What's Love Got to Do With It?
Galatians • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
0 ratings
· 1 viewNotes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
Good morning, Church! It's good to see each and every one of you who could make it out this morning and I want to welcome everyone who may be joining us online as well!
If you have your Bibles with you this morning, go ahead and be turning with me back to Galatians chapter 5.
Last week we looked at verses 16 through 26 at a message called Walk This Way — Walking Right Even When the Rest of the World Walks Wrong.
And if you'll remember, we spent a good part of that message looking at what Paul called the works of the flesh.
Seventeen of them to be exact.
Adultery. Fornication. Uncleanness. Lasciviousness.
Idolatry. Witchcraft.
Hatred. Variance. Emulations. Wrath. Strife. Seditions. Heresies. Envyings. Murders. Drunkenness. Revellings.
And then Paul said, "and such like."
But this week, as I was studying, I came across something Adrian Rogers said that made me see last week's message in a whole new light.
Adrian Rogers — "Now if we were going to display a diamond, we'd probably put it on black velvet—if we want it to show up, exquisitely beautiful. That's what God has done with agape love. He's put it on the black velvet of the works of the flesh." — How to Love and Be Loved, Adrian Rogers
Last week was the darkness of the black velvet but this week, we’re going to begin to see God lay the diamond down on top of it.
So, if you have your Bibles turned to Galatians chapter 5 this morning, would you say, Amen?
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith,
23 Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.
Bow with me if you will.
Now I want you to look at how Paul starts off verse 22 here. He says, "But."
We talked about this a little bit last week but I want to reiterate it again because I sure am glad for those “but’s” in the Word of God that bring hope, and strength, and edification, Amen!
In Ephesians chapter 2, Paul describes every one of us before we were saved...
3 Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.
4 But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us,
5 Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;)
26 My flesh and my heart faileth: But God is the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever.
13 There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.
7 For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die.
8 But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
Listen friend, last week the door swung one way — seventeen works of the flesh, and "they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God."
And there was a point and time in all of our lives when we were lost and undone in our trespasses and sins and we were wallowing in these works of the flesh and having a grand ole time doing it “BUT GOD” got ahold of us brought us up out of that quagmire of clay and set our feet on the solid rock of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and now we are new creatures in Christ, Amen!
We have been born again and set free from that old way of life!
And this morning we’re going to see the other side of the But!
This morning, that door swings the other way! And what a glorious sight it is to see the other side of that old lifestyle we were so accustomed to!
Before we go any further though, I want you to notice something about the way Paul worded this.
He didn't say the fruits of the Spirit — plural. He said the fruit of the Spirit — singular.
J. Vernon McGee — "Notice it is singular: is, not are. You can argue about the grammar used here, but it happens to be singular in the Greek. This indicates that love is the fruit, and from it stems all other fruits. Love is primary." — Thru the Bible Commentary: The Epistles (Galatians), J. Vernon McGee
Now let me give you a picture of that this morning.
How many of you have ever seen a prism? You know — that little piece of glass you hold up to the window, and the sunlight comes through it and throws a rainbow on the wall?
Henry Drummond used that exact picture when he talked about love, and John Phillips quotes him.
Henry Drummond — "As you have seen a man of science take a beam of light and pass it through a crystal prism, as you have seen it come out on the other side of the prism broken up into its component colours … so Paul passes this thing Love through the magnificent prism of his inspired intellect, and it comes out on the other side broken up into elements." — quoted in Exploring Galatians, John Phillips
One plain white beam goes in — and 8 colors come out the other side.
Love goes in. And out comes joy... and peace... and longsuffering... and gentleness... and goodness... and faith... and meekness... and temperance.
But It's all one light.
And that's what we're going to be doing together over the next several weeks here. We're going to be starting a series on the fruit of the Spirit this morning, and every Sunday we're going to turn that prism just a little bit and look at another color.
But here's something you need to know before we start.
James Boice put it like this, as Chuck Swindoll quotes him — "The singular form stresses that these qualities are a unity, like a bunch of grapes instead of separate pieces of fruit, and also that they are all to be found in all Christians. In this they differ from the 'gifts' of the Spirit, which are given one by one to different people as the church has need." — quoted in Swindoll's Living Insights New Testament Commentary, Chuck Swindoll
Did you catch that?
God gives out gifts one at a time — this person can sing, that person can teach, somebody else can preach...But the fruit of the Spirit grows in every single believer.
