Love The World, Lose Everything - [1 John 2:15-17]

Open your Bibles with me, if you would, to the book of 1 John. Book of 1 John, we're going to start looking at a section of text out of the 1 John, but I want to start by asking you a question. I love to ask questions.

I'm a guy who likes to answer questions, solve problems, get questions asked to me, and I think it kind of gets the brain going a little bit. So I want to first ask you a question as you're turning to the book of 1 John.

I love asking a question, too, when I've told you to do something else so we can see how good a multitasking you truly are. But the question I have to ask this morning or this evening is this. What do you live more for than anything else in your life?

What is the one thing that you live more for in your life? Let me put it another way. What is the thing that your affections are most directed towards? What do you have your desires focused upon in life?

Now, you may have thought to yourself, as many here, I'm sure, and anyone who I might ask these questions, a few various thoughts might have come such as my spouse, my kids, my job, my computer, my other stuff, my own life.

Those are just a few things that a lot of people hold very dear to themselves. And the answer to this question is very different for almost anybody. If I were to ask you all individually, I think I would get very close to very different answers.

And I'd get even more different answers if I asked people outside of the church. And it was interesting. I went to the one source of all truth, the Internet, and I looked up to see and there was actually a question that was posed to the Internets, as they are, and it was this, this question.

So think about what you would or how you would answer this question, and it was this. What brings you the greatest pleasure? Or what is the greatest pleasure of one's existence? A big question. A very big question to try to answer.

Let me give you a couple examples of what the Internet answered. As a young man, realizing that a girl I like, likes me too. Visiting old places I remember from my childhood. Spending quality time with friends and family.

That moment when our body transits from the conscious state to a sleepy state. I didn't make these up because I couldn't make up one like that. This one I have to question, but it's the love of a dog.

For some of us, I would say a cat also. Doing what people say you cannot do. Eating freshly baked bread with cool butter. Mmm, I heard, yes. I'm sure most of you have eaten before coming, so it doesn't make you hungry talking about food.

The smell of grass and trees after a rainstorm. Friendship, which includes trust, laughing, and a good company. Struggling to learn something and having everything finally click at 2 a .m. just before drifting off to sleep.

This one's a little more closer to home, and that is meeting your children for the first time. Proving your critics wrong when doing something you love. Being loved by others for who you are and not what you are.

And lastly, as we did just a moment ago, beautiful music. Now, it kind of surprised me as I looked through these, there were over 500 responses. Not one of those, which was very interesting, not one of those mentioned anything about money or riches.

Not one. Which kind of surprised me quite a bit when you asked the internet such things. Even more sadly, not one of them described either the Bible, God, or Christ as something that is of great importance to them in their lives.

Let me show you a couple other examples, because as we look at things, a lot of times as I've asked people in the past, they've always come and said, you know, if I only had money, right, life would be great.

If I only had more money, if I were to win the lottery, if I were super rich, I would have nothing else to worry about, I would give to the poor, I would do what I want to do, and I would just be able to do great things in life.

Well, let me give you some examples of people who have won the lottery and how it's impacted their life before we get into our text. Thomas and Denise Rose, they were married 25 years without any marital issues.

Then, out of the blue, she asked for a divorce. Little did her husband know, the days before filing, she had won a $1 .3 million, and she kept it secret through the divorce proceedings. Once the truth came out, a judge found her guilty of violating California's disclosure laws and awarded the entire winnings to her ex-husband.

Mr. Rogers and Laura Griffiths won $3 million playing the lotto. Again, I'm not endorsing the lottery here. These are purely examples, so I want to put that on the record. They won $3 million playing the lotto.

She bought designer goods and pursued a rock career, as most of you would probably do if you won $3 million. But soon it all went up in smoke, literally. They lost their money in bad investments, and their dream home, which they had borrowed everything against, burned down in what they consider a freak fire.

Another one is it took Billy Bob Harold Jr. 20 months to lose $31 million that he won in the Texas lottery. He quit his job at Home Depot. Here's the good part, right? Good moral person. He donated to charity a lot of money, including 480 turkeys to the poor.

