"How do you conceive Jesus working out our salvation? Wrought is the participle of "work." Yes, it is working out our salvation with great effort. Jesus pounded every nail, hammered, and shaped every corner, smoothed out every rough spot. God toiled, He worked, He humbled Himself, and He was wounded and bled."
[This message is part of a series through the book of 1 John, entitled "Salvific Assurance Through Testimony," preached by Pastor Senter].
In our last discussion, we worked through the first three verses of the passage we are looking at today. We opened by reviewing how difficult it is to deal with difficult people. We talked about our testimony, and how we are to give up our own desires for others. In this way, we give up our life for others, not literally, but attitudinally. We cannot harbor our own personal desires that might negatively affect or even kill others emotionally, or through character assassination. In these dealings, we find ourselves subject to a Christian life, a life to become more Christ- like. We have repeatedly been asked to consider the fact that Christ, as God (and owing us nothing except judgment and conviction for our sins), gave us His life instead. He gave up His desires and literally died for our sinful ones.
Then we opened to 1 John 4:7 and looked carefully at the verse. We found five things that man, when he honestly looks, finds in this world. Man first acknowledges he is not the center of the universe – it is not all about him. Second, he notices there has to be something bigger, something outside man himself. Third, man seeks that thing, that greater being. Fourth, man recognizes the perfection of this greater being and that man must somehow achieve these standards. Fifth, man realizes that only perfection can care for perfection. Only a perfect love can provide a perfect love. Therefore, man notices another Who has been perfect, Jesus Christ the Righteous. This man, Jesus, is depicted as God and as love in this scripture. They are synonymous. His love is perfect, just as He is. This perfect, selfless love is the only way another truly selfless love can be born.
Then we looked at what is not love. We looked at people who do not have love, and therefore cannot be of God. This is verse eight, where the one who does not love cannot have God dwelling in them. John makes the point repeatedly in his epistle that no one can contain God. If you have God in you, that is a perfect love residing in you, you cannot help but love. It must come out of you. Therefore, if you do not love or if you are not loving, God cannot exist within you.
In verse nine, we found another lesson–one of the great pinnacle verses concerning God’s character. God is love. In light of verse 8 where we cannot contain God’s love within us if it truly exists, the question for each believer is, “Do you display godly love every day of your life? Do individuals flock to you because they see a loving soul within you? Do you display this love of God in your life continually?” This has nothing to do with intellectual knowledge of God, but is truly a pain felt, a loving conviction, a great appreciation for all those around you. Parts of His love include His great grace and His great mercy. Do you continually depict these things in your life as well?
We considered how this love can be manifest in us, how it is revealed. How does God come out of a believer? One thing that is evident: it is visual. It is something that people see happening in your life. It is that you are different in how you look, how you act, who you are, and what you do, especially in stress-filled situations. Your love of God shows a distinct trust in His every decision in your life. This is how the Moravians witnessed to the likes of John Wesley. Wesley was on his first missionary trip to the Americas. During the voyage, a life-threatening storm assaulted the ship. All aboard feared for their lives, even Wesley–except the Moravians. These people huddled together in prayer, not fearful of what might happen, but resolved to God’s will and a steady faith. They were trusting in Him, loving Him. These people were not relying upon their own intellectual prowess or some interwoven testimony to affect others. They were purely interested in loving God with all they had, with every fiber of their being. While everyone around them was frantic, they remained calm and resolved. They believed in the Savior’s decision and His doing, not in their own efforts or understanding. They loved Him. This is also a living love. A love that we daily exist to give to others. We should be living here today as God lives in heaven–we should be seeking the godliest things in our lives, the most pure, the most precious, and the most loving. We also know that when God sees us, He sees the same thing we do when we see God – Jesus.
Now, knowing what God’s love is, how His love is displayed to us, and how some have displayed it to others, we move to our next portion of scripture that gives us specific visible understanding concerning our Salvation and the Savior who provided it.
I. Love is visible in the Godly (verses 10-12)
We begin again with the Johannine “in this” translated “herein is.” Before the “herein is” what do we see? Look at the scriptures again. Now, here in is love. We have to grasp this and understand where it drives us. We have mentioned the fact that “God first loved us” many times before this, in this sermon alone. I have repeatedly hammered the atonement of Christ Jesus for our salvation, because that is the repeated message in 1 John. We have also repeatedly looked at things in our lives that are evident or manifest in a saved soul. Here it is not just tied together with other ideas, it is plainly stated. Love is not of you to God, it is first of God to you.
