Living in the Love of Christ

Introduction

There is something money cannot buy. A Japanese businessman once told the story of visiting the home of a wealthy man in Southeast Asia: marble floors, ceilings that took your breath away, riches beyond belief. And on one of the walls, a tapestry with these words: "Money can buy a bed, but not sleep. Medicine, but not health. A house, but not a warm family. It can buy a great many things, but not love." What we are truly searching for, deep down, cannot be bought.

In the First Letter of John, chapter 4, verses 13 to 21, the apostle John comes back to the word "love" more than thirty times in just a few lines. He is not talking about some vague feeling, nor about philia (friendship), nor about eros (attraction). He is talking about agape: that free love that comes from God, the love that drove Jesus all the way to the cross. In the Meiji era, a Japanese translator rendered "I love you" as "I could die for you." That was not an exaggeration: it is exactly what God did for you.

So how are you living today, in this love of Christ? Three things stand out from this text: the Holy Spirit teaches God's love to your heart, you learn to remain in that love, and that love transforms you from the inside out.

Outline of the sermon

1. The Holy Spirit teaches God's love to your heart

"This is how we know that we live in him and he in us: he has given us of his Spirit" (1 John 4:13). No one can confess Jesus as Lord without the work of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 12:3). Praying in the name of Jesus, believing, loving a difficult person, welcoming a brother who wounds you: none of it is possible without the Spirit who comes to dwell in you.

John was writing to Christians in Ephesus confronted with Gnosticism, a false teaching that separated spirit and flesh. According to this teaching, Jesus did not have a real body, his suffering and death were only an appearance, and a believer could live any kind of physical life as long as his spirit stayed "pure." John dismantles this lie: Jesus was truly human, truly born of Mary, he truly bore our sins on the cross, he is truly risen. It is the Spirit of God who makes you able to confess this truth, and it is this confession that proves you belong to God (v. 2).

We must discern carefully. Not every "spirit" comes from God. Even today, something can be presented to you as the gospel when it is not. The mark of the true Spirit is this: it always brings you back to the cross of Jesus Christ.

2. Remain in the love of the cross

"And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them" (1 John 4:16). The word "remain" comes back again and again. Jesus already used it in John 15: "I am the vine, you are the branches; remain in my love."

To remain in the love of Christ is to honestly acknowledge: "I am a sinner, and yet Jesus died for me. He is risen, he has given me eternal life, and his Spirit keeps transforming me." You will not go to heaven because you are a good Christian, because you make an effort, because you rack up good deeds. You will go to heaven because you bow every day at the foot of the cross to receive what Christ won there.

Watch out for the opposite drift as well: cults and religious systems that crush you by saying "give everything, sacrifice everything, or else you are not saved" hold you captive to a righteousness by works. Zeal without the cross is no proof of truth, Hitler too was zealous for his ideas. And watch out too for something perhaps more subtle in the 21st century: wielding the Bible and the Scriptures to dominate, control, or humiliate others. That does not come from the cross. The cross always leads to loving, never to crushing.

3. Perfect love drives out fear and transforms you

"There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love" (1 John 4:18). When you carry an old wound, a fear of the future, unhealed guilt, that fear seeps into your words. It pushes you to belittle yourself, but also to attack others, to crush the people around you so you can feel a little bigger.

God's love strikes at that root. When you understand that you are received just as you are, forgiven, healed, and that even the fear of death has been defeated by the resurrection of Jesus, something loosens inside you. A space opens up. An ease appears. This is not arrogance: it is a humble confidence in being loved.

Look at John, the author of this letter. Jesus had nicknamed him and his brother James "Boanerges," "sons of thunder" (Mark 3:17). Hot tempered, impulsive, quick to flare up. One day when some Samaritans refused to welcome Jesus, John asked him: "Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?" Jesus rebuked them sharply (Luke 9:51-55). That was this same John. And this same John, at the end of his life, writes: "Beloved, let us love one another." That radical change is the work of the Spirit in a life that has remained in the love of Christ.

That is why John concludes: "Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen" (1 John 4:20). Love received proves itself in love given. No exceptions.

Key takeaways

• Without the Holy Spirit, you can neither confess Jesus as Lord nor truly love, Christian love begins with a gift from God, not with your own effort.
• To remain in the love of Christ is to return every day to his cross as a forgiven sinner, not to earn your place in heaven through your works.
• The true gospel sets you free; any religion that crushes you, controls you, or keeps you living in fear betrays the cross.
• Perfect love drives out fear: when you know you are loved, you stop belittling others to reassure yourself.
• Loving God whom you cannot see is proven by loving the brother or sister you can see, John, the "son of thunder," is living proof of it.

Personal application

• What is the "Boanerges" in you? Where do your quick reactions, your outbursts of anger, your judgments show that you need the Spirit to keep transforming you?
• Are you trying to earn your salvation through your efforts, your service, your good behavior, or do you come back to the cross like a child who simply receives?
• Is there a "Samaritan" in your life, someone you are tempted to push aside, judge, or exclude? How does the love of Christ change the way you see them?
• What fear (of the future, of judgment, of rejection, of death) does God's perfect love need to drive out of you this week?
• To whom, concretely, will you show the love you have received from God, through a word, a visit, an offer of forgiveness?

Verses cited

• 1 John 4:13-21 · God is love
• 1 Corinthians 12:3 · Confessing Jesus by the Spirit
• John 15:1-11 · Remain in my love
• Mark 3:17 · Boanerges, sons of thunder
• Luke 9:51-55 · John wanted to call fire down from heaven

FAQ

What does "remaining in the love of Christ" mean?

It is not an emotion to keep alive, but a daily posture: coming back to the cross, acknowledging that you are a forgiven sinner, living out your day receiving what Jesus won for you and letting it transform the way you speak, serve, and love.

Why does John insist so much on the fact that Jesus came "in the flesh"?

Because a false teaching, Gnosticism, had crept into the church in Ephesus. It claimed that the body did not matter and that Jesus had not really suffered. Denying the incarnation emptied the cross and the resurrection of their power. John reminds us that God's love was displayed in a real body, a real cross, a real victory.

How can perfect love really drive out fear?

When you know you are received just as you are, forgiven, and that not even death can separate you from God anymore, you no longer need to defend yourself, justify yourself, or belittle others to feel secure. Fear of punishment retreats, and in its place comes a peace that overflows into the way you love.