So nobody gets to sit here this morning and say, "Well, love just isn't my gift."
It's not a gift. It's fruit. And if the Spirit of God lives in you dear friend — it ought to be growing in you.
Adrian Rogers — "To Paul's most carnal church, the church at Corinth, he said, 'You come behind in no gift' (1 Corinthians 1:7). If I want to know whether a man is a spiritual and mature Christian, I never examine his gift. I inspect the fruit." — How to Love and Be Loved, Adrian Rogers
So, this morning we're going to start with the very first fruit Paul lists — and that's the fruit of love.
And the title I’ve given to the message this morning is..."What's Love Got to Do With It?"
I'm sure most everybody here remembers that old Tina Turner song where she said...what’s love got to do with it, got to do with it? What’s love but a second hand emotion.
Well, to answer that question this morning — what's love got to do with it?
The answer is EVERYTHING!
John Phillips — "Love! It is the sum and substance of the Christian life. It all began with love." — Exploring Galatians, John Phillips
Listen Church, love is the backbone of the fruit of the Spirit. That's why Paul dedicated an entire chapter to it in 1 Corinthians 13 and closed it out by saying, "And now abideth faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love."
Love is listed first because it is the fountainhead from which all the other living waters flow — and without it, none of the other fruits will ever be produced!
Martin Luther — "It would have been enough to mention only the single fruit of love, for love embraces all the fruits of the Spirit."
And listen, the Bible says in...
8 He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.
And then on down in...
19 We love him, because he first loved us.
And the thing I want us to realize this morning about love is this Church — if it weren't for God, we wouldn't even know what love is!
And then, Paul told the Romans in...
5 And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.
Do you see that Church? That's where this love comes from. It's shed abroad — poured out, flooded into our hearts — by the Holy Ghost.
John G. Butler — "'Love' is agape (Greek) love, Divine love, not love found in human nature. It excels all love." — Analytical Bible Expositor: Galatians–Philemon, John G. Butler
Not found in human nature.
So if the love of God comes to us through the Holy Ghost, then that tells us that until a person truly knows God and has been saved, then they can't truly know what this love is, right?
If you're here and lost this morning — you may have heard of love. You may have even told people you loved them. But listen to me, friend — until you truly understand the love of God that was shed abroad through His Son Jesus, so that you and I could inherit eternal life... until you accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior so that the Holy Spirit can come in and take up residence in your heart... you will never fully understand what this kind of love is!
Now, before we get too deep into the message, there's something you need to understand about the word love because a lot of folks have the wrong idea about it.
They think love is just a feeling — something that happens to you. You fall into it, and then one day you fall back out of it, and there's nothing you can do about it either way.
But listen to what Adrian Rogers said.
Adrian Rogers — "Love is not feeling. It may contain feeling. It may result in feeling. But love is not, primarily, a feeling or an emotion. I'll tell you why. The Bible commands us to love, and you cannot command a feeling." — How to Love and Be Loved, Adrian Rogers
Isn't that good? You cannot command a feeling.
The Bible says, "Husbands, love your wives." That's not a suggestion. That's a command. And God would never command you to do something you couldn't choose to do.
Now part of the reason we get so confused about it is that in English, we use the same word for love to mean a whole lot of different things.
When we say, "I love you," it could be to our wife, or our brother or sister, or our mother or father, or to a church member — and in every one of those instances the word love means something different!
Now don't get me wrong — I love y'all. But I don't love you the same way I love my wife! And I love my wife differently than I love my brother or my mom or dad. But when I tell any of them I love them, I use the same word, right?
But in the Greek language, they had four different words for love.
Storge — When this type of love is talked about, it means a familial love — like the love a parent has for a child.
Eros — This is actually where our English word erotic comes from. It means a passionate love — like the love a husband and wife have for each other.
Phileo — which means to like or treat affectionately. This type of love is often used in connection with brotherly love — like you'd see in a close friendship. The city of Philadelphia is called the city of brotherly love for exactly that reason.
Agape — which means to love dearly. This is the most powerful, most noble of all the types of love — and most often it's used to mean a sacrificial love.
And that's the word Paul uses right here in Galatians 5:22.
William Barclay — "Agape, the Christian word, means unconquerable benevolence. It means that, no matter what people may do to us by way of insult or injury or humiliation, we will never seek anything else but their highest good." — The Letters to the Galatians and Ephesians, William Barclay
Unconquerable benevolence.
