Nobody can serve two masters; who is yours? Listen and consider more fully the Love made available to us.

Good morning. Welcome to the next installment of the Walk in the Light series here at Calvary. And before we get started, let’s pray again for just another moment. Papa, we thank you so much for this time together. We thank you for the opportunity to gather and to worship and to lift up our hearts and our spirits before you, Lord. I pray that you would give us eyes to see and ears to hear, hearts that are open and receptive to what you have for us today, Lord. I pray that you would speak through these words and let them take the effect for your kingdom to your glory. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen. So if you don’t know me, my name is Josh Spencer. I’ve had the opportunity for the past few years to serve on the preaching team here at Calvary. And of the various ministries and organizations I get to serve with, I find a common thread, a common denominator to be discipleship. I put it this way if Jesus is my heartbeat, discipleship is the thud. And in the discipleship context I’ve been able to engage in, I find that both with the men who’ve taken time to invest in me and also the men that I’ve had the pleasure and the honor of walking alongside and pointing their eyes to Christ. A basic tool in the toolbox, but an important tool, is that of questions. And a couple of those that have become my go-to’s are what is your why? What is your motivation? What is your heart in a given situation or scenario or issue? And the second is that of definition.

There are many words that get thrown around and they don’t really think about what they mean. And so we’re going to be using both of those throughout our time together today. We’re actually going to start out with that question of definition. We’re going to try to define love together, because I find that love is a word that gets used very often in both Christian and secular contexts, but very little press is put out there on what it means. Very little time is spent discerning its definition. And once we’ve done that, we’ll have to figure out what it means for us. What do we do with this understanding of love that we’re given? And then we’ll spend the rest of our time together conducting a heart exam. So we’re going to be following through First John chapter three, verses 16 through 18. If you want to turn there with me, you can follow along. We’ll be following the flow and structure of John’s argument here with the main point that God’s love should move us to demonstrate his love. So let’s start out with that definition. So we’re trying to define love. We see in verse 16 the first half of this verse. By this we know love that he laid down his life for us.

So here’s a definition and basis of understanding right out of the gate. He laid down his life for us. My first question is why? Why is this our definition, our understanding of love? Aren’t there other examples throughout history that we can hold up as a standard? When I first sat down with my father-in-law to talk to him about the idea of marrying his daughter, he had a question for me and he wanted me to define love. And it’s something I’d actually spent some time thinking about, so I gave him my answer. I believe that love has as a prerequisite humility. That without humility, it’s impossible to truly love. And once we’ve lowered ourselves and thought of ourselves less, and from that place, we are able to truly love and sacrifice for someone else. And that this is the basis of love. I even used the illustration of taking a bullet for someone. If a bullet is headed towards somebody and you love them, you would jump in the way of the bullet to take the harm so they don’t have to. And he nodded and he said, yes, but it’s one thing to take the bullet and kind of be the hero in the moment, and then your life is over. That’s it. It’s quite another thing to go day in and day out, laying down your life out of love for somebody else. And that stuck with me.

But we run into another issue because if you fast forward exactly one chapter from where we are today, we’re told that God is love. And then we’re faced with the issue of really an eternal and the Most High being is able to lay down his life and humble himself. How is that possible? If you know me well, you might know that I find Jesus to be the answer to most questions. And this is no exception. It’s in Jesus that we see God humbling and sacrificing himself. And if you think of the massive amount of humbling that’s implied with the Most High, the creator of the universe being born as a human baby. Think of how much dependence there is as a baby. Someone who needs to be fed needs to be changed. The God of the universe. Born but not just born. Born in a barn. Born in a barn to an unwed mother. Growing up in a town that nobody wants to be from. As soon as they hear Jesus from Nazareth, their estimation of him goes down a notch, maybe several notches. We’re told in John chapter one that the word came to his own, and his own did not receive him. He was seen as average Joe when he’s announced in his ministry to be the one from heaven who’s come to save the world. He’s viewed as really? Isn’t he the carpenter’s kid? Don’t we know his mom and his sisters? How can he be the Most High? How can he be our Lord? But he didn’t stop there.

