Loving God and Others
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You cannot Love God without Loving People
You cannot Love God without Loving People
There is a direct correlation between loving God and loving people
You cannot love God and hate people
34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. 35 By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
John 13:
When you became a follower of Jesus, you entered an eternal community composed of people from every corner of the globe.
God’s Service Requires a New Heart
God’s Service Requires a New Heart
I once had a friend who wanted to enter the military. He went to take the fitness test to get into the Air Force and failed because he was unfit. The military requires you to meet certain physical fitness levels to get in. My friend had to transform his body so that he could do what he needed to do to get into the military. Similarly, we have to be transformed and receive a new heart before we can possess the passion of doing God’s work.
luke 10:25-
25 And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” 26 He said to him, “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?” 27 And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” 28 And he said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live.”
Luke 10:29-
29 But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” 30 Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead. 31 Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him he passed by on the other side.
32 So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. 34 He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him.
Luke 10:32-
Luke 10:35-37
35 And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’ 36 Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” 37 He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” And Jesus said to him, “You go, and do likewise.”
The parable of the good Samaritan is not chiefly about helping people in need. It is about our need for a new heart, filled with undivided love for God and unselfish love for others. That kind of heart can come only through the transforming work of God’s grace.
The gospel, not guilt, motivates us to help our neighbors in need
The gospel came to us when we were needy and desperate.
6 For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— 8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Romans 5:6-
When you understand the grace God gave you when you utterly did not deserve it, your heart will burst with a desire to do anything you can do to show people that love.
Have you heard about the coronavirus? What if your whole family came down with the coronavirus and the government boarded you up in your house to quarantine you? What if your whole family was dying of the virus, death was certain? And what if one day, right before you were all about to die, you accidently discovered that eating the carpet in your house cured the virus! You would eat as much carpet as you could! But you wouldn’t stop there. You would tell your family about the cure and help them eat the carpet so that they would live. You would go even further than that. You would declare to the whole world that you had found the cure to the coronavirus - your carpet! And you would take your carpet to the other ends of the world to save people.
If you had the cure to cancer, you would share that cure. You would help administer that cure. You would do all that you could do to get that cure to people.
You have the cure to eternal damnation - the gospel. We have the answer. And we are called to take that cure - that answer - to the world.
The Bible teaches us that a better more satisfying life comes when we give ourselves away for others, as Jesus did for us in the gospel.
A New Heart Demands Action
A New Heart Demands Action
If we say we are Christians but don’t care about people, we are liars who should worry about our eternal destiny.
You cannot have faith in Christ without actions to prove that faith:
14 What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? 15 If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, 16 and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? 17 So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.
We cannot rightly say that we are a Christian, but we are not interested in doing anything for his glory.
When I was in the seventh grade, I signed up to play football. But once I started actually playing football, I began to realize that I enjoyed the thought of being a football player more than actually playing football. But that doesn’t work. You can’t rightly call yourself a football player if you don’t contribute to the team. If you stop contributing to the team, you will get cut!
In the same way, it doesn’t work out to call yourself a Christian without working for Christ.
To be sure, this does not mean that we are saved by doing a whole lot.
Instead it means that if we are saved, it will be evident by the things we do for others.
We are not saved by feeding the hungry; we feed the hungry because we are saved.
We are not saved because we give to the poor; we give to the poor because we are saved.
Do your actions prove your Christianity?
Do you intentionally seek out those in need at school?
Do you intentionally seek out those in need at Church?
Are you willing to take advantage of the opportunities given to you to serve God by serving others?
We are called to live with an undivided love for God and unselfish love for others.
I want to end tonight by reading, to me, some of the scariest and most convicting verses of Scripture:
Matthew 25:31-
31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. 32 Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left. 34 Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.
35 For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ 37 Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink?
Matthew 25:35-
38 And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? 39 And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ 40 And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’
Matthew 25:38-39
Matthew 25:41-43
41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’
Matthew 25:44-
44 Then they also will answer, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?’ 45 Then he will answer them, saying, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’ 46 And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”