Sermon: Wittenberg Academy – Dec 10

10 December 2019

Text: 1 John 4:1-21

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

St. John, the apostle whom Jesus loved, the last of the Twelve to depart this world, speaks to all of us Christians in his epistle, dear friends.  He reminds us that “God is love” and that we must love our brother.  He writes powerfully that “the love God was made manifest among us, that God sent His only Son into the world, so that we might live through Him.”

The apostle connects the dots between God’s love for us in Christ, and our faith.  “By this,” he says, “is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment,” for “perfect love casts out fear.”

But of course, the world defines “love” differently than we do.  And here is where St. John’s advice is especially crucial for us today: “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world.”

A true prophet acknowledges the fleshly incarnation of God in Christ Jesus.  A false prophet does not confess the Incarnation, and is antichrist.  And “by this we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of error.” 

Once again, it is the Word of God – the scriptures that testify of the Word Made Flesh – that is the true prophecy, that teaches us what love is, as well as testifies to the nature of the love of God.  The world’s distortions and errors are the lies from the father of lies.  Only the Word of God rightly teaches us and bolsters our faith in these confusing and confounding times.  The key, dear friends, is Christ.  As the holy apostles says: “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.”

There is love, dear friends!  There is the truth!  There is our confidence!  Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.