The Incomprehensible love of God For YOU

Notes
Transcript
Advent
Advent is a season of preparation and anticipation in the weeks leading up to Christmas. The word "Advent" comes from the Latin word adventus, meaning "coming" or "arrival."
Advent is a time for Christians to prepare their hearts and minds for the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ at Christmas.
1st Sunday – Hope
2nd Sunday – Peace
3rd Sunday – Joy
4th Sunday - Love
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My goal: I want you to know today how loved you are.
Not how loved you FEEL – it’s good to “feel” love, but love isn’t a feeling – I want you to know how loved you ARE!
God didn’t have to love you. God SHOULDN’T love you…but He does.
Why it’s amazing that we are loved:
1. Sovereign Creator of the universe – why should he care? That was David’s question!
2. He doesn’t need our love – perfect love within the Trinitarian community (explain this!)
3. We spurned the love He gave us – [Genesis 1-3 summarized]
a. But He said in the Garden curse that something was going to happen (Genesis 3:15 )
15 I will put hostility between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.
4. God’s plan of redemption through the incarnation of Jesus was already planned and spoken of throughout the Old Testament.
Jesus – God in flesh—was predetermined to come to this earth as a baby, live a sinless life, die and horrible death on the cross, and rise again on the third day – because of the love of God for you!
A few of my favorite verses about the love of God:
3 the Lord appeared to him from far away. I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore, I have continued to extend faithful love to you.
15 But you, Lord, are a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger and abounding in faithful love and truth.
17 The Lord your God is among you, a warrior who saves. He will rejoice over you with gladness. He will be quiet in his love. He will delight in you with singing.”
16 For God loved the world in this way: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.
Jesus came to this earth to pay the sin penalty of mankind – through death on the cross (the serpent striking his heel”) and “crushing the serpent’s head” by defeating death through resurrection.
What I love is as God unfolds His plan of redemption after the Garden curse, we get wonderful little clues throughout the OT. He really begins in earnest in Genesis 12:2-3 , so I want to camp out there a while and see if we can see “shadows” of God’s promise and the depth of God’s love for us:
Genesis 12:2–3 (CSB)
2 I will make you into a great nation, I will bless you, I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. 3 I will bless those who bless you, I will curse anyone who treats you with contempt, and all the peoples on earth will be blessed through you.
Problem: Abraham’s wife was barren…and old!
Genesis 15:1–6 (CSB)
1 After these events, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision: Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield; your reward will be very great. 2 But Abram said, “Lord God, what can you give me, since I am childless and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?” 3 Abram continued, “Look, you have given me no offspring, so a slave born in my house will be my heir.”
4 Now the word of the Lord came to him: “This one will not be your heir; instead, one who comes from your own body will be your heir.” 5 He took him outside and said, “Look at the sky and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” Then he said to him, “Your offspring will be that numerous.” 6 Abram believed the Lord, and he credited it to him as righteousness.
God delivered on His promise – no pun intended.
Genesis 21:1–7 (CSB)
1 The Lord came to Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah what he had promised. 2 Sarah became pregnant and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the appointed time God had told him. 3 Abraham named his son who was born to him—the one Sarah bore to him—Isaac. 4 When his son Isaac was eight days old, Abraham circumcised him, as God had commanded him. 5 Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him. 6 Sarah said, “God has made me laugh, and everyone who hears will laugh with me.”
7 She also said, “Who would have told Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne a son for him in his old age.”
Everything seemed great until…Genesis 22!
(Genesis 22:1-15 )
Genesis 22:1–15 (CSB)
1 After these things God tested Abraham and said to him, “Abraham!” “Here I am,” he answered. 2 “Take your son,” he said, “your only son Isaac, whom you love, go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.” 3 So Abraham got up early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took with him two of his young men and his son Isaac. He split wood for a burnt offering and set out to go to the place God had told him about.
4 On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance. 5 Then Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey. The boy and I will go over there to worship; then we’ll come back to you.” 6 Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and laid it on his son Isaac. In his hand he took the fire and the knife, and the two of them walked on together.
7 Then Isaac spoke to his father Abraham and said, “My father.” And he replied, “Here I am, my son.” Isaac said, “The fire and the wood are here, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?” 8 Abraham answered, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” Then the two of them walked on together.
9 When they arrived at the place that God had told him about, Abraham built the altar there and arranged the wood. He bound his son Isaac and placed him on the altar on top of the wood. 10 Then Abraham reached out and took the knife to slaughter his son. 11 But the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, “Abraham, Abraham!” He replied, “Here I am.”
12 Then he said, “Do not lay a hand on the boy or do anything to him. For now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your only son from me.” 13 Abraham looked up and saw a ram caught in the thicket by its horns. So Abraham went and took the ram and offered it as a burnt offering in place of his son.
14 And Abraham named that place The Lord Will Provide, so today it is said, “It will be provided on the Lord’s mountain.” 15 Then the angel of the Lord called to Abraham a second time from heaven
o (8) In answer to Isaac’s question of the missing sacrificial lamb, Abraham said, “God himself will provide[a] the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.”
o And here we see a massive shadow of the fulfillment of the covenant: God Himself would provide the lamb.” But that’s not all:
§ Abraham was commanded to sacrifice his only son, but God delivered him from that.
§ (14) “Abraham named that place ‘the Lord Will Provide, so today it is said, ‘It will be provided on the LORD’s mountain.’”
§ That mountain was Mount Moriah (2). Later, Solomon’s Temple would be built there – in the city that would be called Jerusalem, the City of David – the place where Jesus would be crucified some 2000 years later.
“It will be provided on the LORD’s Mountain”!
Conjecture: Maybe crucified at the same spot?? Wouldn’t surprise me.
God’s love was so strong that He would endure for sinful man what He delivered Abraham from doing. He would sacrifice His own Son, who came in the form of man, born in a stable, announced by angels
Luke 2:8-11 – “…good news of great joy for all the people” Sounds like God’s promise to Abraham!
Luke 2:8–11 (CSB)
8 In the same region, shepherds were staying out in the fields and keeping watch at night over their flock. 9 Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified.
10 But the angel said to them, “Don’t be afraid, for look, I proclaim to you good news of great joy that will be for all the people: 11 Today in the city of David a Savior was born for you, who is the Messiah, the Lord.
That Good News was that God was fulfilling the promise He’d made through the prophets to send a Messiah – a deliverer, to save His people from their sin.
This is the love of God!
Romans 5:6–8 (CSB)
6 For while we were still helpless, at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For rarely will someone die for a just person—though for a good person perhaps someone might even dare to die. 8 But God proves his own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Remember John 3:16 from earlier. Look at what is in 1 John 3:16 – “This is how we’ve come to KNOW love: He laid down His life for us.”
16 This is how we have come to know love: He laid down his life for us. We should also lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.
This is what you KNOW, regardless of how you feel.
John 1:10–13 (CSB)
10 He was in the world, and the world was created through him, and yet the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. 12 But to all who did receive him, he gave them the right to be children of God, to those who believe in his name, 13 who were born, not of natural descent, or of the will of the flesh, or of the will of man, but of God.
Birth is a fact, not a feeling. The Bible tells us when we receive Him (carries the idea of receiving His Lordship over you), and believe in His name (that He is the very Son of God who died and rose again), He gave us the right to be children of God. GOD DID THAT! He wouldn’t do that unless He loves you. And like any good parent, He’s going to train you and discipline you and that’s not fun. It may make you feel unloved – but His love is irrevocable. Romans 8:1
1 Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus,