My pulpit message notes: Markers of God's Children

Markers of God’s Children

My Pulpit Message Notes are extracted from the sermon preached at the Nairobi Baptist Church (NBC) Ngong Road on Sunday 21st August 2022. Preacher: Pastor Elijah Mokaya, NBC Ngong Road Youth Pastor. Scripture: 1 John 3 Topic: Markers of God’s Children.

Brothers and sisters, the saddest thing in life is to assume that you are a disciple of Christ only for you to discover that you are merely deceived. This is the case for people that Jesus talks about in Matthew 7. They were certain that they ought to have entered the kingdom only for them to be cast away by Christ Himself, ‘I never knew you, away from me.’

So we would do well to heed the words of Paul in 2 Corinthians 13:5

‘Examine yourself to see if you are in the faith. Test yourself. Do you not realise that Christ is in you unless of course you fail the test.’

How then are we to examine ourselves? What test should we undertake in order to ascertain that we are the children of God? Are there markers that could point us to this?

The Love Test

God’s children are distinguished by love. Two ways in which God’s children are distinguished by love:

1. God’s children are beneficiaries of love.

2. God’s children are benefactors of love

God’s children are beneficiaries of love. 1 John 3:1-10

A beneficiary is a recipient of the said thing. God’s children are first and foremost beneficiaries / recipients of His love.

- John seems to suggest in the first verse we are made children of God on account of His love. John was obsessed by this idea of love that some have called him the ‘apostle of love.’ The gospel according to John is filled with the imageries and words surrounding love. This epistle love seems to be the resounding theme.

- “See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!”.

This love that is revealed by you and I being made the children of God. - What then are other implications of the fact that you and I are truly the children of God / beneficiaries of God?

Marvel at this love.

- This is the thrust of verse one. John is calling us to marvel, to be amazed at this love. “See/behold what manner of love the Father has given unto us.” Marvel at the greatness of this love. The NIV says, “See what great love…”

- This love is wider than the widest width. It is longer than the longest length. It is higher than the highest depth. It is deeper than the deepest depth. That is what Paul seems to be praying for in Ephesians 3:18-19, that we would understand the height, depth, length, width of God’s love to us. This love that surpasses all knowledge. This love is great.

- Marvel at the extravagance of this love

- He says, ‘See what great love the Father has lavished on us.’ Not sprinkles of love, and that would be enough because this is divine love. But it is lavished / extravagantly poured out upon us. Marvel at the fact that God has loved you with an eternal love. Marvel at the fact that God did not hold anything back, but He gave His best. He poured out the entirety of His love upon you.

- Marvel at the unusualness of this love

Notice; ‘See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God, and that is what we are. It is easy to read the Bible and to pass quickly over certain words. This is unusual and that is what John wants us to see, to behold the unusualness of this love, for how can a holy God love a sinner like you and I? How can a great God make Himself to be man for your and my sake? This is unusual.

- No wonder, Paul declares in Romans 5:7,8 “Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” This is unusual. Marvel at that love.

- This is a love that reached you when you were unwanted. This is not a love that looked at your merit and loved you - no. This is a love that looked at your lowest moment and said, ‘I love this one, I want this one, I will draw this one to myself. Marvel at that particular love.

- I wonder whether you are amazed that a sinful human being like you and I would be loved by a holy God. I wonder whether you look at your youthful years and wonder ‘God, surely, how could You love a person like me? Addicted to drugs, an enemy of God like mer raising my fist against you, how could you love me? How could you make me your child? How could you bless me with so many blessings? How am I alive today and not dead? I wonder whether you imagine how far God has brought you, all of the mistakes and this Holy God, created of the heavens and the earth has love you? Marvel at that love.

- Perhaps you are not like me, who looks back and says, Lord, the kind of person I was, unloveable, steeped in evil and wickedness. Perhaps you are looking back and saying, Pastor Mokaya I don’t know those things. I have been good all my life, what are you talking about? In case you are feeling like that, let me give you a description of yourself according to Scriptures, ‘you were dead in your transgressions and sins,’ (Ephesians 2:1), ‘you were once alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behaviour’ (Colossians 1:21). You were without hope and without God in the world (Ephesians 2:12) etc. None can stand and say God loved me because of who I was, because there was merit in me, because this and that.