The Preacher's Outline & Sermon Bible — "Agape love is the love of the mind, of the reason, of the will. It is the love that goes so far … that it loves regardless of feelings—whether a person feels like loving or not; that it loves a person even if the person does not deserve to be loved; that it actually loves the person who is utterly unworthy of being loved." — The Preacher's Outline & Sermon Bible: Galatians–Colossians
Listen Church — that's the love that the Holy Spirit is growing in you.
This morning, there are three ways to love that I want to take some time and talk to you about. And Dr. Alan Carr gave me a picture this week that I think is going to help us see them.
Dr. Alan Carr — "In English, we conjugate our verbs as follows: 1st Person: I am; 2nd Person: You are; 3rd Person: He is... Hebrew, however, has a different approach. In fact, it is totally the opposite... He is; You are; I am. This is the way Jesus taught us to love isn't it? He is to be first, my neighbor is to be second and myself is to be last." — The Sermon Notebook, Dr. Alan Carr
Isn't that something?
The traditional Hebrew grammar lists it right in that order.
He. You. I.
God first. Your neighbor second. You last.
And that's exactly where we're going to start this morning...
Our Love for God
Our Love for God
How are we supposed to love God?
Jesus told us exactly how in...
37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
38 This is the first and great commandment.
With all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
Not just part of it...all of it.
613 commandments — and Jesus boiled every one of them down to one word...love!
And listen — if you don't love God with all your heart, soul, and mind, then you won't be able to keep the first five commandments, because every one of them has to do with our love for God!
Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image.
Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain.
Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
5. "Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee."
Jesus said in...
15 If ye love me, keep my commandments.
We can say we love Him all we want to. But Jesus says right here — "If you love Me without end, if you love Me unconditionally, if you love Me with every ounce of your being — then keep My commandments!"
Listen friend, the Bible says in...
3 And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments.
4 He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.
5 But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected: hereby know we that we are in him.
Do you see that? If we want the love of God to shine through us...if we want to express the fruit of the Spirit that lives in us to it’s fullest, then all we have to do is keep his Word!
“Hereby know we that we are in Him!”
And then in...
9 As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you: continue ye in my love.
10 If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love.
We are to love Him because He first loved us!
We shouldn't put anything before Him, no matter what it is.
We shouldn't worship anything but Him.
He should be what we talk about more than anything!
And not only who we talk about — He should also be who we talk to more than anyone.
Charles Spurgeon — "Love for God is obedience; love for God is holiness. To love God and to love man is to be conformed to the image of Christ, and this is salvation."
And if we love God like Jesus said to, then we'll keep His commandments and we'll bear much fruit — so that the world will know just by looking at us that we're a child of God!
16 And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.
17 Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world.
J. Vernon McGee tells about an old preacher he used to hear named Dr. Jim McGinley — and McGinley used to say, "I am not to judge you, but I am a fruit inspector, and I have a right to look at the fruit you are producing." — Thru the Bible Commentary: The Epistles (Galatians), J. Vernon McGee
So let me ask you this morning — if somebody came along and inspected your fruit, what would they find?
Would they find somebody who loves God with all their heart?
Or would they find somebody who loves God on Sunday morning and loves everything else this world has to offer the rest of the week?
So, we see first off our love for God, next let's look at...
Our Love for Our Neighbor
Our Love for Our Neighbor
How are we supposed to love our neighbor?
Jesus went right on in Matthew 22 and said...
39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
And just like we said in the first point — that if you don't love God with all your heart, soul, and mind, you can't keep the first five commandments — if you don't love your neighbor as yourself, then you won't be able to keep the last five, because every one of them is about how you treat your neighbor!
6. "Thou shalt not kill."
7. "Thou shalt not commit adultery."
8. "Thou shalt not steal."
9. "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour."
10. "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's."
Paul told the Romans in...
9 Let love be without dissimulation. Abhor that which is evil; cleave to that which is good.
10 Be kindly affectioned one to another with brotherly love; in honour preferring one another;
When Paul says here "let love be without dissimulation," the Greek word for dissimulation is anypokritos — and it means unfeigned, undisguised, sincere.
It means we're to love our neighbor without hypocrisy.
Not one thing to their face and another thing behind their back.
Not sweet on Sunday and sour on Monday.
Not one kind of love for the people who are like you and another kind for the people who aren't.
And the only judgment that needs to be going on, is an inner reflection — a judging of ourselves!
