I John 4:17-19 We Love Because He First Loved Us.

If God’s love is perfected in us, it means that we more and more walk as Jesus walked (2:6). In this perfection we can have “boldness in the day of judgment; because as He is, so we are in this world” (v. 17 Cf. 2:28). We have this boldness because, “perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment” (v. 18a). This is also how we know that his love is being increasingly perfected in us, that fears are cast out, and assurance takes its place (v. 18b). “We love Him because He first loved us” (v. 19 Cf. 4:10). This is the key point. We do not earn this love, and we do not love others to earn it. Rather, we love God and others, because he first loved us.