Untitled Sermon (7)

How do People in your life describe God?

One of the most common descriptions that you will here is that God is love. This tends to come from the more main line Christian circles. This is the defining attribute of God that we have attached to and look to inform us about all of our understandings of who God is.

For better or worse this is the very thing that we look to.

For good reason. It is one of the ways that God describes himself.

Exodus 34:6–7 NIV

6 And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, “The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, 7 maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.”

When you hear that word abounding what does it make you think of?

I couldn’t help it but it made me think of thanksgiving. The one day of the year that there is no doubt about the abounding the overwhelming amount of food. IT is plentiful it is more than we could ever hopeful.

Abounding, plentiful is the description that God gives to his love. It is plentiful it is complete it is great. Now we need to deal with the second word here.

What does the word Love mean?

Is it romantic love. Is it love of friendship. Is it unconditional love. Tha is the problem that i think many of us run into when we start talking about love is we all have very different understandings of what love is.

Want proof the dictionary has 9 definitions of love as a noun and 4 when it is used as a verb.

1a(1) : strong affection for another arising out of kinship or personal ties maternal love for a child (2): attraction based on sexual desire : affection and tenderness felt by lovers After all these years, they are still very much in love. (3): affection based on admiration, benevolence, or common interests love for his old schoolmates b: an assurance of affection give her my love

2:warm attachment, enthusiasm, or devotion love of the sea

3a: the object of attachment, devotion, or admiration baseball was his first love b(1)—often used as a term of endearment: a beloved person : DARLING (2)—used as an informal term of address British

4a: unselfish loyal and benevolent (see BENEVOLENT sense 1a) concern for the good of another: such as (1): the fatherly concern of God for humankind (2): brotherly concern for others b: a person's adoration of God

5: a god (such as Cupid or Eros) or personification of love

6: an amorous episode : LOVE AFFAIR

7: the sexual embrace : COPULATION

8 : a score of zero (as in tennis)

9 capitalized Christian Science : GOD

In Encyclopedia's of the Bible it isn’t much better. It gets just as complicated. There are whole book long explinations of what love is. the various understandings within the Old Testament and the New Testament understanding love is a complicated thing. One of the books put it best for us as Christians on how we are supposed to understand love.

Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible Love

Love. First and last word in Christian theology and ethics. It is therefore important to understand clearly this exceedingly ambiguous term

Exceedingly ambiguous term

Why is love so hard for us to Define?

The truth is that we face the challenge of understanding love and what it means because there are so many different views and understandings of it. That doesnt free us from our need to learn and grow and understand what God is saying when he describes himself as having abounding love.

The Hebrew word that is used here for the word has underlying conotations and understandings connected to it. One of the most common understandings with it is the idea of Loyalty. God is Loyal in his love.

Why is loyalty so important in love?

Loyalty is important to us and it is a powerful commitment to make with people. I will be loyal to you through everything. Every loving relationship that we have has some elements of loyalty. That can be good or bad. some ways it is broken and in others it is a bond that is unbreakable.

Knowing that This is how God describes his love let me ask this question.

If God’s love never changes (he is loyal), what do you think he sees when he looks at you? How does he look at you after you sin?

When are we most likely to feel like God does not love us?

For me this is the feeling I might experience after i have sinned. Or when i know i have done something that is not inline with what God wants me to do.

There could also be the times when life is hitting us hard and how could a loving God allow these awful things to happen.

Yet in both of these situations the love of God isn’t removed from us. His steadfast abundant love is still there. We haven’t done anything that would say we are outside of his love.

It is this love that he has for us that reminds us that he sent JEsus to die on the Cross for us. IT is in this love hat we can see God’s love is sacrificial.

Was there ever a time that you had to love Sacrificially?

We have been watching a medical drama and it always amazes me because every medical drama is pretty much the same. What is the new crisis this week. What is the new hardship that someone is going to face?

The other night we were watching and the challenge they had to do was to figure out how to get someone to give a part of their liver to this young women suffering from down’s syndrome. they thought they found a match but it turned out the lady who was willing couldn’t do it. However, she could give a kidney. So they found someone who was a match for her kidney and then got the person who needed a kidney's loved one who then matched the original liver person to donate a part of their liver. I know it sounds complicated. I remember sitting there thinking this sounds like it would be almost statistically impossible.

Yet, the real power comes in the fact that to give up a kidney or a portion of your liver is an act that takes tremendous sacrifice and risk. It is painful and hard it will change your life permanently.

WHile many of us don’t ahve to go to that extreme are we willing to do so for a loved one. Are we willing to lay down so much for other people?

Sacrifice is costly and we know that God sent his son to die for us.

Has your “Baggage” ever convinced you that something God says isn’t true?

Francis Chan is a well known Pastor, author in the church. If you ever hear about some of his story it is amazing. One aspect he has shared before is from his childhood. When he was born his mother died giving birth to him. His father in his grief or uncertainty didn’t want him and gave him up for adoption. He went to live with his grandparents but they weren’t able to take care of him long term and they had to give him up. Here he is a child and thinking that no one wants him. Not his father, or his grandparents. Yet, he is expected to read the story of a loving Father who’s love never changes.

Many people struggle with these ideas and these questions and it can be a challenging thing to move beyond but we have to recognize that our life can change for the better when we stop beleiving the lies we tell ourselves about how God views us.

When we stop letting Satan inform us on who we are and we start looking to and trusting that God is loyal in his love for us.

Romans 8:28 NIV

28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.

God likes to work with broken people. Imperfect people. The truth is we are all broken and imperfect people.

How has God used your life circumstances to make you better? Has it helped you share the Gospel?

God can use us to change the world around us to spread the good news of the gospel. He can take anyones situation and struggles and hurts and help them move beyond and do more. It is in our weakness that he finds our strengths beause we rely on his love to complete us. To help us be more.