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Tyndale University presents a series of recorded chapel services from Tyndale's very own faculty and guest speakers.
Let me read some of First John over you. So I'm reading out of Eugene Peterson's treatment of it, often called the message.
My beloved friends, let us continue to love each other, since love comes from God. Everyone who loves is born of God and experiences a relationship with Him. The person who refuses to love doesn't know the first thing about God. Because God is love. So you can't know Him if you don't love. This is how God showed His love for us. God sent His only Son to the world, so that we might live through Him. This is the kind of love we're talking about. Not that we once upon a time loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His son as a sacrifice to clear away our sins, and the damage they've done to our relationship with Him. My dear, beloved friends, if God loves us like this, we certainly ought to love each other. No one has ever seen God ever. But if we love one another, God dwells deeply within us. And his love becomes complete in us. Perfect love. This is how we know we're living steadily and deeply in Him and He in us, He's given us life from his life, from his own very spirit. Also, we've seen for ourselves and continue to state openly that the Father sent His Son as Saviour of the world. Everyone who confesses that Jesus is God's Son, participates continuously in an intimate relationship with God. We know it so well, we've embraced it heart and soul, this love that comes from God. God is love. And when we take up permanent residence in a life of love, we live in God and God lives in us. This way. Love has the run of the house, becomes at home and mature and so that we're free of worry on Judgment Day. Our standing in the world is identical with Christ. There is no room in love for fear. Well formed love banishes fear. Since fear is crippling, a fearful life, fear of death, fear of judgment is one not yet fully formed in love. We, though, are going to love, love and be loved. First, we were loved. Now we love. He loved us first.
It is such a joy to be here with you today. Now, those are words you expect to hear from a chapel preacher, right? It's a joy to be with you here today, you expect me to say something like that. But for me, they're, they're sometimes surprising words to hear coming out of my mouth. Because there was a season when I wouldn't have been able to say them, let alone mean them. And that season of my life, the professor's would understand this, was the last year or so of my PhD studies.
So when I left Saskatchewan for St. Andrews, Scotland, to embark on PhD studies, I knew the odds were against me. A lot of people drop out of PhD programs. And I expected my studies to be hard. But I didn't expect that every part of my life around PhD would be more difficult than necessary. So one way I can tell the story of that season is to focus on all the ways I felt my heart just get chipped away. There were problems in my first two living situations. I lived in a tiny apartment with three strangers as flatmates, and black mould and cultural conflict, and a garbage that only I ever seemed to empty. And then a lovely apartment, but with a troubled flatmate who really made me feel physically unsafe at times. I was lonely. I was single at the time. And I was studying in the midst of married evangelical, married American males. So it took me a while to make friends. And the British pound was strong, but the Canadian dollar was not. And so I lived off of whatever I found in the discounted produce bin at Tesco. One time I got like 40 Avocados for like 90% off. It was like a big deal in my life. And I was stressed about how to make that month's rent. I developed allergies, and was sneezing and coughing all the time. I was rejected romantically, and what was more painful, my heart was broken, by someone I counted as a really good friend She really hurt me. And writing my thesis was taking forever. I felt like I was never going to finish, let alone get a job and be able to pay off all those student loans. And it felt like I had the opposite of the Midas touch. Like every situation, instead of things turning into gold, they turned to dust. And the common denominator in all of these difficult situations, all of these problems. Well, as far as I could see, the problem was me.
I could look around and see all the ways that God was providing for everybody else, jobs and family and finances. And it made me jealous, and it made me feel like God had forgotten me. And as was my mental health suffered, I realized I could no longer feel God's love. I really doubted that he loved me. I could see that God loves everybody else. But I know me. I know the real me. I know that even God couldn't love me. I just couldn't feel loved by God. And when you have unlovable, you feel like it's tattooed across your forehead. It's hard to come to church and hear texts like First John, which keeps repeating love like a heartbeat, that keeps calling you Greek geeks, agape toss, beloved, dearly loved one dear friend, that's so insistent on the fact that God is love. And think about the author of this epistle, commonly thought to be the author of John's gospel as well. The guy who refers to himself in John, as the disciple that Jesus loved. It almost feels like he's rubbing it in my face. He is so loved.
Now, because I'm human, and because I know many of you, and because of my own experience, I know that there are some of you here today, who winced at the text insistence that God loves. I know that there's some of you who try to hide your tears, because your experience of feeling you are unlovable is so painful. And this isn't just your struggle. If this isn't your struggle, then you probably love and know someone whose deep hurt reverberates in the pain I just described. Why do we feel this way? Why is it sometimes so hard to know that God loves us? Maybe it's shame. Deep down, we think we're unworthy, unlovable. I struggle all the time with thinking I'm not enough. Or I'm too much, or the critic in my head just drowns out all the other voices. And I start to think that the critic in my head speaks for God too. Maybe its comparisons. We look at social media, and it sure seems like everyone else has awesome lives. Surely, if God really loved me, I'd be as "Hashtag blessed" as everyone else. My circumstances must indicate his disapproval. Maybe then I feel isolated, hiding in my doubts, because I think I'm the only one who feels that God is distant. Sometimes our battles with anxiety and depression make it hard too. Sometimes when I couldn't feel God's love, it's because I just really couldn't feel much of anything.