We need to look in the mirror and get things right in our own self and our own lives before we go judging somebody else!
The Bible says in...
17 For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?
Judgment starts right here, right now, this morning — in each and every one of us.
The Bible says in...
21 And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also.
And then in...
17 But whoso hath this world’s good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?
Listen Church — some folks think the love chapter, 1 Corinthians 13, is just something to read at weddings.
But... J. Vernon McGee said — "First Corinthians 13 was never intended to be removed from the Bible, beautifully framed, and hung on the wall. It belongs to the gifts of the Spirit, and the gifts are not to be exercised except by the fruit of the Spirit, which is love." — Thru the Bible Commentary: The Epistles (Galatians), J. Vernon McGee
Do you see what he's saying?
Whatever God has gifted you to do — sing, teach, preach, serve, organize — if love isn't the driving force behind it, Paul says you're nothing but "sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal."
J. Vernon McGee — goes on to say..."Love is always doing something for others. A gift is always to be exercised in the church. It is a manifestation of the Spirit to all believers. All believers have a gift, and it is to be exercised for the profit of the body of believers. My eyes operate for the benefit of the rest of my body. They guide my body in the right direction. They are important. I cannot imagine my eyes walking out on the rest of my body and saying, 'We like looking around, and your feet get tired, so we are going to leave you for awhile.' They never do that." — Thru the Bible Commentary: The Epistles (Galatians), J. Vernon McGee
Listen Church, If we're going to be successful in producing fruit, we've got to learn to love more than just ourselves!
But Jesus didn't just stop with our neighbor. Oh, no! He took it one step further and said we're to love our enemies too!
43 Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.
44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;
45 That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.
46 For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same?
47 And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so?
48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.
Some of you were sitting there a minute ago saying to yourselves, "Alright, Bro. Bobby, I'm going to do a better job of loving my neighbor." You didn't like it, but you were going to try to do better.
And then I hit you with this, and you're like — "Now you're pushing the limit! A neighbor I can possibly handle — but my enemy?! Have you lost your mind?"
Well, the answer is — not yet!
Listen Church — remember what Rogers and Barclay said a minute ago? Agape isn't a feeling. It's a choice.
William Barclay — "It describes the deliberate effort—which we can make only with the help of God—never to seek anything but the best even for those who seek the worst for us." — The Letters to the Galatians and Ephesians, William Barclay
Only with the help of God this morning Church can this type of love be possible!
Adrian Rogers gives us an illustration that I’m sure will hit home with the majority of us here this morning.
Adrian Rogers — "Now let’s suppose you have a neighbor you can't love, and you say, 'Well, I really ought to love this person, I ought to love whoever she is.' Let's give her a name—let's say, Betty. 'I ought to love Betty. I'm going to love Betty. I've been treating Betty wrong. Betty really bugs me. I'm going to love Betty. I am going to love Betty. I hate Betty.'"
"You don't have it. You can't make yourself love Betty. It's not in you to love Betty. And the next time you need to try to love Betty, don't say, 'Lord, help me to love Betty.' Just simply say, 'Lord, I can't love Betty, but I know You do. And Lord, You love her through me.' Thy love, Lord.' Just pray it: 'Thy love, Lord—Thy love. Make me a channel of Your love.'" — How to Love and Be Loved, Adrian Rogers
Some of us have got a Betty in our lives this morning, and you know who your Betty is. Dear friend, ask God to love Betty through you this morning!
John Phillips describes how Jesus Himself lived this love out — "He allowed the love of God His Father to flow through Him as electrical current flows through a wire, in touch with the power at one end and the need at the other end." — Exploring Galatians, John Phillips
Listen Church — a wire doesn't make electricity. It just carries it.
You don't have to make love for your Betty. You just have to stay connected to the power at one end — and let it flow to the need at the other.
Adrian Rogers — "Do you know what true love is? If you love me, do you know what you'll do for me? You will not give me what I deserve; you will give me what I need." — How to Love and Be Loved, Adrian Rogers
And then he got real practical with it —
Adrian Rogers — "If there's somebody that has done you wrong, find some way that you can be kind to them. Lift the load for that person; mow a lawn for that person; carry some soup to that person; bless them, pray for them, or encourage them. That's the way God loves you, and that is agape love." — How to Love and Be Loved, Adrian Rogers
And dear friend, if we're going to walk in the Spirit, then we've got to learn to forgive!