But soon his spending got out of control, and people started harassing him for money. He then separated from his wife. And not more than a month later, his son found him dead. He had committed suicide.

And lastly, Tanya Lynn Dickerson. She worked at the Waffle House. There was a generous regular, as the story goes. And that regular provided tickets as tips to most of them, and they would share in any winnings that came about.

Tanya one day discovered that one of these lottery tickets was worth $10 million. She kept it for herself, alleging that she did not agree to split the tickets. And Tanya decided, again, to keep it for herself.

She was sued by the other people, and she lost. And as the report says here, they lost, I'm sorry. She won, so she could keep the money. But as the report says here, but, quote, karma, quote, came back to bite her.

When the IRS sued her for unpaid taxes and took it all. The last two, so out of these four, we had divorce, fire, death, taxes. And out of the last two, death and taxes are the two things that the world will tell you no one can get away from.

Now, my message today is not to focus solely on that. But it's really to start looking at worldly perspectives, worldly desires, worldly wants. And even when we get that sometimes, and when we get that money, when we get that object, when we get that whatever it might be, is it something that's going to make us happy?

Well, maybe in the interim, but it could be even worse than that. So today, my proposition to you today is I'm going to give you three questions. Again, I told you I love questions. So three questions that if answered in the affirmative, so for the younger crowd there, if answered yes in any way or means, would guarantee that you love the creation over the creator.

And we'll briefly look at what your desires reveal about you, and what the Bible says your desires reveal about you, if that's the case. So if these three questions you answer yes to any or all of these, the Scripture we're going to look at specifically talks to that.

So let me ask you another question before we start. If you were starving, you hadn't eaten in, let's say, a week, and for me that would be very starving, and you had two options on the table, literally, you had a meal of a king over here, nice, thick, juicy steak, cooked however you would like it, maybe little potatoes, little red potatoes, butter, bread with cool butter on it, good vegetables, whichever ones you like the most, right?

Those vegetables are on the side. You maybe get some tiramisu or some cheesecake on the side of that, right? You have that as an option. That's option A. Option B over here on the table, and I got in trouble for this last time when I talked about this, but is a hot dog from 7-Eleven that's been there two days on the rotisserie, shriveled up, right?

Shriveled up. It's been there. The fat's dripped off. There's nothing to it. It's almost like it's bark. And you have the two options. You have option A, the feast fit for a king, or option B, the hot dog, and the world goes after the hot dog.

That's what the world is chasing. And yet, Scripture says this is what we're offered over here. And we'll get into that as we dig more into our text. So think of it. Are you going after the hot dog because it looks appetizing at first, but it truly isn't?

Or are you going after what the feast is over here? So if you haven't done so already, open your Bibles to the book of 1 John, small book again of the Bible in the New Testament. We're going to be looking at verses 2, chapter 2, I'm sorry, chapter 2, verses 15 -17.

15 -17, chapter 2. Let me read these three verses. Follow along with me in your Bibles. I'll be reading from the ESV. It says this, verse 15. Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

For all that is in the world, the desires of the flesh, the desires of the eyes, and the pride of life is not from the Father, but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.

Small portion of text. A very deep and rich part of text also, though. And as you study it more and more and as you look at it, it's a beautiful text, but again, very self-explanatory in most cases. But what I do want to do, if you turn me off for any other reason, right, you've eaten and you've come here and you're just here to enjoy the great fellowship and you ignore me from this point on, I'll say, hold on, give me two more minutes.

I'll give you the two things I want to get across to you and then you can ignore me from there on out. Two key points. John specifically wants to let his readers know in this text, he says that we as Christians are not to follow after the things of the world.

Let me repeat that. We as Christians are not to follow after things of the world. Instead, we are to follow the things of God. Period. And I have period with an explanation point after it. Period. That's it.

The second thing I want you to get across, and we'll dig deeper into these, but the second thing I want you to understand is this is not a nice-to-have. This is not a mere want. This is not a mere request.

This is a command given by God in Scriptures to His children. This is a command. It's not, again, something that we can just ignore. It is to be obeyed. And we are given the power by the Holy Spirit and through the work of Jesus Christ to obey this.

