Our Love

Introduction

Love at Christmas

I have a confession to make. Please don’t tell anyone, but I like the Hallmark Christmas movies. Now don’t get me wrong, but I love watching these movies and fictional towns in which they depict. In the past, some have been filmed in North Carolina, including Statesville. I like watching to see I recognize where it may have been filmed. The story lines are usually predictable, but almost every Hallmark Christmas movie has a fully restored, classic Ford truck. The studly guy always drives the truck. I did see one the other day that showed the couple to be riding in the classic truck driving through the snowy countryside. I thought, “This is beautiful!”, until I realized that even though the seen looked like they were driving, the truck was actually in park. Then I realized the movie was just made up. Christmas in these movies, typically is about some type of romantic love. That’s as far as they get. Boy meets girl. Girl runs from boy. Boy runs after girl. And the movie ends with it looking like they will live happily after ever. Love at Christmas. But do we really understand love?

Do We Really Understand Love?

We think that love is hot chocolate and chocolate chip cookies on a snowy Christmas Eve. We think that love is what is portrayed in that Hallmark Christmas movie we talked about. But, do we really understand love?

What’s Love Got to Do With It?

I am reminded of Tina Turner singing the song, “What’s Love Got to Do with It?”

Then I think of the Christmas Story from Luke’s Gospel. I think of the beautiful love of God, then I realize that love has everything to do with it. You see, the Bible is a love story. We are given multiple passages that indicate God’s great love for us. Today I want to share with you two beautiful verses that should summarize the love we are celebrating today on this Second Sunday of Advent.

1 John 3:1 NIV84

1 How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.

1 John 4:9 NIV84

9 This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.

Oh do not miss the power of these two verses this Christmas season. Do not miss the truth about love that is packed in these verses. Today, we are going to look at 3 characteristics found in these verses that will give you a beautiful foundation of our love and why we celebrate love during this advent season.

We are Lavished Upon

First, notice we are lavished upon. “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us.” The word lavish means “to give something to someone or to bestow a gift.” This lavishingly love is special because it is Godly.

It is Godly

We see in the text that it specifically is linked to the Father. To God. God is the Author and Creator of all things, including love. The Psalmist reminds us multiple times that God’s love is everlasting, it endures forever.

Psalm 100:5 NIV84

5 For the Lord is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.

Additionally read Psalm 136 where it is repeated after every line.

Only God’s love can endure forever.

It is Great

God’s love is great. Our text says it is. But how great is God’s love. Psalm 108:4 says it is higher than the heavens.

Psalm 108:4 NIV84

4 For great is your love, higher than the heavens; your faithfulness reaches to the skies.

God’s love is great. God’s love is also generous.

It is Generous

You and I do not deserve the generosity of our Lord. Yet, He indeed is generous with His love. We read in Ephesians 2:3-5

Ephesians 2:3–5 NIV84

3 All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. 4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.

1 Timothy 1:14 declares this in another way.

1 Timothy 1:14 NIV84

14 The grace of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.

Furthermore, because of the love He has lavished on us, we are longed for.

We are Longed For

Have you ever felt like you were longed for? I know that is not good grammar to end a sentence with a preposition, but for me, there is no other way to describe it. “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us that we should be called the children of God.”

Notice the next phrase, “And that is what we are!” How did we become the loved children of God?

As the Creation of God

First, we must remember that God made us and saw it was good.

Genesis 1:27 NIV84

27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

Genesis 1:31 NIV84

31 God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day.

We are God’s creation and the Bible says as a result, we are very good. Because we are His creation, He longs for us.

Isaiah 30:18 NIV84

18 Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you; he rises to show you compassion. For the Lord is a God of justice. Blessed are all who wait for him!

He calls us His children!

As the Children of God

I will never forget the many times my dad introduced me to his colleagues and friends as his son. He always had a gleam in his eye when he did. He was proud to be my father even though I was far from being the best son I could be. My dad sacrificed much for me and he longed for me to spend time with him and he always wanted to make it happen. Isn’t God just like that and much more? God went way out of His way to make me a child of His!

Romans 5:8 NIV84

8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

John 1:12 NIV84

12 Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—

This was His plan since the creation of the world! God wants His children to succeed! Jeremiah 29:11

Jeremiah 29:11 NIV84

11 For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

Oh how He loves you and me! God lavished His love on us so much that we are longed for as His creation and as His children. Therefore, we are made right through Christ. As a result, we are longed for as the consecrated for God.

As the Consecrated of God

The Hebrew word of consecrated is qadash. It means to sanctify, prepare, dedicate, be hallow or to be holy. It is set apart and sacred. The love our God has for us includes us being made holy so that we can fellowship with Him. God’s ultimate desire for you and I is to be in fellowship with Him. God wanted us to have access to His holiness. He wants us to be consecrated to Him. Our choir sang a song last week that had this verse so beautifully narrated in it by Richard:

Isaiah 40:3–5 NIV84

3 A voice of one calling: “In the desert prepare the way for the Lord; make straight in the wilderness a highway for our God. 4 Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill made low; the rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain. 5 And the glory of the Lord will be revealed, and all mankind together will see it. For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

It was the love of God to give this to us. To lavish us and long for us so much that He called us His children. It was the love of God that made the way.

1 John 4:9 NIV84

9 This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.

God sent us His Son in the form of a baby so that He would live and dwell among us. He would teach His disciples and show them the way to the Father. He would be celebrated as the Messiah from the cradle to the cross. Yet God in His rich mercy, does not make the choice for us. He gives us liberty, the freedom to choose.

We are Given Liberty

To Freely Choose

You and I always have a choice. We can worry or we can trust God. We can believe or we can doubt. We can be made whole or remain broken.

Jeremiah 18:1–6 NIV84

1 This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: 2 “Go down to the potter’s house, and there I will give you my message.” 3 So I went down to the potter’s house, and I saw him working at the wheel. 4 But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him. 5 Then the word of the Lord came to me: 6 “O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter does?” declares the Lord. “Like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel.

God gives us the ability to choose because He wants us to fondly connect.

To Fondly Connect

We can celebrate Christmas through love. We can connect to God the Father, God the Son and God the Spirit. We can connect to each other during the Christmas season through His amazing love. Or, we can choose to fondly connect with Him daily through the reading of His Word, spending time with Him in prayer, and being built up in Him through faith.

Romans 5:1–2 NIV84

1 Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, 2 through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.

We have God’s love lavished upon us and He longs for us as His children. Yet we are given the liberty to choose, the liberty to fondly connect with Him, and to be fully Christlike.

To Fully Be Christlike

The child born in a manger became the One whom the people cried out, “Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the Lord, Hosanna, Hosanna!” That same crowd a week later cried out, “Crucify Him! Crucify Him!”

Yet on that third day after being crucified, He arose from the grave conquering sin and death once and for all! He now sits in the heavenly realms beside His Father. He still beckons you and me to be fully like Him.

John 15:9–13 NIV84

9 “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10 If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.

What does love have to do with it? Everything!

Luke 2:11 NIV84

11 Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord.