Do you love me?
Do you love me?
Sermon Notes and Discussion Guide
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Why all of this? God loves us.
What does He want from us? To love Him.
What does He want us to be known for? Loving God and others.
If you are new and are not familiar with Jesus. I just summed up the good news called the gospel.
Do you love me? Do you love those you work with, live with, worship with?
Read 1 John 3:11-15
Walking with Christ begins with and is marked by a life of love.
- Loving God. Deuteronomy 6:5
- Loving your neighbor. Leviticus 19:18
- Love for God and others is where we can find eternal life.
- Inheriting eternal life is directly connected to our love for God and others. Luke 10:25-37
- Even unlikely others. Good Samaritan loving on a Jew.
- Love for one another is to be the reputation of the church.
John 13:34-35 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
We become known by our love for each other. (35)
Loving God will create discomfort and even hate from those who don’t love Him. (12-13)
- Our love for God will be evidenced in our choices. (worship)
- Others will become envious of our being affirmed, having peace, being blessed, and the wiser (right) path being evident. Read: Genesis 4:1-12
- You might be shocked at what may cause hate
- Minimally leads to distancing or mockery.
- Extreme forms can lead to harm, even death.
- It is a threat to others to have their darkness exposed.
- Jesus told us to expect the hate.
John 15:18-19“If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. 19 If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.
- EVIDENCE you are slipping towards the wrong spirit regarding hate towards you.
- When COMPARISON becomes our practice.
- Use the hate as a license to condemn.
The evidence of one who has crossed from death to life is the person who loves God and others. (14)
- It is in God’s nature to love and through Jesus we have received that nature. (10)
- Child of God.
- To not love God is to remain dead to God and to the life He designed.
- Loving God is to obey His instructions for this life—love Him and love each other. John 14:21
- The love of Christ compels us to no longer live for ourselves.
2 Corinthians 5:14-15 “For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. 15 And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.”
To claim you love God yet fail in loving others is no different than having the spirit of Cain. (15)
- You are not guilty of murder, but you have the same root of spirit that leads to murder.
What kind of love are we talking about?
A love that is…
Read: 1 John 3:16-18
- A love that is willing to give of yourself sacrificially. (16) Sacrificial
- The spirit of Cain seeks to take.
- The spirit of God seeks to give.
- A love that allows the heart to feel the needs of others. (17) Compassionate
- Feeling compassion and pity.
- Seeing the true needs can only come while engaging the heart of another.
- Acts of kindness make a difference when given in love and not obligation.
- A love that does not stop at words but leads to action. (18a) Active
- What good is to identify the need and simply give a kind word but offer nothing for the need. This is not operating in faith. James 2:16
- A love that does not compromise truth. (18b) Uncompromising on truth.
- Love does not ignore truth, especially when there is danger ahead.
- Love is not affirming of poor directions but will speak and do that which will aim someone to God.
- A love not sourced from the limits of human love but out of the love we receive and experience from God. Not natural but supernatural.
1 Corinthians 13:1-7 “If I speak in the tongues[a] of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast,[b] but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.”
As stated in the beginning: Walking with Christ begins and ends with walking in love.
Do you love me?