible, right? Go ahead and picture that person. You, you love them. What do you want for them? You want to give them the greatest, longest lasting happiness possible. Where are you going to find that? With God? Through Christ. That's where you find that. So, so here, here's what I want you to understand. Listen. Worldly love is about temporary affirmation, temporary acceptance, temporary belonging, temporary pleasure. Christian love is about eternal affirmation, eternal acceptance, eternal belonging, eternal pleasure. Often hear me. Often at the expense of temporary affirmation, temporary acceptance, temporary belonging and temporary pleasure. Are you tracking with me when I say that? Let me say that again. This is important to get. Worldly love is about temporary affirmation, temporary belonging, temporary acceptance, temporary pleasure. Christian love is about eternal affirmation, eternal acceptance, eternal belonging, eternal pleasure. Often at the expense of. Of temporary belonging, temporary acceptance, temporary affirmation and temporary pleasure. Who loves like that? That's hard. How does a love like that come about? Especially in a world that misunderstands it or misinterprets it? How do you have a love that goes against culture with endurance and perseverance? How do you like, continue to love people like that? Well, here's the thing. John is not saying you have to love like Jesus in order to be a Christian. Like, you better up your love game. You better do better. That's, that's not what he's saying. He's saying Christians love like Jesus because they're Christians. It's not just a commandment, it's a test. Like, is this love in you? It's part of the transforming work of God. When he takes out a heart of stone and gives us a heart of flesh and puts his spirit in us, that gives us new desires and new affections and new passions and matures in us a love for him and other people like that's part of the work of conversion. So is that true in you? And here's the thing, John is confronting false teachers. So there's confusion in this church. It's Gnosticism. We talked about it a little bit in the first week. But Gnostics like to know they valued knowledge at the expense of love. Again, it doesn't matter how you love or how you treat people. You just need to be enlightened. You just need to know, right? Well, today it can seem like the opposite. It doesn't matter what you know, you just need to love. You don't need to have right doctrine, just be a nice person. But John is not arguing for knowledge over love or love over knowledge. John is arguing for a love that comes from a knowledge. Like they're not enemies, they're. They're united, they're friends. There. There's a type of love that comes from the truth. In fact, it rejoices in the truth. Let's go back to First John and look at verse 8. First John, chapter 2, verse 8. At the same time, it is a new commandment that I'm writing to you, which is true in him and in you. So what's true in who's him? Who's him? Jesus. Right. And who's you? Not a tricky question. You, you, you. Are you? Okay, so what is true in Jesus, this love for others? Like it was evident. It's true. It lived in Jesus. It came out of Jesus like he loved other people. That was true of him. And it's also saying it's true in you. So. So what's true in you? The same thing that was true in Jesus. A love for others. He's talking about genuine Christians. Right? A love for others is true in you. Well, why? Or more better questions. How. How is the love for others true in us? Well, because. Because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining. That's so poetic. What does that mean? What. What does that have to do with the love being true in me? Here's. Here's what he's saying. You could say because the darkness is passing away. Why is the darkness passing away? Because the true light is already shining. Like there's a change that's happened. Like darkness is going away. And darkness is going away because light has come. Okay, what's the light? Well, what does he say in verse five of chapter one? This is the message we have heard from him and proclaimed to you. God is what Light? And in him there's no darkness at all. So here's what he's saying. It's true in you, this love for other people, this love that's inside of you. It's true of you because God has revealed himself in. In Jesus Christ. He has come and the darkness is going away. The light which is God has come in Jesus Christ and is pushing back the darkness. There is a revealing. In fact, John records Jesus saying this. Jesus said to him, have I been with you so long and you still do not know me? Philip, whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, show us the Father. Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you, I do not speak of my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me, does his work. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father's in me. Or else believe on the account of these works themselves. Like, if you don't believe me, I raise the dead. Right? Why don't you go to that? That's a good reference. Right. I'm here. Like there's this revealing of the Father in the coming of Jesus Christ. Now, specifically, what he's revealing is God loves you and you can be with him forever through me. Like that's this revealing that's happening. And believing that has implications, believing that has implications on how we love people. It's an empowering kind of love when you believe it. Because listen, our world, it's not the survival of the fittest. Nobody's fit. It's not a competition. You don't have to look at other people as a threat. You don't have to be the smartest, you don't have to be the prettiest, you don't have to be the richest, you don't have to be the funniest, you don't have to be the most successful, you don't have to be the most athletic. You don't have to be in this competition. Don't. Do you know you're loved? Do you know all that you have in Jesus Christ? That you are a fellow heir with him? And if you believe that and stop treating other people like competition and threats, what do you think that would do? It's this empowering type of love. Here's how John puts it later. 