- God loved us despite the fact that we were enemies of God, because we were sinner. We only desired to do that which was against His will and this Holy God looked at us and love us and said, I want you and made us His children. Marvel at that love you who is a beneficiary of God’s love.

- It is a big deal that we have been made children of God and that is why we marvel at that love.

- I came across a hymn written in 1664 by Samuel Crossman:

My song is love unknown, my Savior’s love to me, love to the loveless shown that they might lovely be. Oh, who am I, that for my sake my Lord should take frail flesh and die?

- Marvel at that love.

- Brothers and sisters there was nothing desirable in us that would warrant this love, but the Father loved us and made us His children. So what has happened is that you and I received a change of status. We moved from being enemies of God to friends of God. Children of darkness to children of light. Children of the devil to children of God. We got a changed status. Some of us marvel at the change of our WhatsApp status. Marvel at the fact that our status was changed eternally.

- If you have not yet received this love, you are not yet a beneficiary of this love, His arms are still wide open waiting for you to come home. He reminds you that He died over 2000 years ago at the hill in Calvary so that you may not die for your sins. Come receive that love. It is offered for you this morning.

- John continues saying in verse one, “And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.” The world does not make a big deal of Christians, or His love because they did not know God. They can’t appreciate what it means to be a child of God because they have not known the God that has made you and I His children.

- The same way they did not appreciate when the Son of God walked on this earth is the same way they will not appreciate that God’s children are in this world. So keep marvelling.

Manifest the love of God

- As recipients of God’s love whose status has been changed to being children of God, we must manifest that.

- It is not just a changed status that we obtain when we become God’s children. It is also a changed nature that we obtain when we become children of God and this is what is revealed.

- “9 No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God’s seed remains in them; they cannot go on sinning, because they have been born of God. 10 This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not God’s child, nor is anyone who does not love their brother and sister.”

- This follows the argument that Paul makes in Ephesians 5:1,

“Be imitators therefore of God as dearly beloved children.

- If you are a child of God then be an imitator of God. Paul is making an argument that you as a child of God now has a new nature. You cannot continue thinking the same kind of thoughts that you used to think before He made you His own. You cannot continue speaking the same way you used to speak before God make you His own. You cannot continue acting the way you used to act before God made you His own. There is a changed nature and this is revealed. This is how we know. - “Anyone who does not do what is right is not God’s child.”

- It is important that we redeem once more this message because, in our attempt to swing from the extremes of legalism, we have gone the completely opposite side of licentiousness where everything goes.

- I made a prayer when I was in high school or primary school, doesn’t that make me born again? It doesn’t matter how I live my life, once born again always born again. Let us be careful when we entertain thoughts in our minds that contradicts what Scripture is telling us because there are markers of God’s children and one of that is that your changed nature will be revealed.

In other words once you are a child of God, you become desirous of righteousness and sin breaks you. Every time you stumble and sin as we will all do, it breaks you that you have sinned against the holiness of God. It breaks you that you have done that which is contrary to your nature. Sin ought to break you because now we have a changed nature.

- Notice what God’s children do. Verse three, “ All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.” What hope? The hope of return of Christ. The hope of being made perfect by Christ. The hope of one day we will be redeemed. all who have that hope. the hope of the resurrection will purify ourselves. We daily put to death the deeds of flesh that are in us. We purify ourselves and do what is right.

- Verse seven.

“Dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray. The one who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous.”

- My brother / sister, kill sin, or sin will kill you. Sin is not to be toyed / played with. It is not something to consider, how far can I get with this? Kill sin, or sin will kill you.

- Verse five,

“Dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray. The one who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous.” Verse seven, the latter part, “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work.”