Now let me give you just some real quick background on the book of 1 John, because it helps with the context of what we're talking here. One commentator said this, and I love this quote, so I just had to read it, but it gives you an understanding a little bit about the book of John and why you should love it as much.

The commentator says, few books of the New Testament are more loved, memorized, or quoted than the book of 1 John. The book's author has been attributed to John of Zebedee. This is the brother of James by most conservative scholars.

It focuses mainly on the incarnation of Jesus Christ. It's to teach those who are reading it. It's to teach the church mostly about the incarnation of Jesus Christ. His coming as a man to this earth. And it's being written to a group of people who have been receiving false teaching about Jesus Christ, about the church, about all the parts of the Bible that they had, and they were constantly being broken down by these false teachers.

But I want to make it clear that this was not given to new believers. These would be mature believers that this was mainly focused towards. So as we look at our text, you may say, yeah, that's great for someone who doesn't have the willpower or the ability to do it, you know, because they're young and not mature, but I don't need to worry about this.

That's not what John's saying here. John's text is very specifically saying this is for all believers. Again, it is a command. It's interesting too that John is very direct in his teaching here when he stresses that Christians are not only to be joyous, we're not only to be joyous in what we're doing and the things that we do, and our affections and our desires and our motives and what we put our energies into, but we are to be holy and obedient also.

Two very key aspects. John also is not a person who walks the gray line, right? You always have those people who are kind of like on the fence, well, this or that, or I'm not too sure. John is very black or white in his writing.

It's either A or it's B. It's either true or it's false. You're either a Christian or you're not. John's very clear about that. He sounds harsh at times, sometimes, when you're reading his text, but you just say, God, I love this guy, right?

He just really, really doesn't play anywhere but black or white. And you'll see as I go through our text this evening, as I look through it, you'll see that is why I titled it as I did, Love the World and Lose Everything, because that's exactly what John says here in our texts.

So the three questions I have for you, if you're those ones that write down your three questions as I go to give them to you, they're coming in verse 16, so bear with me. Okay? Verse 16. But I do need to go over a couple things in verse 15 because I think it's critical from our context that we understand verse 15 as we move into verse 16.

So the three questions are coming, but bear with me. They'll come in verse 16. Verse 15 says this, Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

Did you get the repeated words? Did you see the words that were repeated three times over? There are two of them. You see them? The word love and the word world. Both of those are repeated in the text multiple times.

Their emphasis specifically around this section of text. You may be saying, but wait a minute, brother. Doesn't the Bible, it seems like it's contradicting with something. You know, if I was an atheist or an agnostic, one, I wouldn't be up here.

But I would be thinking to myself, hey, I can think of a verse right away that contradicts this. There must be a contradiction in the Bible. This is one of those many contradictions that are found in the Bible.

Right? Do not love the world. Well, who is the one that loves the world? John 3 .16. John 3 .16 says what? For God so loved the world. And you may be saying to yourself, well, that seems strange. One, we're told not to love the world by John.

And then we've got over here, John is saying, for God so loved the world. That seems very contradictory. Seems strange. Seems odd. Especially at a quick read. And again, if I was an agnostic, I'd be going, ha, ha, ha, gotcha.

Right? How do you get out of this one? And it's interesting because it's all around context. And let me be clear, there are no contradictions in Scripture. And it's easy to look at this and be able to quickly pull out from its context, in the context of John 3 .16, and say, there isn't a contradiction here.

There isn't. The word used here for love, in John 3 .16, it relates to God's compassion. God is compassionate. He looks down, and He has compassion among mankind. And that's what John is saying here. He's talking about God's compassion.

He's saying, I so love the world. I am so compassionate about those who are lost in their sin and mire, and I don't want to see any go to hell. That's the compassionate love that God has for the world.

So let me ask you this. Can we have that passionate love, based on what 1 John says? Can we ourselves have that same love that God has for the world? Or do we have to be obedient and say, we can't because it says, do not love the world.

Well, again, in context, yeah, of course we can. We definitely can. We have to. But if we didn't have that same compassion that God has, why do we evangelize? Why do we want to see anyone to Christ? Why would we ever do any of that if we were not willing to have the same compassion God has in John 3 .16 for the world?