Or maybe our picture of God is too small. In our hearts, we're not really sure that He's good. We want to believe that God is love. But we've beat our hearts up just trying to believe.
So, how does First John speak into this? Well, I think it's important to remember that the Epistles weren't written to super Christians, to people who had everything figured out. These are tender letters, written to people like us, people who are susceptible to false beliefs, people who needed their imaginations refreshed so that they could see God, his world, and his people, in the right way. The epistles were written to people who needed to hear what the Epistles have to say. In the case of First John, that surely is us. And we could rest in this text all day, meditating on what it says. But I'm trying to not do the cardinal sin of speakers, speaking way too long when people are hungry, or shall we say hangry. But I wanted to give you a few things to hold on to. God is the source and definition of love. God is the source and definition of love. Notice in that passage, that God's love is the baseline. It's not an argument. It's not something he's trying to prove. It's what everything else is predicated on. God is the one who shows us what love is. And it's not an emotion he has, it's, it's His character. It's who He is. Notice how it gets repeated. Just listen to this. Love is from God. God is love, the love of God, he loved us. God loved us. His love is completed in us. The love God has in us. God is love. God first loved us. And this was just a small section of First John. There are so many more love repetitions. And it's like intentionally repetitive. So hermeneutics students, you know, repetition is important. It's powerful. And I've found in my life that repeating something doesn't actually cheapen it. But it makes it more true. Every time I tell someone, I love you. Whether it be my family, friends, or my husband, it's like my heart grows. Somehow the love is more true. I think God's love for us is like that. His steady insistence of love needs repeating. God's love is the premise, but this epistle does give us evidence too. One of the ways we see it is in the steady refrain of by this or in this kind of phrases. So those of you who know Greek, it's the phrase "en tut tos". So verses nine and 10. "En tu to", God's love is seen in sending his unique Son Jesus for our forgiveness. God sent His one of a kind son, he did this out of love, so that we can be reconciled to Him and have life and abide in him. But if you grew up in church like me, the beauty of this might have faded for you.
You probably grew up singing the song, "Jesus loves me", and it seems kind of trite or infantile to you. It might seem kind of abstract. But let me tell you a little story from my own life that illustrates this kind of self sacrificing love. In spring of 2022, my life was rapidly changing. I'd accepted a new job. This one, here at Tyndale, to be part of your community, all the way in Ontario. You're several days drive from Saskatchewan. So I had a new job, but I also had a serious boyfriend. A man you probably know as Lynden. And so Lynden's response to this situation was to sell his house, marry me and move to Toronto with me. It really overwhelmed me that someone could love me that much, that he would sell a house, leave his comfortable life, just so that he could be with me. It was really hard to comprehend. How much more God's love, he gave up more than a house in order to be with us. The text says that He sent His son, his mono vinay son. Sometimes we translate this "only begotten", but what it'ss really getting across is his "unique" or "one of a kind" son. God loved us so much that he didn't just send any son, but his one of a kind son. And then there's another by this "en toto" in verse 13. We see God's love and how He gives us His Spirit.
So have you seen growth or change in your life? Have you actually seen the fruit of the spirit, is there like peace or joy are patience there that wasn't there before? Take that as a sign of God's love for you. His Spirit is at work in you. Another "en tu to", verse 17, God's love is completed in us, we don't have to fear judgment. So reading this passage this week, it really struck me, when we don't know God's love, we're actually kind of afraid of him. Not in a healthy fear of the Lord kind of way. But because we often see him as angry or hostile, that he's the kind of God who delights in being vindictive, and this section of First John speaks into this so strongly. So the verse in verse 18, often gets translated like perfect love casts out fear. My cheeky translation is actually the Perfected love, throws fear outside. It's kind of literally what it is, throwing it outside.
Now, when I was struggling during my PhD, one of the people who loved me with God's love, was my friend Bethany. I know I'm safe with Bethany. She knows me deep. And I would always spill my guts to her. She has seen me cry my mascara off so many times. And I would tell her my fears, and the lies I was believing about myself and about God. And her love helped me throw those fears outside. She would tell me the truth. The safety I have in her love tells me so much about the safety I have in God's love. You don't have to fear. So think about who do you feel safe with? Whose love casts out your fear? Think about God's love being so much bigger.
Now our reading today closes with a really bold statement, verse 19. We love because God first loved us. There is so much we could unpack in this statement. Have you ever thought about the fact that you can love, is a sign of God's love for you? That if you can love, it's because God loves you. Notice as well that God's love comes first. God loved us first. Even though I know it's not true, I sometimes feel like I need to do something to deserve God's love. But you don't need to deserve it. You don't need to earn it. You don't need to make it happen. God always makes the first move, his love comes first. And don't miss this. It's not an I thing or you thing, it's an us thing. It's a we thing. It's something we know together. And so sometimes, when I'm wrestling with God's love for me, I isolate myself from the body of Christ, from Jesus's family. And then I miss how God's love comes to me through his family. And I miss how the family alerts me to God's love. How my brothers and sisters see God's love in my life, in ways that I just can't see. We actually see for each other sometimes.