1 John 4:19. We love because he first loved us. That's why we love. It's our reason, it's our fuel, it's our motive. What's behind Christian love? You put it this way, here's the call. Receive the love of Christ to reflect the love of Christ. Receive the love of Christ to reflect the love of Christ. Here's what I mean by that. Christian love is not a love of our own. It's not like something we have in us of ourselves. We don't muster it up. It doesn't come from our own strength, doesn't come from our own ability. Christian love is not a love of our own. It's a reflecting love. The thing of it like this, I think last night, I don't know if it was a full moon, but it was a bright moon. Anybody see the moon last night? Like, they're going to be like a bright moon that just kind of lights up the sky. Right. It's bright, especially in a dark world. Right? You tracking with me? But the moon does not give off light. The moon only reflects the light of the sun. But you don't always get a bright moon, do you? Sometimes you get half a moon. Sometimes you get a sliver of a moon or a crescent moon. And why does that happen? Because this world is in the way. This world gets in the way of the sun, and it doesn't. The moon doesn't reflect like it should. It's not as bright. And when we don't reflect the love of Christ, it points to something in the way this world's getting in the way. You're acting ignorant of his love. Like, why are you so mad at that person? Why are you so jealous of that person? Why did you slander that person? Why aren't you forgiving that person? Don't you know that you're loved? Don't you know that you're forgiven? Don't you know all that you have in Jesus Christ? Like, what does it mean to walk in darkness? Look at verse 11. But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness. So you're in it and you're walking in it. And it goes on to say this and does not know. He does not know where he's going because the darkness has, what, blinded his eyes. Guys, when he talks about walking in darkness, he's not talking about just moral corruption, but also ignorance. You don't know. You can't see. You're going to trip all over things like, you're blinded to this, which really kind of colors in what Paul says in 2nd Corinthians 4. And even if our gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ, is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. Or perhaps John may say it's veiled to those who are lying. In their case, the God of this world has what, blinded the minds of the unbelievers to keep them from what? Seeing the what? Light of the gospel of the glory of Christ who is in the image of God. Here's your problem. When you hate your brother, you don't see. You don't see the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. You don't get the gospel. And when you see, you love, you want other people to see. Because that's the greatest expression of love. It's an empowering kind of love. It opens your eyes to see the world differently. And it matters how we love. Here's the next verse after Jesus gives the new commandment it says the new commandment I give you that you are to love one another just as I have loved you. You are also to love one another by this, by the way that you love. All people will know that you are my disciples. If you have love for one another, it says something, communicate something. There's an evangelistic nature to our community and our relationships. How we love each other matters. And I would guess that you want to be a part of a church that loves well, that loves like Jesus. Amen. Well, we get there because we're not going to get there in our own strength. If this message was just more like, be more patient, be more kind, do better, love more, it might be you might leave here with some rah rah. But that ain't gonna get to the heart. How do we become a more loving church, more loving people? Well, it's not going to happen by just getting to know each other better. Let's be honest, people. Getting to know you better does not make you more lovable. How do we do it? How do we grow in our love for one another? We will grow in love for one another in proportion to how much we are blown away by the love of God to us through Christ. And I want you to love your spouse like a Christian. And I want you to love your kids like a Christian. And I want you to love your boss like a Christian. And your co workers like a Christian, your neighbors like a Christian. And your kids Little League coach like a Christian. And you just gotta get the world out of the way. Sometimes there's things blocking the sun and you're not as bright as you should be. And you turn things into competitions and threats and you're insecure. When you're insecure, you don't love like you should love. And here's what you need to hear. Do you know how God has loved you? Do you know how patient he's been with you? Do you know how kind he's been to you? Do you know how forgiving he's been to you? Do you know everything he's done given you that you are a fellow heir with Jesus Christ? What else do you want? What else could you have be free and so blown away by the gospel that love for others overflows from a heart full of love from God. Amen. Let's pray. Would you stand as we pray, Father, I have one prayer request. It's a prayer request that only you can answer. It's a prayer request that is not dependent on the eloquence of my speech or the skill of these instruments or the talent of these singers. Only you can answer this prayer request only by your spirit and I pray that we would sing like saved people. That we would sing like people who understand how you've loved us and are absolutely blown away. And that we would be people who love. Because we know you first loved us. We pray in your name. Amen.