So then what's 1 John talking about? What is he going after here? What is he saying not to love? Well, let me just clear up a little bit of the word love that's used here. The word love here is agapo, agapo love.

And I know most of you know this word already. But it means this, quote, to esteem, to love, and often indicates a direction of the will and finding of one's joy in something or someone. Let me reread that because that's a great, great direction and it helps us to understand both John 3 .16 and 1 John.

Let me read it again. It says this, agapo love means to esteem, to love, and it often indicates a direction of the will and finding of one's joy in something or someone. It's a different word from phileo, another form of love that is used.

And that's more of an affectionate love. That's more of a brotherly love. That's the Philadelphia love, the city of brotherly love, Philadelphia. That's what phileo is. And that's not what the word is that's used here.

I also want to make it clear that the word love as used here is neither negative or positive by itself. Love itself is a neutral word. It's the direction or the desires of that love, what you've applied it to.

I can love something. I can love someone. But it's that or something else. So it's where I'm putting my affections. Do we humans here today, and I'm assuming all of us are humans, but do we find joy in the things of the world?

Can we be obedient to this command and still find joy in the things of the world? I think we can. It depends on, again, the amount of affection towards something. We'll get into that in more detail. But I think of things like this.

When I've gotten married, when my child was born, these are things that brought me joy. But guess what? I wasn't pleasing myself through that. I wasn't saying, boy, good old me, look at what I did. It was more of, thank you, God, for giving me and blessing me with the wife I have and the daughter that I have.

That's the type of joy. But the thanks is still directed at God. The glory still goes to God for what He has done. One commentator said this when he rightly wrote, The love of something often carries with it a loyalty to that person or object.

And Scripture is clear that our focus needs to be heavenly focused instead of worldly focused. It is clear that we are to embrace our minds and our thoughts in the things that are heavenly, the things that are eternal, the things in Scripture, and not be clogged by the things that are here in this world.

How can you love, and the Bible even says this, how can you love the world and love God? A and B. John's essentially saying it makes no sense. You can't love both. You love one or the other. You may have affection for some things and want and love the other, but you can't love both.

Scripture states here that your love, your affections, your desires, will be more directed towards one or the other. And the question I have today for you is, which one are you directed towards? Are you directed towards the world or are you directed towards the Bible?

It's critical for understanding who you are. So let me move from the word love and quickly just move down to the word world, because this is something we also need to clear up briefly. The word world, by John himself, the word world in Greek is kosmos, very familiar to most of us, spelled with a K instead of a C, but it's kosmos.

And most of you would think of what kosmos is. If I said out in the kosmos, you'd be thinking of the earth, the sky, the moon, the stars, the sun, whatever it might be, right? Space in general, that's kosmos.

That can be one form of the word and the way it's used. Another form is mankind. So it's a little bit narrower. It's a little bit more focused. It's not just everything in general, but it is mankind on this earth.

It's a focus of man, humankind. Lastly, the third way, and it's in our context in our text today, and that is that it can relate to the evil, sinful, earthly system. And oftentimes, this earthly system is in direct opposition to God Himself.

It's one's desires and affections. Do they go against God or do they go against the world? This Greek word that's used here in 1 John 2 .15 -17 in its context, again, kosmos, refers to that last definition that I spoke of.

Again, very different from John's definition. 1 John is all about, again, the love of mankind, the love of people, the love of humans in their desperate state. And yet, 1 John speaks specifically to the sinful worldview.

And again, if John intended any of these other two definitions, if John was just generally talking about space or John was talking about just humans or mankind, then it makes no sense as to why we would desire to evangelize the good news with people.

John's telling people in this text, in 1 John, he's telling people it is this continuation of your desires. It is this willingness of always going into this. And one analogy is, are you dipping your toe in the things of the world?

Are you just tapping it? Or are you swimming in the cesspool of what the world provides? And John is saying his direction here in our text is he's going against do not swim in the cesspool of the world.

That's what the context is. The worldly things. It's that persistent love of those worldly things. Those things that are so much in love with that they get in the way of my Bible reading in the morning.

