Christian Spiritulity: 1 John 4

I'm going away for mission for a week, so I thought I'd post up an old sermon. For those still around, enjoy.

1 John 4:7-21

Have you ever tried to explain christian spirituality to someone?
It’s incredibly difficult.

Before I started college, my wife and I used to run a cafe up in Katoomba.
Now Katoomba is a place that has a smorgasboard of different spiritualities.
If you can think of a way of attempting to know God, commune with the divine, reach nirvana, chances are, someone is giving it a go in Katoomba.
All sorts of people would come to me at work and tell me about their spirituality, it was like I had a big sign on my head that said ‘ please tell me your spiritual stories”
Different people would tell me about their meditations, their special oils, their visions of God and angels. Some of it was quite impressive
One bloke would tell me his stories of complete inner enlightenment he acheived by going into the bush for a month, no human contact, very little food.
Eventually the conversation would turn to me
“What does your spirituality look like Michael?”
“I’m a christian”, I’d answer, hoping that that ended the conversation
But they’de usually keep asking
“and what does that involve?”

I’d mumble out a few words, well, we umm, meet together in an old hall and we ahh sing some songs and then read a book, then listen to a guy talk for too long then ahh

I think we often find it hard to explain what we do because we don’t really know why we do it.
What is the heart of a genuinely christian spirituality? Christians live in different cultures all around the world, and engage in all sorts of different practices. How do we explain what binds them all together,and what makes christian spirituality different to other ones?

The first letter of John is an excellent resource for us, as it’s first readers seemed to be wrestling with just the same questions, what does a spirited christian look like . My hope is that today you will understand and enjoy your spirituality more, and be able to give a better answer than I did to your friends

I’m going to be jumping all over the passage, but I want to use verse 16 as a structure.
Firstly, Christian spirituality is about who God is: God is love
Secondly, Christian spirituality is about what God has done for us:we know and rely on God’s love for us
and finally Christian Spirituality is about what God is doing in and through us: making us lovers like him. Whoever lives in love, God lives in him and he in God