This Is How We Know | Week Five
1 John 3:16
16 This is how we have come to know love: He laid down his life for us. We should also lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.
How do I know God loves me?
Do I believe God loves me?
1 John 3:16a
16 This is how we have come to know love:
Who is God?
1 John 4:16b
…God is love, and the one who remains in love remains in God, and God remains in him.
John 17:4-5
4 I have glorified you on the earth by completing the work you gave me to do. 5 Now, Father, glorify me in your presence with that glory I had with you before the world existed.
- C.S. Lewis
“In Christianity God is not a static thing…but a dynamic, pulsating activity, a life, almost a kind of drama. Almost, if you will not think me irreverent, a kind of dance.” - Cornelius Plantinga
Self-giving love is the dynamic currency of the trinitarian life of God. The persons within God exalt each other, commune with each other, defer to one another. Each person, so to speak, makes room for the other two.
Romans 3:23
For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God;
1 Corinthians 5:21
21 He made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
Step 1: Receive It
1 John 3:16b
…We should also lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.
Step 2: Move from being self-serving to self-giving.
- Timothy Keller
If this world was made by a triune God, relationships of love are what life is really all about.