He allowed his own creation to mock him, to spit on him, to strike him, and to nail him to a piece of wood that he also created. And he died because he loves you. We know love because he laid down his life for us. He desired that you would no longer live in darkness, but that you would be able to live in the light. That you would no longer be ruled by death, and instead, you can have his life operating within you. Now we have the question did Jesus make God able to love? Was God unable to love until the incarnation? And the answer is no. Who Jesus is, who God is, is true of eternity past. And throughout the pages of Scripture, from the very beginning, you see God’s plan of salvation unfolding over the years, over the millennia, and we get to see it in its fullness in the person of Jesus. Part of this plan, yes, he came to his own. His own did not receive him. But those who did receive him, he gave the right to become children of God. We’re brought into relationship because of Jesus’ humility and sacrifice on our behalf, and that relationship produces something within us. We heard this from David last week. He read First John chapter three verse 14.

We know that we have passed out of death into life because we love the brothers. The love that’s produced within us is meant to be evidence that we’re no longer living in death, but that we’re living in his life. And this is consistent with the command Jesus gave in that short period of time, between him washing his disciples feet and going to the cross. In John chapter 13, he says, a new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another. First couple of chapters of Acts, you see the followers of Jesus right after Pentecost they received the Holy Spirit and they are transformed. And this community is transformed into one of love, into one of giving and sacrifice. And this is a community that becomes attractional. This is how it affected them. Let’s see what it means for us. Looking at verse 14 of First John chapter three and comparing it to our verse this morning, in verse 16, we see a raising of the bar and upping of the ante, because no longer is it just love for the brothers that’s said to be the evidence, but we’re told because he laid down his life for us, we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.

There’s this response aspect, which is still in line with John 13, still in line with love one another as I have loved you. Because in Jesus’s command to his disciples, he makes himself the standard for love. And again, the early church walked in line with this standard. It had this life and this love being produced from it. Sometimes it looked like individuals laying down their lives literally, being martyrs. But more often you saw the early church prioritizing community over comfort and people over possessions. They were invested in the institution of God’s kingdom instead of individual interests, and they operated with gratitude instead of greed. As I was researching and preparing this sermon, I was reminded of my conversation with my father-in-law when I read David Guzik’s commentary on First John. He says, we often consider ourselves ready to lay down our lives in one great dramatic, heroic gesture. But for most of us, God calls us to lay down our lives piece by piece, little by little, in small but important ways every day. So are we ready for the heart exam? The verses that we have here in First John, verses 16 through 18 in First John chapter three, serve as a tool for us to determine the true desire and catalysts of our heart. And we know this is meant to be diagnostic, because so much of First John is written for the purpose of being assurance to John’s audience.

But just before, we already saw verse 14, we see that the love that we have is evidence that we passed out of death into life. And immediately after our verses this morning, verse 19, we hear by this, by what we’re about to talk about, we shall know that we are of the truth and reassure our hearts before him. This is the heart exam. First John chapter three, verse 17. The first half of the verse says, but if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, and just like that, the exam has begun. If anyone has the world’s goods. This is a phrase that’s describing the resources and wealth and provision. This is what’s needed to sustain life day by day. So if you made it from yesterday to today, and you’re pretty sure you’re going to make it from today to tomorrow with pretty minimal challenge as far as resources go, then this is you in this exam. There we go. And Amen. We have the world’s goods and then we see our brother in need. We see our brother in need. The question is, how does your heart respond? What do you do? What’s your next move? Because whatever your next move is, that’s the thud. And that thud is a result of whatever is driving your heart. Now John finishes out the illustration by saying, yes, we see our brother in need, and yet you close your heart against your brother in need.

