NewCity Orlando Sermons

1 John 4:7-21 | Vision

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Rev. Benjamin Kandt:

Hello everyone. This is Pastor Benjamin. You're listening to the sermon audio from New City, orlando. At New City, we long to see our Father answer the Lord's prayer. For more resources, visit our website at newcityorlando. com

Sarah Bruner:

Good morning. Please join me in the prayer of illumination as we ask the Holy Spirit to open our hearts. Heavenly Father, we wish to see Jesus. By your Spirit's power, give us eyes to see his glory. Through Christ, we pray, amen. Today's scripture reading comes from 1 John 4, verses 7 through 13. Reading comes from 1 John 4, verses 7 through 13. 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 love. Not that we have loved God, but this is God in us. By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his spirit. This is God's word.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

Well, good morning. There you go. That's pretty good. My name is Jason, I'm one of the pastors here at New City and, as Ben has already said, we are in a series in August we do our vision series. We are in a series in August. We do our vision series both in August but also in January, and we did something similar we preached through communion, community and commission in January and we're doing that again this August, and so that's where we're headed today, and I'm going to be talking about community, as Ben already said, and Josh does such a good job talking about how we want to be known and loved in this community.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

Now, before I was a pastor, I was an engineer, so that's why I get to talk about pivot tables and different things up here, and my daughter recently asked she had a math problem and she's like, hey, hold on. I got to go talk to mom about this she's the one who can teach me about this math problem and then I had to just inform her that, as an engineer, I took lots and lots and lots of math in high school but also in college, and that I do a thing or two about math, and she tried to give me an opportunity to do that. Well, one of the things that I've learned in mathematics is that you have to always define your terms. You can't make sense of the formula unless you define the terms in it. That's gonna help you understand the work that you need to do. And so the formula for New City is our vision and it's our mission, and we just heard it right with the kids up here. Our vision is what Is to see the Father answer the Lord's prayer, and how are we going to accomplish that vision? We're going to accomplish that vision by calling, forming and sending disciple makers. So in this series here in the month of August, we are trying to define the term of what a disciple is, and we're trying I mean, we've defined it this way and I think there's a slide for this Disciples are those who are united to Jesus, in communion with God, community with one another and commission for the world. So this is our definition. We're defining the terms of what a disciple is, and so that's where we're at here in the series, and I'm jumping into that middle part community with one another. So that's where we're at, and let me just jump in Now.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

I thought about starting this sermon in two different ways to talk about community. I could tell you about all the stats of loneliness that we've experienced. 30% of you in the room probably experienced significant loneliness even in this last week. I could talk about that. I could talk about the pandemic of isolation that we find ourselves in, and I could describe the fact that we have lost connection with those around us, that we don't truly know our neighbors or feel loved by those around us. So that's one way I thought I could start the sermon and I kind of just did.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

But I thought the better way, the better way to start the sermon would be with something positive, something to draw you in, something like honey. I say this sometimes to Ben, I said we need to use honey and not vinegar when we're leading our people. We want to draw people into a mission together, into community together, and so what's the honey today? It is the beauty of our triune God, and so, kind of on that theme of beauty, I want you guys to think about something. Think about what's been truly beautiful, what has captured your heart, what captures your emotions, your desires, what has struck you in this awestruck kind of form of beauty? Well, since I was preaching this Sunday and that we had our all-staff retreat this last week, a 24-hour retreat. We weren't gone the whole week.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

I asked the question, I pulled the staff, I said, hey, where have you experienced beauty? And they answered it in like two different categories. One category, the first category, was an area of creation, and we all know this type of beauty right, if you have traveled in the United States or have traveled the world, like places like Yosemite or the Rocky Mountains, there's just awestruck beauty of God's creation. We also talked about sunrises and sunsets, because we're on the beach. The other category that kind of came up was the one of beauty in relationships, and you guys know this type of beauty too. It's when the child is first coming into the world and they breathe their first breath. There is something majestic about that, there is something beautiful about that. It's your bride dressed in all white on your wedding day. And for me, as I reflected on that question of where I've experienced beauty, it's where I've experienced beauty is in the love of a father for their child.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

Simone Bay, a French philosopher at the turn of the century, she says this there are only two things that pierce the human heart. One is beauty and the other is affliction. And so what I want to reveal from our scripture today, reveal from God's word, is the beauty of our triune God Father, son and Holy Spirit, that our pursuit of community is in light of the beauty of the triune God, who experiences community together as the Father, son and Holy Spirit. And those are our two points the beauty of the Trinity and the beauty of our trying the beauty of community, excuse me, so look with me if you have a Bible or device. Starting in verse 7 of 1 John, chapter 4.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

