Saving Faith Means Loving God and Loving What God Loves

I heard a good sermon by Pastor Don Horban last Sunday. It was based on 1 John 2:15-17.

1 John 2:15-17

Do not love the world, nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him, (16) because all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. (17) And the world passes away, and the lust of it, but he who does the will of God abides forever. (MKJV)

The Message describes these passages well.

1 John 2:15-17 (MSG)
Don't love the world's ways. Don't love the world's goods. Love of the world squeezes out love for the Father. (16) Practically everything that goes on in the world--wanting your own way, wanting everything for yourself, wanting to appear important--has nothing to do with the Father. It just isolates you from him. (17) The world and all its wanting, wanting, wanting is on the way out--but whoever does what God wants is set for eternity.

Generally there are two ways Christians try to get closer to God and sense his love and presence. The first way is used most often and not that effective. When gathered together in corporate worship, usually on Sunday's, people try to dwell up feelings and try to sing or worship 'harder' to sense God. They pray harder to feel love for the Father. They may then feel God's presence but throughout the rest of the week get bogged down with life's demands and the world's ways and forget to spend time with Jesus.

The second way, and used less often, is to rid themselves of the world's ways. John clearly states all that is in the world is not of God. You can not serve two masters. If you are a slave to the world, and its ways, then you can't love the father. Going to church on Sunday and trying to stir up feelings of love for God before going back to the work week and searching for things in the world and its pleasures will not bring peace. Again John clearly defines to have love for the Father means not loving the things of the world. What does he mean then by the things of the world? The Message lists some of them as: "wanting your own way, wanting everything for yourself, wanting to appear important." You can add on things like not serving others, showing favoritism, and lying. Paul talks more about things of the world, which he describes as works of the flesh in Galations.

Galations 5:19-21
Now the works of the flesh are clearly revealed, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lustfulness, (20) idolatry, sorcery, hatreds, fightings, jealousies, angers, rivalries, divisions, heresies, (21) envyings, murders, drunkennesses, revelings, and things like these; of which I tell you before, as I also said before, that they who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. (MKJV)

Basically, if the only thing that separates a Christian from a non-Christian is that the Christian goes to church, says grace and prays sometimes, but lives for things in the world and its ways, then both people have no love for God. This is a dangerous thing to be playing with and shouldn't be taken lightly. We all fail sometimes, and sometimes more often than we would like, but to have love for Jesus means to repent and turn from your sinful ways. The struggle that you go through, while consistently praying for help from Holy Spirit is all part of getting closer to Jesus. A mature Christian will always have struggles, but moves beyond struggles that they had when they were just a babe Christian.

If you would like to study further into this topic, please visit Horban's sermon notes:

My prayer is that God reveals to people, including myself, things in our lives that push our love for Him away.

Days to the wedding: 10