The Love Sin, from Sept 13

Read 1 John in the New Testament and you get the feeling that you just entered into the middle of passionate conversation. Emotional, high-pitched language laying down absolutes about the nature of God and the consequential behaviors reveal that someone or something is being responded to. That something, bible scholars believe, is the Gnostic movement of the late first century.

The Gnostics believed they had received extra special revelation, which was necessary to truly "know" God (gnosis). They also felt the physical world was a product of the evil one and creatively found ways to deny the full humanity/deity of Jesus. God, being holy, could not dwell in sinful flesh. This also led to the belief that they no longer sinned, but had achieved a superior spiritual state.

John, now an old man and possibly the last remaining apostle, writes to his spiritual children to guard them against these heresies. First, we must understand that God is love, he is light, he is life. God is good and above all is passionately in love with his creation. He made us to be in a caring, affectionate relationship with Himself. Man has fallen out of this by loving other things in place of God. Almost all of our junk can be reduced to this - the misplacement of our love. John calls us to love the Father first and foremost, then all of our other loves and affections find their proper place.

So, in opposition to the Gnostic idea of special knowledge, John reveals how we truly know God and love Him: we obey Him. In obedience, we get to know God not just intellectually, but by experience. We understand what it's like to forgive or show mercy or sacrifice. We can say we know God all we want, but the real test is what our lives look like.

If we're not being obedient to God's commands to love Him and our neighbor's, then we love the world. John describes love for the world as "the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life." Loving the world means we're putting ourselves first, wanting things that make us happy while disregarding the needs of others. When we love stuff, or even people, more than our great God in Heaven, we commit the love sin.

What do you love more than God? Are you good at love? Can you be loved as God wants to love you: completely, extravagently, righteously? Can you love Him back?

Next week we'll flesh out how we actually love God.