1John 3:11 - The What AND The Why Behind It

"Because this is the message which you [all] heard from [the] beginning, in order that we may be loving one another."

-In order that.  This word (it’s a significant single word in the Greek - hina) always speaks to purpose, to result/outcome.  It is the big picture, end-game goal, the why behind the what.  So let's not miss the significance here, when John says, in order that we may be loving one another.  In other words, loving one another is not only the what, it is also the why.  It is what we do, should do, must do, of course.  The new-old command, which John says once more that his readers heard from the beginning.  But here he doesn’t call this a command (aka "the word") as he did in 1John 2.7.  Here he is describing a message, a broader category of teaching, and this whole message was delivered with a purpose in mind, a desired outcome, specifically love.  John elevates this here as the why behind and above all that we do.  It’s a nuanced approach for making his point, a slightly different tack than simply conveying a command to love.  When given as "just" a command, the implicit assumption is that the big picture God has in mind is obedience.  "I’m telling you, love one another, and what I want is for you to obey, to do what I say."  And of course there is nothing wrong with obedience.  Obedience is good - but there's something more, way more.  But when stated like it is here in this verse, the focus is shifted somewhat.  The emphasis is on love.  Love gets just a little more love.  It’s as if the Lord is saying, "This message I’m giving you, I’m giving to you, SO THAT you will love one another.  What I want more than ritual and rote obedience, what I SO want, for you (both individually and corporately) and for the whole world, as well as for the sake of My Name, for My glory, is LOVE, is for My people - YOU - to love one another."  Does that make sense?

-John does restate here that this whole notion of loving one another, it is nothing new.  These believers and really all believers had been hearing this message from the beginning, from the very inception of the church.  The body of Christ and the localized assemblies thereof is to be characterized by love for one another, a family of brothers and sisters who show they are family by their faithful joyful sacrificial love for one another, hilarious generous sharing of their time and their talents and their treasure, their hearts and their lives, children of God who resemble their loving heavenly Father in this one respect as much as anything.  Love one another is more than a command, one of hundreds of such imperatives which we can sort of take a stab at, which we can generally approximate, try to do our best to comply with and hopefully check off our spiritual to-do list at least most the time.  It’s way more than that.  It’s not just one more thing to do.  In the horizontal plane, it is THE thing to do.  This is to be the outcome, it is the desired result of the message which we have heard.  All our hubbub, all our commotion, and programming, and emphases on buildings and tithes and sermons and preachers - the goal of all of this is love (1Timothy 1.5).  THIS is our "BHAG" - Big, Hairy, Audacious Goal.  For all our talk of processes and systems and new strategies - failing here, we fail ultimately.  Love.  This is our so-called widget.  Loving our people, our brothers and sisters in Christ, well.  In order that we may be loving one another...  Let it be so.