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. So we see here there's two truths, really simple truths, in two short verses. The first truth is that love is from God, god is the source of all love. And the second truth is that God is love. God and his substance and his being and his character is love. Now let's pause for a moment on that second truth, because that's going to help you connect, or help me connect, truth to the beauty of who God is as the triune God. God is love. It doesn't say that God has love. It doesn't say that God is sometimes loving, but it says that God is love. It's in his very being, it's actually in his nature, in his ontology, it's who he is. God is love. So if he is love, then everything hinges on what type of God we worship.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

In Michael Reed's little book, delighting in the Trinity, he subtitles this and I forgot. I was going to bring it as a book giveaway but I have it in the car. So if you guys are desperate of a book about Trinity, come find me in the parking lot afterward and I'll give it to you. But Michael Reed he says Delighting in the Trinity. He subtitles it An Introduction to the Christian Faith.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

He belabors the point that the Christian God we worship is God the Father, god the Son and God the Holy Spirit. This is actually integral to our Christian faith. It's just not an add-on that someone created. But the Christian God is the God who is three in one, one in three. For 1,700 years Christians have been given voice to the mystery of the Trinity and we've been doing that every Sunday as we confess our faith together here. In a little bit we're going to confess through the Nicene Creed. So that's kind of why we've been doing that because we want you all to have a deep, rich theology that is Trinitarian in its nature and it's the anniversary of this year, so it's a big, big deal.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

But let me connect now that truth that God is love to beauty. It is only when you grasp that God is Trinity, three in one and one in three, that you really see the beauty of who our God is. Karl Barth says that the triunity of God, the Trinity, is actually the secret of his beauty. And we can also say from that first truth that the triunity of God is the source of all beauty. And we know this just through music. I'm not going to talk about music up here because I'm not a musician, but when you play a chord, right, it's three different notes but they're brought in together and it makes a beautiful sound. Or when your children or you see beautiful art in the Louvre or in the Orlando Museum of Art, there are multiple different colors that come together in a beautiful painting. So there is diversity and in that diversity there is unity and there is this beauty that is formed. There is unity and there is this beauty that is formed the three in one.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

So why is this important for us. The three in one existed before all creation in relationship, and out of that relationship between the Father, son and the Holy Spirit, they're overflowing love for one another. They're overflowing kindness toward each other. It has given to this self-communing expression of creation in the world. They didn't create because they needed something from us, but they created as an overflow, as a fountain of their love towards the world.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

And Dr Reeves he does an excellent job describing the pitfalls of a singular and not triune God by asking this simple question, and Josh alluded to this earlier. He says how can a solitary God be eternal and essentially loving when love involves loving another? So the beauty that we have is that our God is three in one and they have always existed and they love one another. The Trinity is the bright lane, it's the path that leads us into the beauty of God. It's not this abstract idea, this abstract force, but the loving communion of the three persons Father, son and Holy Spirit is perfect in fellowship. That loving communion has never been self-serving but has always existed to be self-giving. So let me ask you this question Does the beauty of our triune God, does that, move you, not just in theory but personally? Is your heart pierced by the beauty of the triune God. The reality is that we cannot love. We only choose to love the things that we find beautiful, the things that are desirable to us.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

In CS Lewis, in his little essay called the Way to Glory, he reminds us that we are all too far easily pleased with mud pies when infinite joy and beauty is offered to us as a holiday at the sea. And that's what I'm saying here, is the infinite joy and beauty of our to us as a holiday at the sea. And that's what I'm saying here Is the infinite joy and beauty of our God is the triune God. This is why King David asked for that beauty in Psalm 27.4. And I quote King David says One thing have I asked of the Lord that I will seek after, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life. To do what? To gaze upon the beauty of the Lord. So where do we gaze upon the beauty of the Trinity? Well, look down with me at verse 9. 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. How do we gaze upon the beauty of the Trinity. We gaze upon the beauty of the Trinity by gazing upon Jesus Christ, who was sent into the world by the Father so that we may live through him.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

Now, at the beginning, in terms of the different categories of beauty, I mentioned two. I mentioned the beauty of creation and I mentioned the beauty of relationship. But there's a third category of beauty that I want to talk about. It's called moral beauty, and a UC Berkeley report says that the greatest kind of beauty is in fact, this thing called moral beauty. It defines moral beauty as this exceptional virtue, character and ability marked by a purity and goodness of intention and action. The report goes on to say that, in fact, moral beauty is what actually transforms people's lives. And we see that if you keep reading in verse 10 here in our passage in this is love, not that we have loved god, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation, the satisfaction of god's judgment for our sins. And if you skip down with me actually to verse 13, because I'm trying to pull out the idea that Trinitarian theology is right here in this text, verse 13 says by this we know that we abide in him and he in us because he has given us his spirit. So the question is I think we all resonate with the idea of moral beauty as the greatest type of beauty.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

