1 John 2:7-11 – True Love is Found in Jesus Alone

True Love Is Found in Jesus Alone

A Japanese soldier was stationed on Guam in World War II. When the Americans took the island in 1944, he scattered into the wilderness and lived for 26 years in a cave he dug about seven feet underground. The war ended, and leaflets were dropped telling soldiers they could come out of hiding, but he stayed. Why? In his own words, “I was scared because I didn’t know what life would be like after the war I knew the war was over but that’s all I knew.” He had freedom, and he lived in captivity to himself anyway.

I wondered as I heard that story whether there are people here who have never truly put their faith in Christ. You have heard about him, but you are afraid of what it means to give all of yourself to God. And I wondered about the other kind of person, the believer who feels like he did going back to a different homeland. How do I actually live this out when God tells me to love like he loves? This passage speaks to both of us: you can trust Jesus, he is enough, and he will change you.

An Old Commandment

John writes, “I am writing you no new commandment, but an old commandment.” God’s love goes back to the beginning. The law was never given so that people could earn salvation, but “to show them how much they fell short how much we fall short and how much we need a savior.” Even there, love runs all the way through. Leviticus 19:18 says to love your neighbor as yourself. Paul says “therefore love is the fulfilling of the law,” and the first four of the Ten Commandments are about loving God and the last six about loving others.

We see it in Genesis 3:15, too. Right after the fall, God promises a seed who would crush the serpent’s head and be bruised himself. Love is at the very core of the gospel from the beginning.

A New Commandment

Then in verse 8 John says it is also new. He does not mean new in time but in freshness. A dated kitchen that gets gutted has the same frame, “but everyone understands what you’re saying it’s a freshness.” It is fresh because it is true in him. We have seen love lived out perfectly, on earth, by Jesus.

Great Old Testament figures only pictured Christ. David was a man after God’s own heart, and he failed to love a woman and a man who served him. Moses loved his people, but when he saw them abused he killed an Egyptian. “Our love is imperfect but Jesus love is perfect and it’s the key to our Salvation.”

His love is different from what our culture calls love. “Jesus love is a love that does not shy away from correction.” At the well he spoke to a woman no religious man would speak to and told her she had had five husbands. Then he said, “I have something for you I care about you I want to give you this living water.” And we do not generate love ourselves. “We are not love generators we can only reflect love that he gives to us.”

The Darkness Is Passing Away

The True Light is already shining. We will have a new body someday, but his love is already perfecting us. So when I struggle to love someone, “the key is not to love myself more.” I need to look at the love Christ has for me, and reflecting it becomes more possible.

How do we define this love? Our culture says it is a feeling, and I may not be in love with you later. John 3:16 says God so loved the world that he gave. “Love is sacrificing myself for the best interest of others.” That costs effort. “True Ministry is very rarely easy,” and “anyone can love someone who’s easy to love.” The test is people who abuse us and speak evil of us.

Love Always Changes People

In verses 9 through 11 John says that if you say you are in the light and hate your brother, you are still in darkness. That does not mean we never struggle. That is sanctification. But if you have no desire to love at all, you need to check your heart.

Hatred is the opposite of love: “if true love is I want what’s best for someone no matter what it costs me then the opposite of that is I want what’s best for me no matter what it costs them.” A person who loves like Christ sees the hard neighbor or the terrible boss differently: “I see them as image bearers of God as people who need a savior.” I do not need to get even, “because I serve a god who is the perfect judge.” And I would never want to cause someone else to stumble.

Verse 11 says the one who hates walks in darkness and does not know where he is going. Picture someone searching a dark room who keeps finding emptiness. “Without Jesus you’re just trying to find something and it’s always empty.” We can laugh at people like that or get angry, or we can have sympathy and show them light. Often their first sight of the gospel is a believer. “They see a little Jesus walking around and now they look for the real thing.”