How does God’s love abide in you? According to John. A closed heart toward your brother in need is incompatible with God’s love. And how do we know that? You go back to verse 16. By this we know love that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. So if you have the world’s goods and you see your brother. Do you see the cyclical nature of this exam? Now, before we move on, there are three potential errors I want to address here. The first one is the word ask versus see. Now I’m going to read verse 17 again. But I’m going to read it incorrectly. So follow along and make sure I get it wrong. But if anyone has the world’s goods and his brother in need asks him for help. How do we respond to that? Well, sure. Okay. If he asks. Pretty sure the Bible says give to those who ask. So I guess then I can. But at this point, there’s a passive generosity. I am waiting for my brother in need to have to step forward and take that initiative. But that’s not what we’re told in the verse. If anyone has the world’s goods and you see your brother in need. I see the need. Now how is my heart reacting? Am I holding back? Am I waiting for my brother to have to ask? Or am I stepping forward? Am I proactive in my generosity and my love for my brother? The second is the question who is my brother? Who is my brother in the first place? So looking at this term, brother, we have to ask who is this written to? And we know that the letter of First John is written to the church.

You have John writing as a spiritual father, as a leader within the church, and he’s addressing his audience as little children. These are brothers and sisters in the Lord. This isn’t gender specific. Your translation may say brothers and sisters. But does this mean that we only have to love other Christians? Does this mean we are off the hook when it comes to non-Christians? To Christians who are part of the wrong denomination? Or people who root for the wrong sports team, or vote for the wrong politician? They have the wrong driving technique. They live in the wrong part of town. Or worse, they live right next to you. They’re your neighbor and they bug you. Do you still have to love them? Yeah. That’s correct, that’s correct. Very good. Because we remember that Jesus has something to say about loving your neighbor and your enemy. Be wary of your heart’s temptation to create categories of people that you feel it’s okay not to love and be thankful God didn’t create those categories when he chose to love you.

Now the audience is to the church. So what I’m saying right now is less application and more implication of our passage today. But watch out as we go through this heart exam that you start creating categories of people who are the exceptions, right? The early church was well known for being generous to those who were outside the church, but it was the way that they demonstrated love for one another that became a testimony of God and His character. It showed the world who God is, and the church grew exponentially as a result. If either you or your brother has to make do with less or to even do without. Who do you choose that to be? And if you choose your brother to be the one who has to make do, or do without. Are you actually operating as his brother? Are you living as his brother? Now I want to talk about the deception of plenty. So I’m going to read verse 17 again. But if anyone has the world’s goods and we read world’s goods as once I pay off my vacation home, then I can afford to help someone else who’s struggling with rent. I have my luxury car and I have my fishing boat, but I need the Ice Palace. And once I have that, then I could be more generous with someone whose car just broke down and they needed a way to get to work, right? So we are not called merely to lay down our luxuries, but to lay down our lives.

We might do the same thing with tithing, where we think, if I make more, I can give more. Sacrifice isn’t the shedding of surplus, it’s the shedding of self. And we’re not talking today about whether it’s good or bad to own things. We’re talking about how our attachments to things in our lives hinders our love for God and for others. Picture the scene. The temple treasury. People are going in to drop off their gifts and their offerings, and people are dropping bags of gold. And all of this money is coming into the treasury. And then the widow who walks in and drops in her two copper coins, and Jesus points to her and says, did you see that? She gave more than everybody else because they gave out of their excess. They gave out of their abundance, but she gave everything she had to live on. How does your heart respond when it’s challenged to let go of its stuff? This last Christmas was the first time our family participated in Operation Christmas Child. My wife took my son, Jack, he just turned four, she took him to go find toys to put into this little shoebox. And the idea of this ministry is that there are some people around the world. There are many people around the world actually, who don’t have the world’s goods, and they struggle even to give gifts to their kids around the holidays.

So this ministry is supposed to be able to deliver those gifts to those families so that in a very small way, we can lay down our lives for some people who don’t have the world’s goods. It was, in a very small way for me and my wife, it was a much bigger way for Jack, because when you’re four and you’re picking out gifts for someone else, what do you pick? Exactly. You pick what you want for yourself. And this shoebox was full of monster trucks and Hot Wheels cars and sunglasses. And as soon as I managed to Tetris at all into the box, he wanted me to open the box and get the stuff out. There is no way, buddy. We are keeping it all in there. And this ministry doesn’t tell you who exactly your box is going to. But Jack had a very distinct picture in his mind of. My wife grew up in Kenya. There was a little boy in Kenya. He was convinced, who’s going to get this box. And Jack had also just recently learned about sharing and this was always used against him, right? He has something. Someone else wants it. Suddenly it’s not his anymore. He has to share it and he doesn’t like it. But he was in this phase at the time of if he saw someone, if he saw you and you have something that he wants, he’ll walk up to you and he’ll say, I will share that with you.