The Bible says that if you come to this altar to pray and you remember that your brother has something against you, you're to leave your gift right there at the altar, go and make things right with him, and then come back and finish praying!
Jesus said in...
23 Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee;
24 Leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift.
Adrian Rogers pointed out that when 1 Corinthians 13 says love "thinketh no evil," the word thinketh there is a bookkeeping term.
Adrian Rogers — "Actually it means, 'does not keep a record of faults.' It is not a collector of grudges. It means, 'that is able to forgive and forget.' And my dear friend, that costs... so many of us are bookkeepers... we have in our ledger little I.O.U.'s. I owe you for this, and you owe me for that, and so forth. My dear friend, we need to learn to forget those things, and to bury those things in the grave of God's forgetfulness." — How to Love and Be Loved, Adrian Rogers
Some of you are still carrying a ledger this morning. You've got a page in there with somebody's name at the top and a whole column of what they owe you.
We’ve got to learn to forgive this morning Church!
Let this sink in this morning, what kind of shape would we be in if God didn't forgive us?
We'd all be doomed, wouldn’t we?
So we've looked at He — our love for God. And we've looked at You — our love for our neighbor. And now you'd expect the last one to be I.
But listen — when God loved us, He turned that whole order upside down. Let's finish this up by looking at...
God's Love for Us
God's Love for Us
How much does God actually love us?
Remember Carr's illustration? He. You. I. God first. Your neighbor second. You last.
That's how we're supposed to love.
But dear friend, when God loved you — He put you first and put Himself last.
6 Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:
7 But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men:
8 And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
He made Himself of no reputation.
And here's how far that love reached.
6 For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.
8 But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
10 For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.
Do you see it, Church? We were...
Ungodly.
Sinners.
Enemies.
Remember a few minutes ago when I told you to love your enemies, and you looked at me like I'd lost my mind?
Dear friend — you were His enemy.
And He loved you anyway.
And this morning, God's not asking you to do one single thing that He hasn't already done for you!
Now you might ask — but why? Why would God love somebody like that?
John Phillips said that when Moses wrote down Israel's history, he went looking for a reason God loved them so much. A people who murmured and complained and rebelled and doubted Him every step of the way through that wilderness.
And Moses could only find one explanation.
7 The Lord did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than any people; for ye were the fewest of all people:
8 But because the Lord loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, hath the Lord brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
That's it. That's the only reason.
Because the LORD loved us.
Not because of anything in them. And not because of anything in you or I but simply because of everything that He is.
3 The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: Therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee.
Do you see that Church? An Everlasting Love!
Before a soul ever set foot on this pad of dirt we call Earth, God already had love in His heart for each and every one of us!
God loves you this morning dear friend. Not because of anything you have done but simply because of who He is!
How much does He love me you ask?
Well let me tell you....the Bible says in...
16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
There's an old hymn by Frederick Lehman that I believe says it better than I ever could...
Could we with ink the ocean fill,
And were the skies of parchment made,
Were every stalk on earth a quill,
And every man a scribe by trade,
To write the love of God above,
Would drain the ocean dry.
Nor could the scroll contain the whole,
Though stretched from sky to sky.
Church — drain every ocean dry, and you still couldn't write about all the love God has for His creation!
John Phillips — "There was never a road too rough, never a way too long, never an appeal too faint, never a case too hard, never a sob too late, and never a day too long for His love." — Exploring Galatians, John Phillips
And then he shows just how far that love went.
John Phillips — "He loved poor, lost Herod, self-seeking Annas, crafty Caiaphas, and weak and wavering Pilate. He loved them enough to die for them. He loved Peter even as he cursed and swore and denied Him. He loved Judas even as he planted the traitor's kiss on His cheek. He loved the man who punched Him in the face, the man who crowned Him with thorns, the man who smote Him on the head with a reed, and the man who plowed His back with a scourge. He loved the soldier who dropped that heavy cross upon His lacerated back and commanded Him to get going. He loved the men who nailed Him to that tree. He loved the very men who mocked Him as He died: 'Father, forgive them,' He said." — Exploring Galatians, John Phillips
And let me show you what that kind of love can do to a man.
Henry Drummond said this about the man who wrote 1 Corinthians 13 — "A man is apt to recommend to others his own strong point. Love was not Paul's strong point.… The hand that wrote, 'The greatest of these is love,' when we meet it first, is stained with blood." — quoted in Exploring Galatians, John Phillips
Do you hear that, Church?
