This series is an answer to a very public love letter. It is from a missionary and while the letter is short in pages, it is packed full of defining love, corrective love and a challenging love that would die for you. This is both a disturbing kind of love but it is also reassuring. The letter writer is none other than the apostle John who was a very prolific writer. He spent a lot of time on an island where he had the chance to talk to God-a lot. If you read his other works you will find his account of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ; a detailed description of end-times in Revelation and three letters, one of which we in Denver are answering.
Fear not Denver
“There is no reason for fear in love; perfect love banishes fear.” How many times do we fear? Jason Gray, the singer songwriter sings “fear is easy, but love is hard.” Have you ever had a situation where you feared someone you loved? It could have been a parent, it could have been a spouse, it could be a sibling or someone you reached out to. It is easier to be fearful than to go all out in love, tough love or otherwise. “If we claim to love God,” John writes, “but hate our brother, we are liars.” This speaks to a lot of aspects that make people shake their heads when someone claims allegiance to Christ but is in the Neo-Nazi movement or the Aryan Nations, or shoots abortion doctors, or blows up buildings in Oklahoma City. Fear is easy but love is hard. I think of the tragic death of radio host Alan Berg on Adams and Colfax in the early eighties. Terrorists who claim to love God but murder a man for talking, hating a man for what he believed, and planning acts of terrorism against your country are examples of the liars who claim to love God, do God’s work and hate people. Another example is the so-called church that holds up signs at military funerals that “God hates (name the group). They fear so they lash out in words and actions that show hatredm while claiming to love God. John calls them liars and God is not fooled by their motive which is fear. (1 John 4:17-21)
Parental love
Answering a challenging letter such as 1 John can bring up things in our culture that have damaged people but love heals all wrongs. “Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ is a child of God and to obey his commands; we love his children too.” God is like a parent that we could not have without being adopted. We were adopted at the cross, we were taken in at our hour of decision, and we will be taken in at the hour of our death here based on our capacity to love. When Jesus says “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and your neighbor as yourself,” that command was the law in which we live on. For if we do those two things the rest fall int place. Our life is successful based on our ability and capacity to love. Denver would be a better city if those two command were obeyed. “The victory that defeats the world is our faith, for who is victor of the world but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?” Are you ready for love in Denver? You can find it where you least expect it. (1 John 4:21-5)
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