And that was his code for what you have is now mine. And if you’re lucky, you might get it too, right? So he started saying around this time that he wanted to share the things in this box with this little boy in Kenya, and he wanted to share so badly that when the time came to drive to the church to drop off this shoebox, Jack was convinced this was Kenya. This is Kenya, and he’s going to see the little boy, and he’s going to share the things in the box with him. And he’s four. He’s four. The volunteer was very gracious and explained that this was not Kenya, but that we can take the box and we can put it on a truck and we can drive it to the little boy. Right. We’re going to get it to him. This is the picture of us. This is a sweet little moment. But at this point, Jack has talked his way to the back of the church and onto the back of this truck. Right. He is going to Kenya. And the volunteers have to explain further. Sorry, Kenya is across an ocean. We’re going to have to drive this truck to a ship, and then we’re going to take it on a ship to Kenya. And Jack doesn’t skip a beat. Okay, where’s the ship? Where’s the ship? Let’s go.

We know we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. But somewhere along the way, our goods stop being just provision and they take on a different title and role. Jesus puts it this way. Matthew chapter six, our worldly goods, verse 19, they start to become worldly treasures. And in verse 22 Jesus lays out, we just had a heart exam. This is going to be an eye exam. He says the eye is the lamp of the body. This is the way that light comes in. It comes in through our eyes. This is how we’re able to see. This is how we’re able to navigate. So if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light. The words used in this verse seem to be very intentionally used to be interpreted multiple ways. And if instead of healthy, your translation says single. If your eye is single. This is talking about a focus, a singular focus. Jesus has just finished at this point, talking about where is your treasure? He’s asking the question, is it on earth or is it in heaven? And if it is in heaven, then your heart, your focus, is going to be on the kingdom of heaven, and the light of the kingdom of heaven is going to enter into you, and it’s going to fill your body with light. The idea of your eye being healthy could also be that your eye is generous, that your eye is wide open.

It’s wide open. It’s giving. It’s receiving. Your full of light because of this posture and this focus that you have. But there’s the other side of this exam. If your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. So the idea here of your eye being bad, instead of having that single focus, you have a divided focus. Yes, maybe you want some of the benefits of the light of the kingdom of heaven, but you also have your own kingdom here on earth. Yes, you might treasure the idea of what’s out here, but also you have treasures here that you would like to focus on. And the idea of your eye being bad, it may also be translated evil in the Bible that you have. The idea is that it’s stingy, it’s selfish. Now it’s actually turned inward and you’re closed off. Instead of being filled with light, you find that you’re filled with darkness. This idea of having an evil eye, you might be able to think of the character Gollum, if you’re familiar with the Lord of the Rings stories. This is a character who lives in the darkness. He lives in darkness, and he is obsessed with one particular treasure. There’s this ring of power, and he’s so attached to this thing that anybody who even just appears to be a threat to his hold on this precious thing of his is met with any amount of violence.

This is where his treasure is. And Jesus is point in verse 21 is where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Christmas was a little while ago, but as recent as two days ago, Jack was still asking about this box, wanting to see the monster trucks and the Hot Wheels cars. He’s four. We’re not four. What’s our excuse? Because we all have a box. It turns out my father-in-law was right. My wife, at our wedding, we stood across from each other and made a vow with one another to choose each other, for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, till death do us part. And then I went back to California and packed up my bachelor pad into my car with everything I was going to bring with me and drove it to Minnesota. And some time goes by and suddenly there’s a box that I don’t realize I brought with me. And it’s a box of my identity, of my security, of my comfort, my preferences, my ideas of home and safety and family. And light shines into this box. And suddenly I’m faced with a really difficult decision. What do I do with this thing, in this box? Because I have a choice. I either give it up in order to love God and love her well. Or I hold on to it and I choose to make it a priority, more than God, more than her.

