Passion: Unstoppable Love
Passion • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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· 23 viewsThe soldiers couldn't stop Him... The crowds couldn't stop Him... The nails couldn't stop Him... Not even the grave could stop Him!!! Jesus is Risen! Nothing can stop His Love! Jesus's Love for us is unstoppable, and nothing can separate us from it... Are we living with that kind of Unstoppable Love for Him and for His Will in our lives?
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Good morning again!!! Today we celebrate the Resurrection!
Jesus is Risen! (Jesus is risen indeed!)
Jesus is NOT dead… the Tomb is empty… the darkness of Friday is overwhelmed by the Light of Sunday… Jesus is alive!!!!
Today, we celebrate Him… as we wrap up this series on the Passion.
We have been looking at the Love of Christ…
We have seen that it wasn’t the Nails that held Him there, but His passionate Love for US!
John 13:34–35 (NIV)
34 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.
35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
Christ commanded us to “Love one another as He has loved us”, so that the world would know His Love… Amen?
That means that we must love others with the same passionate… humble… perfect love that Jesus loved us…
We must humble ourselves and serve them… We must sacrifice our own desires, needs, and wants, for their sake…
But that’s not easy, is it?
Loving others is tough business. So often, our love is tied to how we feel… to how our wants/needs are being met… and when they don’t act and do as we want, our love changes…
But God’s Love is unconditional… humble… perfect....
— God Loves even when it’s not reciprocated.
— God Loves even when you are nasty, rude, and mean.
— God Loves even when He’s not getting anything out of the relationship!
God’s Love is this: that “Even while we ARE still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8, emphasis mine)
God’s Love is revealed in the sacrifice He made…
God’s love is made in the sacrifice that Jesus made on that Cross!
Jesus WILLINGLY came … He WILLINGLY humbled Himself… He WILLINGLY became OBEDIENT to the Father… ALL THE WAY TO DEATH ON THE CROSS!
But… That’s not the end of the story, is it?
Today, we celebrate that Christ’s death wasn’t the end… It was the beginning!!!
The Grave could not hold Him!!!!
God’s Love is UNSTOPPABLE!!!!
Look at Luke 24.
1 On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb.
2 They found the stone rolled away from the tomb,
3 but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus.
4 While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them.
5 In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead?
6 He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee:
7 ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’ ”
Not even the grave… death itself… could stop Jesus!
Jesus’s Love is UNSTOPPABLE!
Think back to all the things that tried to stop Him…
— The devil tried to stop Him…
— The religious leaders tried to stop Him…
— The soldiers tried to stop Him…
— The crowds tried to stop Him…
— Even the nails in His hands and feet tried to stop Him…
BUT THEY COULDN”T!!!!
Jesus has overcome death itself!!!
And He did it all for OUR sake! (Can i get a hallelujah!)
THAT… is why we get to stand with Paul and proclaim:
55 “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?”
You see… death itself is made feeble in the Cross!!!
Chances are there is something in your life, right now, that if you allow it to, will try to stop you from following Jesus…
Maybe it’s something that has, for a long time now, acted as a distraction…
Maybe its a sin that keeps creeping back up… The Bible calls those: “the little foxes that come to spoil the vine.” (Song of Solomon 2:14)
Let me tell you… Distractions are normal… The world is full of them.
Hebrews 12:1–2 (NIV)
1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us,
2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
This world throws everything it can at us… to distract us from Jesus… from becoming EVERYTHING we were called to be…
— — Do you understand that? You were called… You were created to be so much more than what you are right now! — —
That is why we MUST keep our eyes on Jesus!
Nothing can stop God’s Love for us!!!
31 What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?
32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?
33 Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies.
34 Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.
35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?
36 As it is written: “For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,
39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
What a passage! Paul says that there is NOTHING in ALL creation that can separate us from God’s Love for us.
This should give us HOPE! This promise is the power for us to live a life free from worry and stress… We don’t have to worry about how we will be right with God… about the cost of sin… Christ already paid the price!
10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
Christ paid the price so that we could experience TRUE LIFE…
So, What do we do with that?
How do we respond to that kind of Love?
Die to Sin
We follow Christ’s example… and we die to sin.
9 For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him.
10 The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.
11 In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.
When we put our faith in Christ,… we are not saying: “I believe He exists… or I believe He was raised from the dead...”
We are saying: “He IS the Power… He IS the Life… He IS the Resurrection… I will TRUST Him COMPLETELY!”
We die to ourselves, and Live for and through Him!
But here’s the problem… “What does dying to sin actually look like?”
(Cell phone ill. — Phone only has power when charged… w/o a charge it has no power… But even when charged, it only has power when I give it my attention - facebook, youtube, tiktok, even games… When I give it power [by charging or attention], it controls me… But tif it dies...)