There is a correlation there. Our sins, the devil’s work, how can we build up again that which Christ came to destroy? How can we fight with the devil when Christ has laboured so much to purchase our salvation? Kill sin, or sin will kill you. That is how we are beneficiaries of God’s love. We marvel at the fact that we have received this love and we manifest this love in how we live lives that are filled with righteousness.

- I am not talking about sinless perfection. That is balanced by John in 1 John 1:7-10, If we say we have no sin we deceived ourselves…”

What he is arguing here is that you cannot continue sinning. Not that it is an impossibility, but an impassibility. It is not permissible. You cannot continue sinning. Manifest the fact that you have received God’s love.

God’s children are benefactors of love

Benefactor means giving. So we not only receive God’s love as a marker of being God’s children, but we also give love as a marker that we are God children. I.e we are not only the loved ones, but we are also the loving ones. 1 John 3:11

“For this is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another.”

- Here John has in mind the words of Jesus in John 13:34-35, “

“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

- Again he argues in verse 14 that there is a way to know whether you are a recipient of God’s love. He says in verse 14 that “ We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love each other.” So how do I tell whether I am a child of God? Do I love the brothers, the people that God has purchased by His own blood. Is there love that is coming out of me? Am I a benefactor of God’s love.

- Verse 16,

“ This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.”

- This is huge in a society that tells you that you need to prioritise yourself. This is huge in a society that has hashtags like, ‘#me first.’ What God calls us to do is completely counter cultural. It is to follow in the footsteps of Jesus and just as he lay down his life for us, so therefore we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.

- This means that there are moments when we will have to go beyond our comfort zone. This means there are moments when we will not feel like it, but we will do it because of love. This means that there will be sacrifices that will be made in the path of loving our brothers and sisters. We follow in the pattern of Christ. Not only that, we also love practically.

-verse 17-18

“If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? 18 Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.”

- It is not enough to say that you love. Is it revealed practically. And that is the thrust of this passage here. What John is saying is that you don’t love people. No. Keep doing it. But let it not just end with mere words. Let it be revealed in your actions that you truly love and he gives an example here. That if you have material possessions / financial means/ material wealth and you have a brother in need, if you don’t take care of them, how is the love of God in you?

- There is this thing that has been coined black tax and the term is used disparagingly. It refers to the fact that in Africa, when you are the one that has ‘made it in you family’ you are encumbered with all these responsibilities because you must take your children through education, you must take care of your parents and when conversations about it are heard, it is so difficult for Africans to progress and prosper because of ‘black tax’.

Brothers and sisters, Scriptures ask you to do that. Scripture calls us to do that even when it inconveniences our prospects of being whatever it is we desire to be. Scripture calls us to love, when it inconveniences us. So away with this notion of- me first, personal convenience and comfort, but let us go back and be benefactors of God’s love because that reveals whether or not we are God’s children.

- The practice of the early church in Acts 4:32

“All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had. 34 “that there were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned land or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales 35 and put it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to anyone who had need.”

I ask the question, Was this foolishness or was it love?

- Love has always distinguished Christians throughout the centuries. In fact the fourth century Roman Emperor Julian is quoted as saying,

“Atheism has been specially advances through the loving service to strangers and through their care for the burial of the dead. It is a scandal that there is no single Jew who is a beggar and that the godless Galileans care not only for their own poor, but for ours as well while those who belong to us look in vain for the help the we should render them.”

Even unbelievers could recognise there was something different because love. They were recipients of love, they were givers of love. They were beneficiaries of love, they were benefactors of love.

- What would it look like in this electioneering period to actually love our neighbours despite the fact that they voted differently from us? What would it look like to actually ask someone this day, how may I pray with you? But even more, is there a way that I can be of help to you? You be the one that is actively seeking to love practically. What would it mean for a church like ours, could it mean the painting the picture like Acts 4:32 would come alive? There was no needy person in their midst This is not just material need, there was emotional need, psychological need, social need. Every kind of need. If only we were persuaded that we are beneficiaries of love and therefore became benefactors of love. That would be a true marker of the fact that we are children of God.