They get in the way of my prayer life. They get in the way of my fellowshipping with others because I desire this over here so much more. That's what John's talking about in 1 John. It's that desiring.

It is that, not even that I'm being pulled over here to a godly position, but I just want to be over here because that's where I love it. That's what's in it for me. And John essentially tells his readers here, he gives two words to those who he said are in this miry pit of worldliness.

He gives two words. And if you want to write something down, this is what he says essentially in our phrasing today and that is stop it. Stop it. Just stop it, he says. Why? Why would you even desire that when you know what we have here in text?

Why would you go over here for the hot dog when the meal is over here? It's laid out for you and it's free. Why would you want this? To him it sounds ridiculous. So he says stop it. If you're swimming in the cesspool of the world, if your mind is filled with that, he says stop it.

He says repent. Turn your mind from worldly things and instead turn your mind towards heavenly things. I'm not saying it's easy. I'm not saying to you that this is something that happens overnight. It can happen overnight, but if you find yourself being pulled and drawn all the time, it's not something that we can do on our own.

And John is clear that this is something that only by the work of Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit can we even have that desire to want to get out of that pit and instead go towards things that are heavenly.

Stop it, he says. A child of God should find pleasure in Scripture and prayer and fellowship. Now, you can find pleasure in other things, yes. I'm not saying you can't. It's that is that getting in the way of what you should be doing.

His last phrase here in v. 15 is pretty clear. He says, for that person who is drawn, who is torn asunder to stay and swim in the cesspool, he essentially says this. And you can see it in your text in the end of v. 15.

It says, the love of the Father is not in him. The love of the Father is not in him. It can be translated also as, the love towards the Father is not in him. Or the desires of the Father are not in him.

So the question is, if you have those desires, if you're always here and you're doing that, can you be a child of God? And John is saying, you're either a Christian or you're not a Christian. This is to put a pulse and say, are you a Christian?

Are your desires today, tomorrow, and in the future to be geared towards the world? Or are they to be geared towards heavenly things? And that's what John wants to portray here. So let's move from v. 15 to v. 16.

Let's move on down to v. 16. This is where our three questions are going to come. Fairly self-explanatory, but let me re-read the text itself. For all that is in the world, the desires of the flesh, the desires of the eyes, and the pride of life is not from the Father, but is from the world.

First you need to understand this is not a comprehensive list. John in 1 John is not trying to lay out a list of all the things in a comprehensive list, but he's writing to his readers to say, these are the biggest stumbling blocks not only for the readers then, but for readers today.

They're the biggest stumbling blocks. And from these three questions that I said earlier, answering yes to these questions, as we'll see in the book of 1 John here in our text, you really need to wonder if you are a Christian or not.

John's clear about it here. Are you battling with the world in your life? Are you struggling with these things in your Christian walk? That's good. That's good if you're struggling. Instead, if you're just saying, no God, I don't need you.

I'm going to go and do what I want to do, right? That's a different story. That's what John's talking about here. Now it's made very difficult as we read this text and we try to make this non-gray area and we try to be as black and white as we can, very difficult in a world that is full of post-modern, relativistic, egocentric, narcissistic, secular lives that we see today in our world.

Right? Very difficult. Very, very difficult. So let's get to the three questions. Three questions are this. Here's question one. So if you're writing them down, here's question one. This is John's check on your life.

Do your fleshly desires rule your life? Do your fleshly desires rule your life? This is more literally translated as lusts felt by the flesh. Are you going after and acting upon the lusts felt by the flesh?

John's asking, are you acting on these fleshly lusts in a way that isn't pleasing to God? Are you acting on these things? Are you doing these things? We know that God is all-knowing. We know that God is all-seeing.

And whether you're acting on them or not, God knows. Are you acting on your fleshly desires? And again, I have to come back to context because the word flesh used here, again, is neither negative or positive.

It all is based on context. We have a positive example of the word flesh when in Philippians 1 .23, Paul has a desire to be with Christ. He doesn't want to be in the flesh, but he would rather be with Christ.