So, how did I move forward? How do we move forward? Well, first off, maybe your presence here today, well, maybe that is a sign of God's love. You're in a community that tells you God loves you, God loves us. But hopefully, it's also a safe space for you to say, I believe, help my unbelief. The fact that you are at Tyndale, please interpret that as a sign of God's persistent, relentless love for you, for us. The rest of what I'm going to say is kind of what I would say to you if you came to my office for a chat. And it's it's not the whole of the conversation but a start. So let's keep listening. And let's keep talking. But hear this is from my heart. I want you to know, that if you are struggling to feel God's love, you are not alone. You're not weird. It's not a sign of you being defective. And you're not the only one. Don't hide. There are people who are safe for you to be vulnerable with. And that's why I've been vulnerable with my story with you today. Let God's people love you. Being loved is not a weakness but a strength. I also want you to know that God is bigger and more beautiful than you realize, that his love is persistent. I love the image at the end of Psalm 23. Sometimes it says like that His love will follow you all of your days, but it's more than his love will chase you. He pursues you, you can't escape him. He's just gonna keep loving you.
I know as Lizzie Reynolds has counseled students, she's challenged students that you can change your picture of who God is, you can swap out the photo, you can update the profile pic. So if your image is of a God who doesn't love, who's kind of angry, we can change that picture. Let's talk. And I want you to know that if you can't feel God's love, because you can't feel, or because you feel too much, it is good to get help. It's wisdom. Maybe a sign of God's love for you is the Tyndale Wellness Centre. When I understood in my PhD that I was what I was feeling was actually anxiety and depression, and not just that I sucked, I got help. And you know what? I actually finished my PhD. And God took my shame away. The shame that I felt about my anxiety and depression. And I learned that God's heart is for me, that he grieved with me in my grief. He didn't stand over me in anger. And I want you to know that it is possible to change the narrative, and to believe the truth of God's relentless love for you. In my PhD, when God's love felt far away, one of the ways I stopped was, I stopped the negative rehearsal of grievances, that all of those like nasty things that I treasured up as signs of that God didn't love me. And instead, I held on to moments of wonder, and beauty, that made God's love real to me. I would go for walks by the North Sea. I would eat strawberries, my favorite fruit. I would reread cards from people I love. I would wear this necklace that I have on today, that I bought on the Isle of Iona, and would remember an experience I had of worship where God felt really real in the stone chapel on Iona. I treasured up all of these moments of beauty and goodness, as tangible reminders that God loved me. Basically, I practiced an active remembrance of God's love, in order to tell a different story. God loves us, God loves me. And to be honest, I still need to do this. I still have to tell myself stories of God's love. Because it's easy for me to let go of this. I still need the reminder that I am Beloved.
So going back to, like my comments about the author of this epistle, and this gospel, and his audacity to call himself the disciple that Jesus loved, it used to kind of bother me. And now, like his steady insistence on that, really speaks to my heart. I understand that his identity and his safety are in God's love, that he actually believes the words of what he wrote to us. That saying, He's the disciple Jesus loved, is not saying he's the most special. He's just saying what's true. Because, and this is something his gentle insistence repeats and repeats and repeats, each of us is the one Jesus loves. That's why in First John, he calls us agape, tue, the beloved. By calling himself loved, he's telling the truth of all of us. Each of us is a disciple Jesus loves. So, agape toy, beloved ones, ones loved by God, and by each other, here's an invitation. Borrowing from the words of a wise woman named out Aundi Kolber, oh, sorry, I butchered her name. She invites us to try softer. Receiving God's love is not a work. It's not something you try harder to receive. It's not something you can discipline your way into receiving. It's not something you can beat yourself into believing. Instead of trying harder, let go and try softer. For those of you who are plagued with the internal critic, hear me. God is Kinder with you than you are with yourself. He is more gracious with you than you are with yourself. Try softer, not harder. I'm gonna pray over us. But I want each of you to sit a minute.
I challenge you to think how do you see God's love? Are you struggling to feel it? Be honest with him about that.
You can ask him. Put your phone away. Don't look at your texts. Sit in the silence and listen. Relate, release your grip. Don't try harder, try softer. So take a minute and think about God's love.
God, we think you that you love us first? That you are love. That is just a fact. It's not something we earn. It's not something we work ourselves into, but something that you invite us into, that you pursue us with. So Lord, I pray over our hearts that are broken, hearts that feel sad or hearts that feel cold. Lord this day, may you meet them through your spirit, through your people. That you will reveal to all of us the truth of who you are. That we would rest in the knowledge that we are loved. And that you would give us the ability to respond in kind, that because you love we would love each other. And then that would be a beacon to the world, that we tend to love each other as your people. Thank you for your persistent wooing of us. We love you, and we want to love you. We pray these things in your name. Amen.
All right. Go forth in peace, to love and serve the Lord and let Him love you.