And I find that every couple of months, light will hit a new corner of that box and I’ll find something in there I didn’t even know was in there, and I have to identify it and release it. And again, this is not easy. Identify and release, identify and release. You know, in order to keep all of us in context, we’re going back to first John. I actually want us to go to the very final verse of the entire letter, First John chapter five, verse 21, little children, keep yourselves from idols. And at this point, maybe you’re thinking, Josh, we’re not talking about idols here, right? I know a couple of weeks ago, Pastor Kyle was talking about the sins that we keep hidden. And yes, I’m on board with that. But you don’t understand the stuff in my box. Yeah, there’s a box, but it’s full of good stuff. I have good things in my box. Yes, I have a nice home, a nice car, but I work hard. Right. I feel like I deserve to have some nice things. And aren’t we supposed to work? And if we don’t work and provide for our families, aren’t we even worse than an unbeliever? And by the way, my family, my family is in that box. If I’m supposed to love my enemy, surely I’m supposed to love my family all the more? How can you say I’m supposed to let go of them? Take a breath.

Paul says this in Ephesians five. He says that the one who is covetous is an idolater. This idea of covetousness, this describes an appetite. The appetite that you feed is the appetite that’s going to grow. And this is an appetite for stuff, for things, for more, for me. And it might be other people’s things. It doesn’t have to be. Your translation may have greed. The one who has greed is an idolater. And if you back up just a couple of verses, you see Paul say that covetousness should not even be named among the saints, the holy ones, those set apart for God. Because how can we love one another as Jesus loved us, while we’re busy grabbing things for ourselves, for our own kingdoms. Prioritizing people over possessions is one piece of evidence that Jesus is our Lord, our master. If we have it the other way around, how are we any different from the rest of the world? It shows that we have a different master, and Jesus makes it very clear you cannot serve two masters. You cannot serve both God and mammon. You cannot serve God and the stuff in your box. Now I get it. Hearing this is going to raise some defensiveness. It’s going to bring some resistance. Let me ask you, what is your why? What is your why for that resistance?

At the beginning I said that Jesus is my heartbeat. Discipleship is the thud. But it’s probably better to say if God’s love is abiding in me, if Jesus is my heartbeat, then whatever I do, whatever the thud is, should be the same as his. So we can ask, what does he care about? What motivates him? What does he do? And can we say the same about ourselves? And we can make cultural and situational excuses, but the challenge remains. John says in First John chapter three verse 18, little children, let us not love in word or talk, but in deed and in truth. Because hopefully we know by now that love in word or talk alone isn’t love. And it’s not how God loved you. By this we know love. He laid down his life for us. If we’re going to have his love in us, this is what it looks like. So it’s said this way, Ephesians five, verses eight and nine. At one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light, for the fruit of light is in all that is good and right and true. Calvary. You cannot live and love the way Jesus does while you hold on to your box. So what is it you have in your hands? What would it take to let it go? To truly let it go. To give with a pure heart. Because I’m telling you, whatever’s in your box. Jesus makes it clear. Moths and rusts and thieves. Whatever’s in your box is subject to decay, to corrosion, to death, to loss. And you can fight to protect it. You can work to ensure your way out of it. But you’re fighting a losing battle because your kingdom, your treasure, is in the wrong place. And you need to ask yourself, what is your why for fighting so hard to keep your hold on things that are disappearing? Is there a chance you’re serving an idol, a false god in your life? Are you willing to let the thud of your heart be transformed into God’s. By this we know love that he laid down his life for us. Therefore we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. God’s love should move you to demonstrate his love. Does it in you? We often close with a spoken prayer here at Calvary, but today I want to give us the opportunity to pray together in song. So if your heart’s prayer is that your thud would become the same as God’s, that you would let go of your box and that your hands would be empty before him, and that your heart would be made pure to love him and love others. I invite you to make this song your prayer. Let’s do this both individually and corporately, as we seek the face of our God together as a testimony to this world of his presence in our generation.