And then in a negative context, this same word is used in Romans 1 .24 when it's talking about the sinful hearts of pagans. Chapter 1 of Romans. But John's meaning here in 1 John is negative. In its context, it's completely negative.

And he's talking about mankind's desire to fulfill your fleshly desires. To fulfill the lusts of your flesh. To actually act upon them. And as I alluded to earlier, a sample list is provided in Romans 1 of what these are.

It's just some of the fleshly desires that sinful man wants to go after. And again, it's not an easy thing. John is sure that it takes faith and belief in the work of Jesus Christ to be able to overcome these.

The world knows nothing different. The world is lost. And that's where, again, John 3 .16, there's the compassion that God has for lost mankind, because in most cases, He's left them to their desires.

So the first question in John is, do your fleshly desires rule your life? Are they taking over your life? Is that where your focus is? Are you actually acting upon those desires? In the second question, John actually now moves from the fleshly desires to a more laser-focused, centered type of question.

Question number two, do your eyes or your mind desire ungodly things? Do your eyes or your mind desire ungodly things? Let me say it another way. Are you interested in ungodly things? Are you ingesting ungodly things through your eyes?

Are you reading things you shouldn't be reading? Are you seeing things you shouldn't be seeing? Are you doing things you shouldn't be doing through your eyes? John moves. There's a slight difference here, but John moves from the very first portion that says, are you acting on this?

Are you actually doing it with your flesh? Are you doing it where it can be seen publicly? To this more, is it a mental thing? Are you just thinking it? Right? And it makes me think of the Pharisees when they came to Jesus and he even spoke about it.

And he was talking about adultery. And they essentially said, we haven't committed adultery. And he said, no. But if you've just lusted in your mind, you've committed adultery. It's that not only the physical act, it's the mental act of it.

So 1 John starts to target this mental act also. And this can be translated very literally as lusting with the eyes. Lusting with the eyes. So he moves quickly from the physical to mental lusting. It's interesting because oftentimes we as humans can sit and think on things lustfully or even just ungodly things we can have in our minds.

And guess what? There are no checks and balances. There aren't other people that can sit there and see that apart from God and yourself. And yet it's clear that God sees them as if you were performing those same acts before his throne.

He wants to show his readers that the struggle is with both. You may turn around and say, I'm a great person morally because I haven't acted upon my lust. I haven't actually physically committed adultery.

But he says even narrower, have you even just thought about lusting after a woman or a man? And if so, then you belong in this camp. And again, if it's a struggle for you, good. Continue to pray that God would change your heart and your mind.

Continue to focus on Scripture and those lusts can be taken away. Most people wouldn't think of murdering. One, because we've got a sheriff here that would probably arrest you. But most people wouldn't think of murdering because of jail time, consequences, things that may come with it.

And yet Jesus again clearly states that just our thoughts, our hatred towards our brothers and sisters is as if we were murdering them. He was again changing the whole philosophy from it's a heart process.

It's not just acting physically. It's what we're thinking mentally and what our heart is. We desire harm to someone. It's as if we were wanting to murder someone. It makes me think of the song that most of us are familiar with.

Oh, be careful little eyes what you see. I think most of you have heard that I'm not a good singer. So I won't sing it, but let me just read it really quick. It says this, Oh, be careful little eyes what you see.

Oh, be careful little eyes what you see. There's a Father up above and He's looking down in love. So be careful little eyes what you see. John is saying stop lusting with your eyes. Stop looking at things that would cause you to lust with your eyes.

Stop reading the romance novels. Stop watching the TV shows. Stop reading other things or stop looking at images on the computer. That's what he's saying. He's saying stop all of that. Do your fleshly desires rule your life?

Question one. Do your eyes desire ungodly things? Question two. Question three as we move quickly is this. Do you enjoy taking glory from God who rightly deserves it? Let me say it a little bit less wordy.

Do you enjoy rightly taking the glory God deserves? Do you enjoy that? Is that something you enjoy? Do you sit there and say, Oh me, I'm so great of a person and instead give God the glory for who you are and what you've done?

Our text here again at the very end of verse 16 essentially out of these three areas, John is talking about the pride of life. He closes these three examples with, quote, the pride of life. And this can be translated as vain glory.