Course: Faith Over Fear
February 10, 2022 | Dave Rueter
Passage: 1 John 4:18
Perfect Love
Last week we talked about the love of God as it relates to the power and self-control the Holy Spirit grants us to deal with our fear. This week we return to the topic of love, this time considering the perfection of God’s love. If John were suggesting in this passage that we needed to muster up a more perfect form of love in our own lives in order to remove fear from our experience, we would be in deep trouble.
Sin continues to impact even the best of us. Scripture established perfection as the standard for salvation then provides clear indications that this perfection would be fulfilled by another. Only Christ lived a perfect life, the life that we could not. Similarly, only Christ’s love is perfect, the love we are not, in this life, capable of. This perfect love, which Christ gives to us in His life and ministry casts out our fear. We are no longer bound, captured by what we cannot overcome. Christ has overcome for us.
Further, John notes in verse 19 that “We love because he first loved us.” Fear is displaced in our hearts by love. It is as though there only so much room and the more love we receive from God, the less of a foothold remains for fear to infect our lives. In the end, this love of God is able to be passed on as we return love to God and learn through Christ how to more perfectly love one another. In this way, we join with God in casting out fear from our lives and the lives of those we are called to serve in Christ’s name.
Thoughts for Reflection
How have you experienced the love of God casting out fear in your life?
Course Information
There are a great many things that a capable of causing us to fear. Yet, God instructs us many times in Scripture to "fear not." In this series, we will explore how it is that God casts out our fear, enabling us to live lives of faith over fear.
