Historic pastoral reading
God's love is costly and holy. It is not a blank permission slip.
1 John 4:7-10
God is love.
The text
WEB
7 Beloved, let's love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves has been born of God, and knows God.
8 He who doesn't love doesn't know God, for God is love.
9 By this God's love was revealed in us, that God has sent his only born Son into the world that we might live through him.
10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son as the atoning sacrifice for our sins.
KJV
8 He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.
10 Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
What kind of text
- Letter
- John
- God's love
John defines love by the sending of the Son.
How Christians have read this
Common misuse
Used to cancel any hard word in Scripture.
What the next verse does
Verse 11: if God loved us, we ought to love one another.
Older commentary
Matthew Henry
Henry on 1 John 4: God is love, and that love is seen in the sending of the Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Charles Spurgeon
Spurgeon: do not preach God is love while hiding the cross that shows what that love cost.