"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."

The servant of God is backed from his hectic schedule in the USA. He stepped into the side room while I waited, and immediately said that he wanted to preach from 1 John 3:16 because he felt moved to do so. Spontaneously, he led the 5 in the room into prayer for the resumption of the preaching sessions. Dr Tong's habit of prayers has always been very natural, very spontaneous; which is really how we should be praying.

Dr Tong started by sharing with the congregation about the gospel rallies and seminar sessions in the USA during the last month. Apparently, the rallies are seeing larger crowd with better response. Dr Tong also shared that for the second half of this year, gospel rallies are being planned for Rome and Paris as well. This being the 7th year of the theological lessons at the Reformed Institute, Dr Tong said that on the 10th year, he may want to conduct the month-long course in Jarkata, and get his church to provide food and lodging for all participants. One other news was that Dr Tong did his medical examination with the doctors concluding that his medical state has not deteriorated since 4 years' ago, so no surgery would be required. This was good news to Dr Tong, who said that he would have to be out of action for at least 6 months should he need to undergo surgery.

The lesson for the evening was entitled "The Change Love Brought". Dr Tong said that many people know John 3:16 and can memorise it (indeed, this may be the only verse some can memorise), but few would be able to recite 1 John 3:16. While John 3:16 tells us about the depth of God's love, 1 John 3:16 tells us about what true love is, and acts as a demarkation point for human history. This verse separates the history of the world into two portions: Before we know what love is, and After we knew what love is. The verse declares that by knowing the the LORD Jesus Christ laid down His life for us, we know what true love is. In other words, we start to know what true love is from the moment we know about how Christ died for us. Nothing else can tell us about this true love.

There are areas that the human reason cannot simply reach. For example, our emotional reactions are often not something that can be reasoned out fully. While the rest of the world places great emphasis in head knowledge, the Bible combines knowledge with the emotions. In the Bible, when describing the sexual love between Adam and Eve, Adam is said to 'know' Eve. That knowledge of Eve was sealed with the physical relationship they had, which meant that true knowledge is not simply a celebral act, but one that combines heart and mind. The great theologian/philosopher Immanuel Kant said that one's knowledge of God cannot possibly exceed his love for God. In other words, you know God as much as you love Him. Dr Tong said that many people think that they can know God by reading all kinds of books about Him. This is as silly as saying that you know and love a girl by reading all about her and kissing her photograph a thousand times. If we do not love God, we certainly cannot say that we know Him, for knowing God is a matter of relationship, not simply head knowledge. This point is of great significance, for we know of many people who claim to know God, but does not seem to exemplify godly behaviour. Many seminary graduates and even lecturers are like this, resulting in the failure of their ministries. This is clearly because they have not understood that you cannot possibly know God more than you love Him. The knowledge of God and the love of God are inseparable from each other.

And the knowledge of true love cannot be gathered from human experiences. In the west, Plato explained love as the attempt to seek for a higher understanding of the absolute good. Thus a person would slowly work his way towards the absolute good by casting aside all his 'lower' and more base behaviour pattern. It is an attempt to reach the higher plane through working up from a lower plane. In the east, Confucious instructed his disciple to repay kindness with kindness, but repay evilness with justice. Lao Tze however, asked his disciples to repay evilness with goodness, a con cept more noble than Confucius' teaching. But both of these understandings of love are human understanding, and not from the WORD.

The WORD of God declares here that we know what true love is only because Jesus Christ laid down His life for us. The apostle who wrote this was very special, in that he used to be a person who was known as the son of thunder (Mark 3:17). He was so impatient that he once asked Jesus to send down fire from heaven to consume the unbelievers (Luke 9:54).

But why would this apostle be later known as the apostle of love? Dr Tong compared John with the apostle Paul. Paul wrote long descriptive passages about doctrines and the correct teachings, but the apostle John wrote with great emotions. This was because he was the most emotionally perceptive of all the apostles. John was unique in that he was both the youngest, and oldest among the apostles. He was youngest in age, but lived the longest among the apostles.

Dr Tong pointed out that the transformation of John must be at the cross at Golgotha. At the crucifixion, all the apostles fled. John fled too, but he turned around and went back to witness the death of His Master (Dr Tong said that the crucifixion showed that women are stronger than men, for 3 women stayed versus 1 man). His transformation was completed when alone among the apostles, he observed the great suffering of Christ, and the sacrifice that He has made for mankind. He not only understood what love was, he understood how deep it was. Decades later, he would pen the famous verse, "For God SO love the world..." (John 3:16), the word 'so' fully displaying the qualitative understanding of John for the love of God, as seen in Jesus Christ. From that point onwards, humankind has the clear and final demonstration of what true love is all about.

It is interesting to note that from a son of thunder, John was slowly transformed till full humility took over. By the time he penned the gospel, he referred to himself NOT as the disciple who loved Jesus Christ, but as the disciple whom Christ loved. Dr Tong said this is of significance because it showed a full understanding of our relationship with God. John's relationship with Christ was so closed that he rested his head upon Christ's chest at the last supper. The transformation was not only knowledge-based, but emotive as well. Dr Tong related an example of a sister in church who started out giving offering and putting her name down as the donor. Then she progressed to putting the word 'anonymous'. When the pastor pointed out to her that everyone must have a name, she put down the name "the disciple who loves the LORD". Later, as she progressed spiritually, she finally changed the name to "the disciple whom the LORD loves".

So John not only gave us the demarkation point in human history, he also expressed the depth of Christ's love for us. This was only possible because he was the only apostle who witnessed for himself the death of Christ, and personally knew of the sacrifice Christ made. But because of this understanding, the subsequent action would be for him to admonish his readers to also emulate the example of Christ, and give of their lives to others. This is a natural, and inevitable conclusion that can come about when one has true knowledge of God and His love. His very example in demonstrating to us what true love is settled all arguments. By seeing how He died for us, we ought to be prepared to love others the way He did, to preach the good news, to bring others to Christ by loving and caring for them.

I was personally very encouraged by the message. I thought Dr Tong's insight on the uniqueness of the apostle John (and the observation of 1 John 3:16) was refreshing and new. His emphasis on Immanuel Kant's idea of knowledge plus love of God answered many questions for me as well.

Disclaimer: This summary does NOT represent the official position of STEMI (Stephen Tong Evangelistic Ministry International), and is the personal opinion of the author, expressed without prejudice. Expressed opinions are meant for academic discussions only