B, Easter 4 - 1 John 3:16-24 "Pleasure and Peace"

In the hymn “Lead us Heavenly Father lead us” by James Edmeston, there are three verses based on the Trinity.  The third verse focuses on the Holy Spirit and it reads...

Spirit of our God, descending, 
Fill our hearts with heavenly joy,
Love, all other love transcending,
Pleasure that can never cloy:
Thus provided, Pardoned, guided,
Nothing can our peace destroy.

The line “Pleasure that can never cloy” has always stood out, probably because of the word “cloy”.  It’s a word that isn’t familiar in our language today.  However, it means to be become sickly sweet, over the top, nauseating, disgusting, or tire from excess.  So the line says “Pleasures that can never become sickly sweet and disgusting.” 

This line addresses the line before, “Love, all other love transcending, Pleasures that can never cloy.  It seems there is plenty of love out there today that is nauseating and over the top but before us here in the text is love that transcends all love that is fake and fleeting. 

In 1 John 3:16 we hear, “By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.”

Let’s take an audit of your love life in comparison to this verse.  What do you love?  What is your pleasure?  Jesus laid down his life and now we OUGHT to do it for others.  Ought is another word that stands out.  One would expect it to read, we should or must do the same.  Ought here comes from the Greek word ophelos from where we get the name Ophelia.  It means “to help” but not from a sentimental or feel good motive but as an obligation as what one owes.  So again, what do you love?  What is your pleasure?  What do you owe to the Lord for all his steadfast love toward you?

Saint Paul tells the church in Romans... Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.  For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.”  Love does no wrong to a neighbour; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law. (Romans 13:8–10 ESV)

Do I love God in the way that God loves me? How do I get that desire to lay down my life for others when every waking fibre in my body wants nothing of laying down my life for anyone or anything?  What pleases God and what pleases me are two different things.  Maybe it’s okay to lay down my life for others, but only if there’s a benefit for me, my family, my community or even my country!

Love, all other loves transcending, pleasure that can never cloy.   It seems our pleasures are not just cloy, but they have completely clogged us up!  Therefore, the love God wants is not love as our society would have us believe today.

But let’s not focus on others but on ourselves, myself and yourself.  How do my pleasures and fears shape me?  What truths do they reveal about you and me before God?  What do you owe God for the removal of your debt of sin?

The text continues, “But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him?”  (1 John 3:17 ESV)

Notice how all our daily bread, given to us by God; our food, our shelter, our time and our possessions are called goods.  However, these goods stop being good when our pleasure in them make us lose sight of what pleases God.  The question is asked, “How does God’s love abide in you?”

Then follows, “Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.” (1 John 3:18 ESV)

Our words and what we say stands and falls before God’s word.  As we have heard Paul has reminded us of the commandments in our debt to love.  God’s love in Jesus’ death has fulfilled the law yet the law still stands to show us why we need continuing steadfast love because we constantly turn to what pleases us rather than what pleases God.

Take for instance the two commandments, you shall not murder and you shall not commit adultery.  These two commandments on the surface are quite literal and we all know what they tell us. 

But we gain a deeper understanding of our feelings where murder is the ultimate bad feeling and sexual desire and its fulfilment is the supreme good feeling. Any feelings coming from within, from any bad feeling through to murder, from the simplest of good feelings through to sexual climax can be condemning cloy or perverse pleasure built on a love that serves and pleases us rather than God.

Jesus takes the ultimates of our feelings and condemns all degrees, from the least to the greatest, as he speaks to the people at the Sermon on the Mount.

We hear, “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’  But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of fire. (Matthew 5:21–22 ESV)

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’  But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart. (Matthew 5:27–28 ESV)

Our pleasures, both what we believe to be good or bad, condemn us when we take the goods of God and make ourselves gods of all good and evil. 

What is the truth of our motives?  Are we motivated by a fear that is based on love and reverence for our Father who is in heaven or on a fear that is frightened of death?  On the other end of the scale, is our hope of heaven based on a love and desire to be with God forever or is heaven a place of more selfish pleasure for you? 

I hope you can see the greatness of your ongoing debt because of your dubious motives, but also the pleasure of God to clear the debt in Jesus Christ.  

So what deeds do we need to perform here when our hearts condemn us?  To what truth do we need to turn so we might not be “liable to the hell of fire” as Jesus so bluntly puts it!  And how do we actually turn to this truth?

The pleasure of God is a pleasure that brings peace and this peace comes through true love.  This is not love that self serves and looks within.  This is not a love that serves the feelings as the ultimate but a love that can shape feelings so you can look out of yourself, love God and serve your neighbour.  It’s the love I desire every day but one which I struggle to keep hold of too.

I encourage you to keep on in the struggle by not looking into yourself for answers, rather because you don’t find answers in yourself look into the truth of God’s word so you might do the deeds that truly please God.

So let’s return to the text again, “By this we shall know that we are of the truth and reassure our heart before him; for whenever our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and he knows everything.  Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God;  and whatever we ask we receive from him, because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him.”  (1 John 3:19–22 ESV)

God is greater than our heart.  He is greater than our feelings and our thoughts and our words.  And so feeling condemned or not we are the beloved of God.  God loves you, and me, and he gives us freedom to ask and receive from him. 

So what do you think we should ask him that should please him?  One hundred million dollars!  An endless packet of lollies, block of chocolate or sexual potency! 

No! Rather we can ask for a deepening understanding of God’s word and a desire to immerse ourselves in it as our daily bread!  A willingness to share our goods rather than hoard them as evils!  Forgiveness of our sins and a willingness to forgive others as God has forgiven us. To be led towards God’s kingdom rather than our fickle kingdoms of feelings that at best become cloy and at worst lead us away from God!  And deliverance from evil, especially from the evil within to the holiness and joy found in God.

But the question remains, “How do I get the will or the power to ask?”  To find out we go back to the only source of truth, God’s word because we do what pleases God.

And this is his commandment, that we believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ and love one another, just as he has commanded us.  Whoever keeps his commandments abides in God, and God in him. And by this we know that he abides in us, by the Spirit whom he has given us.  (1 John 3:23–24 ESV)

What is God’s pleasure is that we recognise what we owe, or what we ought to do, and confess our sin.  The focus here is not on you or me but on Jesus and how he has cancelled our debt at the cross.  The recognition of our cancelled debt brings praise and thankfulness.  Praise is practically telling others about your debt and how God has cancelled it in Jesus’ death and resurrection.

And how do we do this?  Well it’s actually not us; our human spirit, our heartfelt desire, or our feelings.  Rather it’s that God abides in us because he has given us his Holy Spirit as we are told in God’s word. 

This is the point of the last verse of the hymn “Lead us Heavenly Father lead us”

The Holy Spirit descends to us and brings us hearts of joy, and love, love that transcends, giving us pleasures that never cloy.  Our Heavenly Father provides, Jesus pardons, and the Holy Spirit guides.  He guides us to Jesus, he guides us in our confession of sin, he guides us in our confession of God’s forgiveness, and he guides us in our forgiveness of others, so we can love and lay down our lives for others.

It all comes down to the Holy Spirit awakening in us our need for salvation, forgiveness, and our need to forgive.  We cannot love God unless we receive the forgiveness of sins.  You cannot love God unless you receive the forgiveness of sins.  I cannot love God unless I receive the forgiveness of sins.  Amen.