In a similar way, we are called to die to sin.
Sin will continue to be a temptation… There may be moments when you might even give in to it… But now…
We have the power to ask forgiveness from God!
We leave sin behind…
We no longer seek to gratify the desires of our flesh… We are new creations in Christ… We are learning to conform ourselves to His good and perfect will for our lives… (Notice I said “learning to conform”…)
12 Therefore, brothers and sisters, we have an obligation—but it is not to the flesh, to live according to it.
13 For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live.
14 For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God.
15 The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.”
Dying to sin means giving it no control over us.
I want you to notice something… It is not sin that dies, it is us!
When we die to sin, we say to sin: “You have no control over me, because I am dead to you!”
Have you ever seen a corpse do anything?!
NO!!!
Sin cannot affect a corpse!
Dying to sin is not easy, we ALL know that! BUT… 1 Cor 10:13
13 No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.
The Holy Spirit living in you ALWAYS provides a way out!
We MUST die to sin!
And Christ empowers us to do so.
BUT… That’s not all we have to do…
Look at Romans 6:1-8
1 What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase?
2 By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?
3 Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?
4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.
5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his.
6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin—
7 because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.
8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.
Whew! Preach it Paul!
We must…
Live for Christ!
23 Then he said to them all: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.
Take a look at Abraham’s story… (we are going to look at a part of it in Gen 22)
God’s Unstoppable Love for us began so long ago… in fact, it began the day He created us!
If we look at Abraham...
— Called out of UR… out of the land of his family… away from his “religion”… away from ALL that he knew…
1 The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.
2 “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.
3 I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”
— He was given a promise
4 “As for me, this is my covenant with you: You will be the father of many nations.
5 No longer will you be called Abram; your name will be Abraham, for I have made you a father of many nations.
6 I will make you very fruitful; I will make nations of you, and kings will come from you.
7 I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the generations to come, to be your God and the God of your descendants after you.
8 The whole land of Canaan, where you now reside as a foreigner, I will give as an everlasting possession to you and your descendants after you; and I will be their God.”
— Isaac was the fulfillment of that promise…
— Look at Gen 22, Abraham is commanded by God to sacrifice Isaac… (Read it from Bible)
People ask, “Why? Why would a Loving God command that?” That’s the question I want us to answer…
Look at v.4… Abraham gets the wood… He gets Isaac… and 2 servants go with them… (read)
v.6… Isaac is carrying the wood for his own sacrifice… and he realizes “Hey! Wait a minute!” … so he asks his dad…
v. 7-8…
Does that sound familiar?
People ask, “Why would God do that? Why would a Loving God command Abraham to sacrifice his only son?”
— The answer (look at the Cross)
— “Because it is what HE was going to do!”
John 3:16 - “For God so loved the world...”
God’s Love is perfect… it’s unfailing… and it is unstoppable!
He loves you so much that He did what He asks you to do!!!
For Abraham, it wasn’t about His son… It was about his life!
It was about his desires — his hopes and dreams…
— Issac was the Promise… He was the answer Abraham had been looking for… to lose him was to lose the Promise… to lose Sarah… to lose EVERYTHING!!!
God was asking Him to place the promised blessing back in His hands!
Did he trust God enough?
Was his faith strong enough?
the answer — “YES!!!”
11 But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!” “Here I am,” he replied.
12 “Do not lay a hand on the boy,” he said. “Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.”
13 Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son.
Abraham lived his life for God!
Will we?
Faith means giving Him everything… our fears… our desires… our doubts… our dreams… our life… TRUSTING Him with the Promise!
John 10:10 (NIV)
10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
God’s desire is that we experience abundant life NOW… through the powerful sacrifice and unstoppable, perfect love of His Son, Jesus.
In stark contrast of this stands the devil…
satan wants us to hold on to our lives… to our dreams… to control… and in that way, he steals the life God promised.
I have experienced this....
Before coming back to Christ.... Before receiving Him actually… I was angry, greedy, selfish… My life revolved around wealth… how much I could provide for my family…
— my marriage was a mess
— my finances were a mess
— my life was meaningless… sure I had dreams, hopes, but I couldn’t make them happen…
But after…
— peace…
— we haven’t really struggled… we’ve had what we need…
God has done things w/ me I never would have imagined…
I have witnessed what Jesus can do with someone that was way away from Jesus… I wanted things my way… I wanted to call the shots… but what i got was a mess…
But here’s the good news: even in the midst of all those things… that I tried to put in God’s way… even when I was running full-tilt away from Him… God still found me and loves me!
His love is Unstoppable, Unconquerable, and Unyielding.
If that’s you… If you have been putting things in God’s way… holding on to your life… and you want change… pray with me…