Let me tell you a story. A pastor has told this story before. There's two brothers kind of younger brothers who go out after lunch. They go out to the river and this is a big river that ebbs and flows and it creates these big sandbanks and so, as any young boy would do, you got to climb to the top of the hill and unfortunately, as they climbed to the top of the hill, their weight actually caused that sand dune to cave in and they were stuck. So they never made it back home and somebody good parents were like hey, where are the kids? They sent people to go search for the boys and what they found was the younger boy who was up to his head in sand. He was unconscious, so they started moving the sand away and then he awoke at some point when they got enough sand away where he could start breathing better, and they said, hey, they couldn't find the older brother. They said where is your older brother? And the child responded and said I am standing on his shoulders With the sacrifice of his own life. The older brother lifted up the younger one to safety. This is the tangible and sacrificial love of the older brother. He literally served as a foundation for the younger brother.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

Now, don't you understand that? That is the moral beauty we all seek for, the moral beauty that we want? And our text tells us that Jesus is the propitiation for our sins. That means that Jesus is the one who satisfies God's loving judgment for our sins. We stand on the shoulders of Jesus so that we don't longer have to be in the pit. We don't create love, but we actually receive and rest upon the one who is sent in love. This is the moral beauty that is for you. This is the moral beauty that is for me. Let that triunity of the Father, son and Holy Spirit be your source of love. Let them be the one who secures you in love.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

So how do we gaze upon the beauty of the triune God and let that pierce our hearts? Well, here at New City, we do that in numerous different ways, but one of the ways is we have eight different practices. We practice together as a community, four daily and four weekly practices, and it's up on the website. It's probably not behind me, but there's a great, a lot of good information that we have about how we do common practices together to build our love up for God and for our neighbor.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

And one of the practices that has been so impactful to me and Ben did not pay me to say this has been prayer, and particularly praying the Psalms every Wednesday from noon to two. And it's just opened my world up to who God is, the triune God, the beauty of the Trinity. It's opened up my world to know God as a father, because that's who he is. He's this self-giving, loving Father who gives to the Son. It's opened my world up to see who God the Son is. Jesus Christ is the beautiful one. He's the propitiation for our sins. Prayer has opened up my eyes to see God, the Holy Spirit, as the one who has been given to me to comfort me, to strengthen me, to support me so that I might abide in the triune God Beloved, let their beauty, father, son and Holy Spirit, captivate your soul, captivate your heart, and let their community, father, son and Holy Spirit, be the pattern for our community, a community that is self-giving, overflowing towards others in love. And that brings me to our second point.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

Turn with me to verse 11 and 12. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. That's a command there. As we receive God's love, we then in return and respond to loving one another. Verse 12, no one has ever seen God. If we love one another, god abides in us and his love is perfected in us. God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. So the beauty of the community that we all have established here as Christ's body is meant to reflect the beauty of the Trinity. It's meant to reflect a love that goes out, a love that does not separate but goes to war.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

Teresa of Avalos states this Christ has no body on earth. But yours, no hands. But yours, no feet. But yours, yours, are the eyes through which the compassion of Christ must look out on the world. So yes, jesus still does have a body. We believe that it's ascended into heaven and he's seated at the right hand of God, the Father. But on earth his body is the church. Now look with me. At the beginning of verse 12 again, it says no eye has seen God.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

What is John doing here? It's kind of an odd sequitur. You could read those verses 11 through 12, like this Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. Skip that part. If we love one another, see, it flows perfectly. God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. But John puts it here for a reason. He puts that phrase no one has ever seen God because he actually intends the beauty of our community. The love that we extend outward towards other people is where the invisible God actually becomes visible. God's love it says in verse 12, is perfected in us. Or better understood, god's love in us is matured as we are able to love others. The goal of God's love in us is to move outward toward our neighbors.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