The first time we ever meet the man who wrote "the greatest of these is love" — he's standing there holding the coats while they stone Stephen to death.
He was God's enemy.
And God's love got hold of him and turned him into the man who wrote the love chapter.
Dear friend — there's nobody in this room too far gone that God’s love can’t change you!
13 Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.
No conditions. No strings attached. Jesus Christ, the one and only Son of God, came and died simply because God loved us — and the choice is yours this morning as to whether or not you'll love Him back!
If you will — if you'll love Him the way He loves you, if you'll trust Him as Lord and Savior — then He will give you eternal life.
And if not — if you won't accept Him — then He'll grant you what you want upon death... eternal separation from Him.
But you say, "Well, you could have left off that part!"
Friend, unfortunately, it doesn't work like that. It's either all or nothing when it comes to God!
The Bible says in...
9 In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him.
10 Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another.
Conclusion
Conclusion
So, what's love got to do with it?
Dear friend, everything!
It's how we love God.
It's how we love One Another.
And it's how He loved Us — when we were ungodly, when we were sinners, when we were His enemies.
John Phillips — "When all else fails, love never fails. Christianity is Christ, Christ is God, and God is love. Christianity is love in action. The fruit of the Spirit is love." — Exploring Galatians, John Phillips
C.S. Lewis — "God loves us NOT because we're lovable, but because He is love. Not because He needs to receive, because He delights to give."
God loves you this morning, friend, and wants a relationship with you.
The question is — do you love Him as much as He loves you?
Invitation
Invitation
As we come to a close and they come and get us a song of invitation, I want to leave you with one more picture from Adrian Rogers.
He grew up in Florida, down in citrus country, and he said they had a kind of tree down there called a sour orange tree. Beautiful tree but the fruit was no good at all and he said if you took one bite of that fruit, you'd immediately have lockjaw.
And Rogers asked — what could you do if you wanted that tree to bear sweet oranges?
"Let's suppose you pruned it, and that's all you did to it. You just pruned it. Do you think that's going to make it bear sweet oranges? '
Well,' you say, 'I'll tell you what I'll do: I'll transplant it. I'll take it from this church, and I'll put it in that church.' Or, I'll take it from this field and I'll put it in that field.' You transplant it.”
"A lot of these folks moving their letter need to get saved. Did you know that? Moving their membership—it's like moving a corpse from one mausoleum to another."
"'Well,' you say, 'I'll dig it and dung it. I'll fertilize it. I'll water it. I’ll cultivate it.' So what?
You say, 'I'll rename it. I'll call it a sweet orange tree.' So what?
You say, 'Well, I'll tie some sweet oranges on to it.' So what?
My dear friend, it is not a matter of pruning, transplanting, cultivating, naming, and decorating it. The nature of that tree has to be changed." — How to Love and Be Loved, Adrian Rogers
And he said what the nurserymen do is...
They take one of those sour orange trees, and they cut it down. Well, first of all, they bud into it a sweet Valencia bud down near the base. They call that sour rootstock. And then, after that bud gets to going, they cut the top off and a new life comes out. It's into that old sour stock, but the new life is a sweet orange tree.
The nature of that tree has to be changed. But when they graft in that Valencia bud, the very nature of that tree is changed. It becomes a partaker of a nature that is not its by nature.
Listen friend, the Bible says, when you and I get saved, we are what?
“We are 'partakers of the divine nature' (2 Peter 1:4). The nature of God comes into us. And this love that I'm talking about, my dear friend, is not the work of the flesh, that sour root; it is the fruit of the Spirit, it is the nature of almighty God that has been engrafted into you."
"And those of you who would like to receive the new nature, those of you who know that you're just a sour orange stock, you know that transplanting the tree is not enough, decorating the tree is not enough, renaming the tree is not enough—you know that you need a new nature...— How to Love and Be Loved, Adrian Rogers
Dear friend, if that is you this morning...if you've never been saved — friend, you don't need to be pruned. You don't need to be transplanted. You don't need your name on a new church roll. You need a new nature. And the only one who can give you that is Jesus Christ.
And the Bible says in...
9 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
10 For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
If that's you this morning — this altar is open. Won't you come?
If you're saved, but you're not bearing any fruit — maybe somewhere along the way you've drifted away from the vine, and that love that used to flow just isn't there anymore. Come this morning and get reconnected.
The altar is open and there's a spot reserved just for you.
Won't you come?
Let us pray.
