‘We love, because he first loved us.'
‘We'. That is, we who are His, who have come to believe in Jesus Christ as our Saviour and Lord, who come together with His people that we might learn more of Him, who know that Jesus Christ is true man and true God, who have received Him as our means of reconciliation with God, of propitiation before God, who have come to understand His purposes for His own, all His own, who are continually experiencing the working of His Holy Spirit within us. But what is the source of this love which is perfected within us, which gives us this assurance? The source is His love which bestows on us all these things and reaches out to us to draw us ever nearer to Him. Because He first loved us we have entered into the sphere of His love, and this has produced love within us.
What then does this whole passage tell us about His love and what our love should be in relationship to God's love?
a) That love is of God, He is its source and producer (1 John 4:7).
b) That we love because by His gracious goodness we are begotten of God and know God (1 John 4:7).
c) That God is love, holy love to those in the light (1 John 4:8).
d) That God's love was made fully known in sending His only unique Son into the world that we might live through Him (1 John 4:9).
e) That He revealed His love by sending His Son to be the propitiation for our sins, that is, to be the means of turning away from us God's aversion to and hatred of sin (1 John 4:10).
f) That because God so loved us this love should make us love one another. As we contemplate that our brothers are all taken up in God's love, share with us in the life that God has given, have been made right with God as we have, are being daily transformed as we are being, bring to us the truth and maintain us in the truth, are fellow-workers together with us in His service and in the maintaining of His truth, are those who will be transformed with us at the Parousia, are those who pray along with us for the extension of His kingship, are part of our destiny, so will we love. It is not a love of affection, although that will grow, so much as of goodwill and fellow-feeling, a willingness to bear with them and show Christ's kindness and compassion towards them, as they do to us, and be partakers with them in the service of Christ. It is a sharing love.
g) That God continually abides within us so that His love might be perfected in us (1 John 4:12), as we grow from one degree of glory to another (2 Corinthians 3:18).
h) That we know that He abides within us because He has given us of His Spirit (1 John 4:13).
i) That because of His love we have beheld and bear witness that the Father has sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world. It is His love for us that has brought this truth home to our hearts (1 John 4:13).
j) That it is God abiding within us in His love which results in our confessing Jesus to be the Son of God (1 John 4:15).
k) That our contemplating of Him brings home to our hearts His great love, so that we know that He is continuing love to all who are in the light. Thus through His love we know and believe it, and know that He abides in us and we in Him (1 John 4:16).
l) That His love being made perfect within us, coming home to us and possessing our hearts, and making us more aware of the truths about Him, and what He has done for us and of what He is, gives us boldness in the day of judgment. This is because He has made us as He is in this world, transforming us in Christ that we may be His witnesses by living to reveal Him in this world. To this end He has made us potentially like Himself in Christ, and has promised that He will conform us to the image of His Son (1 John 4:17; Ephesians 1:4).
m) That His making us perfect in love, which is His guaranteed purpose in Christ, casts out all fear. Once we have within us His assurance of love because we have been made His through Christ we will no longer fear His judgment.
How then can we not ourselves love, both Him and those on whom He has set His love?