We remember love is something we do not originally have the capacity to give. Here we learn not only that is it given, but that we are also obligated to give it and we find it between one another.
A. Love Originated (verse 10)
“Propitiation” is a very interesting word. The dictionary on my computer says it means “to win or gain the favor of by doing something that pleases.” My big encyclopedia dictionary says, “to prevent or reduce the anger of; win the favor of; appease or conciliate (one who is offended or likely to be).” Propitiation is the act of doing these things. Another definition says “theology: Christ, and His life and death, as the means by which reconciliation of God and mankind is attained.” They all miss the point. It is not just the act that satisfies an angry God’s wrath. It is how it is done. It is doing the things required. This propitiation, biblically, is only partially understood by most Christians, let alone the unsaved. For Christ to Propitiate for our sins, He first had to be pure. Second, He had to do it selflessly. Third, He had to suffer our judgment, not just give His life. Fourth, because one sacrifice was to be the perfect sacrifice, He had to give it for every single soul that ever existed, did exist, and ever would exist on earth. He had to satisfy every sin that could ever be committed, or conceived. In the Septuagint, the Greek word translated here as “propitiation” is used in almost every case with reference to sacrifice for atonement. This, therefore, is not just a satisfaction, but a way to that satisfaction.
It is easy to say, “propitiate means to satisfy anger.” It is far and away harder to contemplate the complete satisfaction Jesus wrought for our salvation. Wrought means “to beat out or shape by hammering.” How do you conceive Jesus working out our salvation? Wrought is the participle of “work.” Yes, it is working out our salvation with great effort. Working through every obstacle Satan could conjure. Jesus pounded every nail, hammered, and shaped every corner, smoothed out every rough spot. God toiled, He worked, He humbled Himself, and He was wounded and bled. At the end of every day, He leaves His blood on every thing He works on. He leaves little bits of His flesh in everything He does. He loves you so much that to every one of you who accepts Him, He gladly gives pieces of Himself, quite literally, and bleeds on you so you can be purified. God’s love is first from Him.
Do you really know what it took for God to go through what He did in order to secure your place in heaven? It was purely in love that it was done, a love that was the beginning of any capability for man to love.
If, then, as wicked as we are, and as we still are in our hearts–if God could do all this for you and me, it only makes sense that we (knowing how we truly are) love one another.
B. Love Obligated (verse 11)
Our lack of love and condemnation is a pretty easy argument. Remember no greater love hath a man than he give up his life (his own personal self desires – to humble himself and his wants) for another. We will try testing some of man’s arguments against humility by looking at Revelation 21:8.
- If you do not think you are so bad, you are haughty and arrogantly sanctimonious and deserve condemnation out of pride, just like Satan. This pride earns you condemnation.
- If you are afraid of God, you are afraid you will have to give something up for Him and your lack of sacrifice shows you to be too self centered. This conceit is pride and earns you condemnation.
- If you do not believe in God in some way – either in Him, or in His statutes, you believe in your own way, your own self, your own desires, and you own understanding. If you say you do not believe, then you choose to ignore the obvious things around you that point to God. This conceit is pride and earns you condemnation.
- If you just want the pleasures of the flesh and refuse to give them up, you are saying your self-indulgence is paramount in your life. This is self-oriented and prideful and earns you condemnation.
- If you destroy people and their lives either physically, emotionally, or through defamation of character, you place yourself and your personal ambitions above others. You force people to see others poorly in order to see you better. This conceit is pride and earns you condemnation.
- If you regularly seek things in your life that do not conform to the moral standards of scripture, of maintaining proper relationships with people outside the faith, and in keeping with the standards set by God for your attitude and aptitudes (modesty and testimony), seeking only the things of the world– then you are saying you do not want God in your life, you do not need these precepts. This conceit is pride and earns you condemnation.
- If you dabble in sorcery, use of magic or seek power in black magic, or if you think that exercising these techniques are a way to gain success, to gain acceptance, or to gain remuneration–you are not heeding God’s word, you are ignoring His precepts, and you think you know better because you are able to do these things. This conceit is pride and earns you condemnation.
