1 John 4:7-21 - How Do You Know Who God Is?

Today, Saturday August 21 How Do You Know Who God Is? 1 John 4:7-11 “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. Have you ever wonder what God is? How do you define God? How do explain to someone who the eternal God is? We are told and actually commanded that we are to love God with all our hearts, our minds, our might! Well, how do we love a God we don’t know? We need to remember that in this fourth chapter of 1 John we are learning three great foundational truths about God! What God Is (1 John 4:7-8), What God Did (1 John 4:9-11), and What God is Doing (1 John 4:12-16). As we study these passages we find out that God is Spirit, God is Light, and God is Love. Jesus told the woman at the well in John 4, that “God is a Spirit and they that worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and in Truth.” We can know about God through creation and maybe what other people might tell us about Him. But to know Him personally, we must have a relationship with Him. For example, we know about another person through observing them, reading about them or by what someone might tell us about them. But we can be fooled by observations or lied to by our source of information. The only way to really know someone is by establishing a personal relationship with them and then spending lots of personal time with them. My friend that is how we get to know God! We establish a relationship with Him only by admitting we are a sinner and then believing that His Son Jesus Christ died for us on a cross two thousand years ago.  We receive Him into our heart and life by confessing and repenting of our sin and asking Him to save us. (Romans 10:9-13) Immediately a miracle takes place and we are “born again” into His family and God becomes our personal heavenly Father. Then every day we spend time with Him in His Word and prayerful communion. As we do, we really get to know and understand Him. We experience the reality of His great love and have the full assurance of knowing our sins are forgiven and we are forever His! Today, I have the privilege to officiate a wedding here in Holland Michigan for some dear friends. The two friends will come down the aisle separately as singles, but will leave together in a new status and relationship as a married couple. It will happen at the moment they commit themselves to each other with their promise and vows and I pronounce husband and wife. A miracle takes place at that moment because the scripture says, “What God joins together, let no one try to separate”. God makes them “one”. That is what happens when you surrender your life to Jesus Christ. God Himself brings you into His forever family! “But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God. They are reborn—not with a physical birth resulting from human passion or plan, but a birth that comes from God.” (John 1:12-13) God bless!