Now let me tell you a story, a true one. This is another true story that I read recently and it was printed in a newspaper a while back. There was an older woman who lived in a neighborhood and she was surrounded by neighbors who you could say were not cruel neighborhood. And she was surrounded by neighbors who you could say were not cruel, but neighbors who were very responsible, like many of you all in here. Now, when the old woman's, this older elderly woman, when her grass got too high, they sent a boy over to mow her lawn, and when her water pipes broke, they sent somebody to turn off her water and fix those things, and when her mail on her front porch got a little bit too high, they finally called the police. They did everything except check on whether or not she was alive, and she wasn't. When the police finally entered her home, they found her remains just bones, buried under five feet of trash. She had been likely dead for four years. Buried under five feet of trash, she had been likely dead for four years. One of her neighbors, a woman who used to be close to her, said this she was alone and she needed someone to talk to. But I was working two jobs and I was sick of her coming over at odd hours. Eventually I just stopped answering the door.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

Friends, this is a tragic picture of what a community is, not a community. This community is not a beautiful community when neighbors do everything except truly know and love one another. Our text says when we are loved by God, we have to move out towards loving one another, not from a distance, not just responsibly, not just, but instead personally, sacrificially, attentively. Love is not a task, it's not a box to check. Love is an overflow of the love that we have received from God. So this is not just a sad story but it's a mirror. It shows us what happens when we believe community is responsibility without relationship, when we settle for proximity without presence. This actually tarnishes the beauty of community.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

Here are some diagnostic questions to ask yourselves if you have or are you giving this type of of community? Here are some diagnostic questions to ask yourselves if you have or are you giving this type of beautiful community? Here they are. Do you deliberately enter into another's joy or pain each week through personal connection? Do you seek ways to give love to others, your family, your neighbors? Jesus calls us in the Sermon on the Mount to your enemies on a daily and weekly rhythm. Do you have at least two friends who know the current season of your soul and you know theirs? So there's the diagnostic questions, and I don't know where you guys find yourselves in that, but we really, if you're in deficit which I don't know where you guys find yourselves in that but we really, if you're in deficit which I'm sometimes in deficit, if you long to be more known and more loved and also to extend that outwards in a beautiful community, we encourage you all. Find a community here at New City. You can open up the app. It's really easy to do that. You can go out these doors and, on the left, you can speak to someone at the connect table. But we long for all of you all to be in fellowship, to be in relationship with people who truly know and love you, and that you do that for them.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

Drew Holcomb has this song. He says you've got to find your people. That will call your bluff, who will ride along when the road is rough. You've so the song. I really love it. We sing it together as a family my family and I. But the point is that, yes, you have to find your people, but you can't just find your people. It actually takes work to build community.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

Now I'm going to close with this. I'm going to summarize where we're heading back to. So Ben talked about communion and I'm talking about community, and next week we're going to do commission. If we could put up that slide of the very last bullet, or not the bullet, but the picture of our defined disciple. There it is. So for those of you who weren't here last week, I'm sorry, but for those of you here this week, I'm going to summarize this real quickly. But, ben, already we talked about this.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

Our union with Christ is the centerpiece for our faith as a Christian. That union with Christ actually gets us into communion with the triune God Father, son and Holy Spirit. And as we commune with God, I'm trying to make the case that beautiful community is actually the community that leads us to loving, knowing and loving one another here in this community, and then we are sent out, called, formed, sent as disciple makers, as those who, in our work and our witness, are bringing the name of Jesus and God's kingdom here on earth as it is in heaven. And so one way that Ben talked about this was in relation to fruitfulness. We desire that all of you here at New City grow in your communion with God, the triune God, where you would receive and respond to that type of love that he's given you. We also want you to grow in your depth of community, where you are known and loved, and we want you to be sent out and commissioned to the world through your work and through your witness. The other way that we talked about that's a qualitative depth that we want all of us to experience here at New City is on the top, is kind of more qualitative, it's the numeric. We want to see people who are not yet disciples become disciples and then take on responsibility of sharing this type of community with one another. Ben is going to talk about this again next week and probably clarify a lot of what I just said.

Pastor Jason Dunn:

So, beloved, I want to kind of close with this. I want you, if anything, to remember from this sermon, I want you to behold the beauty of the triune God. God who is the loving Father, who sent his only Son to be a Savior for us, to be the propitiation for our sins, so we can have verse 13, the empowering, life-giving Spirit. The beauty of the Trinity is not only that God is love, but that we are loved and we are welcomed in to that communion with God. So let us pray to the beautiful triune God. Pray with me, father, we are grateful for your love for us in this that you sent your son, jesus, to ransom a people, to be a propitiation for our sins. Jesus, you are the faithful, promised one. You are the one who brought us to the triune God. Father, son and Spirit and Spirit. We ask that you would fill us up, that you would help us to love and encourage those around us. We give you the glory, Amen.