A Love That God Hates

1 John 2:15-17

Introduction: The Fallen Pastor Story

Attention-

Need: Our culture is permeated with the disease called spiritual adultery. The Bible calls it worldliness.InWorldliness: Resisting the Seduction of a Fallen World, CJ Mahoney writes, worldliness is “a love for the fallen world,” C. J. explains. “It’s loving the values and pursuits of the world that stand opposed to God.” More emphatically, it is “to gratify and exalt oneself to the exclusion of God.” voices of the world calls us to a love affair that pulls us away from our intimacy with Jesus.But , it gets worse. Humanity, by nature, are rebels against God and His revealed Word ( Rom.3:10-18).

Sermon Idea: God warns the believer in Jesus to not love the world.

Interrogative: Why does God warns the believer in Jesus to not love the world?

Transition: Our text gives us three reasons why God warns the believer in Jesus to not love the world.

Division 1 Statement: Loving the world is rebellion against God v.15a.

Explanation:

The Command v.15a.
Present Prohibition
The meaning of love.
Three possible meaning of “world.”
The heart of God.
The text reveals the heart of a loving Father.
The text reveals the heart of a holy Father.

Illustration:Keeping Clean

A writer who visited a coal mine noticed a perfectly white plant growing by the side of the entrance. The author and the other visitors with him were astonished that there, where coal dust continually blew and settled, this little plant would be so pure and white.

As the people watched, a miner took some black coal dust and threw it on the plant, but not a particle stuck. The visitors repeated the experiment, but the dust would not cling. Nothing could stain the plant’s snowy whiteness.

This illustrates what every Christian life should be like. We live in an evil world, surrounded by ungodly influences. It is our mission to be pure amid all this dirt and remain unspotted from the world. How is this possible?

Enoch lived in the days before the flood, a time when “the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen. 6:5). Yet the Bible tells us that “Enoch walked with God three hundred years” (5:22).

If the Lord can keep a plant white as snow amid clouds of black dust, can He not by His grace keep your heart pure in this world of sin?

Argumentation: We live in the world, but the world must not live in us- Gal. 5:16.

Application: You can resist worldliness by walking in the Spirit-Gal. 5:16.

Transition: So, loving the world is rebellion against God, and second…

Division 2 Statement: Loving the world is incompatible with loving God v.15b.-16.

Explanation:

The conditional statement
The Characteristics of the world
Lust of the flesh-Gal. 5:19-21
Lust of the eyes
Pride of life

Illustration: Appeal of the Forbidden

The story is told about a young boy who was being cared for by a nanny. He saw a beautiful vase in the china cabinet, and he wanted it. When he was refused, he began screaming, kicking, and crying. His mother, hearing the fuss, came into the room to find out what the problem was.

Picking up the child, she said to him, “What do you want, darling?” He pointed to the vase, so she gave it to him. But that didn’t satisfy him and soon he began crying again. “Now what does my little darling want?” the mother asked. “I want . . . I want,” said the boy between sobs, and then he blurted out, “I want what I can’t have!”

The desire for what is off-limits is not confined to spoiled children. It reflects a tendency in all of us that goes back to the beginning of human history. The fruit of the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil” was forbidden (Genesis 2:17), a fact that very likely enhanced its appeal.

The Bible teaches us that many practices and attitudes in today’s society are forbidden. But that often fuels the flame of desire. So it’s important that we know God’s will, identify evil allurements, and resist temptation. We must beware of the appeal of the forbidden!

Argumentation: Don't keep one eye on the temptation while praying not to be led into it. Remember the Joseph principle-Run!

Application: You can resist worldliness by drawing near to God ( James 4:7-8.) (Keep close. Keep clean. Statement by Johnny Hunt).

Transition: So, beloved, loving the world is rebellion against God; loving the world is incompatible to loving God; and finally…

Division 3 Statement: Loving the world focuses our attention on the temporary instead of the eternal v.17.

Explanation:

The Temporary Focus v.17a.
The Eternal Focus- v.17b.

Illustration: Proper Priorities

In his classic spiritual allegoryPilgrim’s Progress,John Bunyan paints a word picture of a man “who looked no way but downward.”

This poor creature was on his knees in the dirt and filth, working constantly with a rake, trying to unearth some choice morsel that would enrich his life. Yet all the while a bright crown of immeasurable worth was within reach just above him.

Bunyan summarizes the tragedy: “There stood One over his head with a celestial crown in His hand, and proffered him that crown for his muck rake; but the man never looked up as he continued gathering to himself the straw, the small sticks, and the dust of the floor!”

Bunyan’s words remind us that the rewards of heaven will have no appeal unless we set our mind “on things above, not on things on the earth” (Col. 3:2).

Argumentation: The best way to live in the world is to live above Col.3:1-4.

Application: You can resist the world’s temptation of focusing on the temporary by focusing on the eternal One-Jesus!

Conclusion:

Visualization: I Will Trust by Fred Hammond

There was a time I truly believed
That I could do it on my own
But all that I found at the end of that road is
That concept for me was all wrong

But I found a Savior who turned me around
And He placed His love on me
And I will trust in You till my last heartbeat

Some put their trust in earthly possessions
But in the end, it won't bring them through
I will not lean to my own understanding
But with my whole heart, here's what I'll do