Reading: 1 John 3:16–18
So often in the history of God’s people, we have shifted the focus from God’s grand redemption to our own petty kingdoms of self. It happened when Abram fearfully took Hagar (Genesis 16). It happened in the rebellion of Korah against Moses (Numbers 16). It happened with the Jewish leaders in Jesus’s day as their self-glory blinded them to the glory of Jesus (John 5:44). It happens every Christmas when our preferences about the holiday aren’t honoured. Is it a quiet day at home that you prefer? The temptation will be to grumble about travel. Is getting away something you’ve been looking forward to? The temptation will be to complain about having to stay home. Perhaps you have been hoping that a gift you give will bring a certain reaction (e.g., loud, spontaneous eruptions of joy and gratitude). We can even make giving gifts a self-centred act!
Our passage today cuts right to the heart. It’s not about you! First, John teaches us that the definition of love is not left open to personal interpretation, private whim, or legislation by democratic referendum. Love is defined by Jesus’s self-sacrifice, and this is inescapably uncomfortable. We want to love in ways that are inexpensive, in ways that feel good, in ways that aren’t too risky, or in ways that make us look heroic or competent. Jesus doesn’t politely allow us to shape love’s definition. He gives it to us straight—because he gives himself to us.
Second, with that revolutionary definition in place, God calls us to practically love others by laying our lives down for them. Now this rarely requires that we suffer execution surrounded by mockers like Jesus did. We may be quick to say that we would take a bullet for a dear friend or loved one. But will we take a rebuke from them? Will we take the trash out for them? Will we take a meal to them when they’re in need of provision or rest?
So laying down our lives is rarely a call to face flying bullets. But laying down our lives nevertheless requires courage. It requires that we see and meet practical needs (3:17). The phrase, “the world’s goods” or “material possessions,” is connected to the words of 2:15–17, “Do not love the world.” The call to love is the call to sever our attachment to our creature comforts and to live for the benefit of the children of the coming age—your brothers and sisters.
The call to lay down our lives is also more than a call to make adjustments to our family budgets, living space, and calendars for the sake of the community. As we’re fond of saying around here, hospitality is more than opening your home; it’s opening your life. Notice that the decision to help someone in need is not an academic one. To love is to not close our hearts to those in need (3:17). When Jesus became a man he opened himself to all the human grief that love brings. He knows rejection and loss. He knows pain and heartbreak. And he calls us to follow him in that path, refusing to close our hearts off in self-protective apathy. We are called to surrender those petty kingdoms. We are called to incarnate again and again the love of the incarnate God.