- If you worship other gods, you want your own god out of convenience; a god for your own purposes, so that you can have what you want– your own desires and personal elevation. This is pride and earns you condemnation.
- If you try to fool people regularly by coming here to church, yet are holding on to the world or the things of the world; if you are living a life not representative of scripture, or if you are continually seeking the things of this world or telling people you are something you are not–then you think you can get away with the deceit and, in doing so, deny God has any power over you. This conceit is pride and earns you condemnation.
It really does not matter how you boil it down: any refusal of God and His atonement results in pride and condemnation. When we practice any one of these things it confuses and confounds the believer’s testimony. Equally, any denial of a responsibility to love other brothers and sisters in Christ who profess Christ and show evidence in their lives that they know Christ, regardless of the imperfection of their testimony, is a way of side-stepping your obligation to love one another. This is a self-centered act, and is sinful. If you repeatedly do this to anyone for any reason, you show evidence of a lost soul, and you know any prideful act earns condemnation. The word in verse 11 then, which is very, very important, is the word “ofeilomen” which means, “to be obligated.” It is in the present active form. Another often overlooked word is “outos,” which means “in this way.” The scripture then reads, “beloved, if God in this way loved us, even we are obligated to love one another.”
With all our failures, with all our foibles, with all our pride and conceit, if God loved us enough to give Himself for us, we are equally obligated (knowing how horrible we are), to forgive others and love them as God loved us. We should be willing to give up our own desires, our own petty things, our own foibles and understand other’s need love. We are obligated not just to give this to other people, but we are obligated, because of His sacrifice for us, to give all this up for Him. In “Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus” the hymnist wrote, “the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace.”
Knowing all the prideful issues that we have; if He still loved us enough to save us from our condemnation, we too must come to terms with forgiving and loving one another through even the most difficult circumstances.
When we can operate in this level of love, we can then see this love one to another.
C. Love Observed (verse 12)
Though no man has actually seen God at any time, we can see God through one another when we observe this love with one another. We can actually see God dwelling inside other Christians. We can see them abiding in His love in their life. Many commentators have struggled with the opening sentence of this verse. “No man has seen God at any time.” It seems so easy to put this phrase in proper perspective, when we consider the thrust of this section of scripture. Though no man has literally seen God, by the love He gives us we can see Him through one another. The closest we will ever get to heaven while we are on earth is in this fellowship with one another. Once you read this scripture, how can you not realize why Christians love being in church? Once you read these scriptures, how can anyone question why we like to gather together so much and be with one another? Once you read this scripture how can people never want to be here, who are professing Christians? If there is true Christian love in this assembly, it is here because we have a great God who gave us the capability to love one another. Anyone coming into our assembly, I pray, sees this love–the love of a true God–the love born out in the lives of believers, and freely given to one another. As we grow in this love, it is perfected in us. We grow in Christ, and His grace shines forth from our lives. This is the light of Christ shining from the Christian testimony, and no mere man can douse that light.
Do you love to be here with these folks? On the other hand, do you dread being here? Do you love to fellowship with the dear saints in the Lord that are here? Alternatively, do you see them as people you cannot believe–hypocrites, or pious and sanctimonious fools. I submit to you that in either case, you are seeing and observing the love of God. It is you that needs to change or remain, not them. You stay because either you enjoy their love and appreciation for God, or you leave because you cannot stand to be around them. In this, your faith, your salvation, and your love of God is evident. Equally, your hate, contempt, or pride is shown in your own self-absorbed life.
We opened our discussion concerning man and his inability to truly love, that true selfless love is of God. We also looked at why man’s love cannot be and never is selfless, the type of love that is originated by God. Next we considered a pinnacle verse in scripture, “God is love.” We looked at the totality of that love and how it is displayed in lives on earth. We then looked briefly at living a life of love in the world, which was followed by a concentration on how we look at love as a Christian, and how love is specifically realized as a Christian and among Christians.
Ladies and gentlemen, God is love, and in Him is no darkness at all. There are no other agendas associated with His love. You are the one who is driven to purity. By your own admission and acceptance of His gift of salvation, you know you need purification. Let the love of God be perfected in you then, and love one another as God loves you, forgiving one another as God for Christ’s sake has forgiven you.
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