Love is Everything

Good Morning. How are you all doing today? I am so glad you are here with us today. Chris is much better but he still is struggling with some coughing fits that we thought may get in the way of him preaching this morning. Last week my sermon was titled “What’s Love Got to Do with it?”. We looked at two interactions that the religious leaders had with Jesus that related to Love. The first interaction was with an expert in the law and he asked Jesus what the greatest command is and what was Jesus’ reply?

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.

Lets read that together.

And then he continued with the second is like it

Love your neighbor as yourself.

These are so important that all of the Law and prophets depend or hang on these two commands.

We looked at a second iteration Jesus had with another religious leader who wanted to know who his neighbor was. We talked about how he wanted to see the list of people he had to love. Jesus responded with the parable of the good Samaritan and then asked the religious leader who proved to be a neighbor to the man who had been beaten and robbed?

The mans response was “The one who showed Mercy to him” Jesus said Go and go the same.

After that we looked at Paul’s writing in 1 Corinthians 13 that says no matter what we do in this world if we are not motivated by love then it is worthless and of no value.

Maybe you left last week and thought that sounds supper great but how? How do I get there? What would it look like in my life to Love God and People they way the bible talks about. Maybe you walked away last week and thought I don’t feel very loving right now but I want to get better. Maybe you were just upset that I banged on the cymbals really loud. Regardless of what you walked away with I think it is good to look at how we develop this type of love in our lives and what does it look like. We know it comes from God as it is a fruit of the Spirit but lets be super honest. How many of us struggle with loving people? I would think most of us do at times.

I think we can hear sermons that reveal to us how we should be but we struggle to live them out. We start to lack confidence, get discouraged, or ask ourselves if it is even worth it.

Where should we go when we are discouraged or questioning what is going on in our lives. There is only one place to turn to and that is His word. We open the bible and see what it has to say.

We are going to look at the question.

How do I love God this way?

We are going to start in 1 John chapter 2. While you are turning in your bibles a little background. John was the last apostle alive when he wrote this letter. He was still active in the church and there were false teachers and ideas infecting the church. John writes this letter to fight against the heretical views that were showing up. John will continually point to love as a test for true followers of Christ and though his writing we can see what this looks like in our lives.

1 John 2:3–6 CSB

3 This is how we know that we know him: if we keep his commands. 4 The one who says, “I have come to know him,” and yet doesn’t keep his commands, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. 5 But whoever keeps his word, truly in him the love of God is made complete. This is how we know we are in him: 6 The one who says he remains in him should walk just as he walked.

This is how we know that we know him. This means we have confidence and assurance in what we know. This is an experiential knowledge that comes from living out our lives. And what does it say:

Love is Obedience

If we keep his commands. Where do his commands come from? The scriptures. We know we know God by our obedience to what he has written in here. But Remember that all of the Law hangs on the two commands of love God and Love your neighbor. How do we love God? by being obedient.

John 14:15 CSB

15 “If you love me, you will keep my commands.

John 14:21–24 CSB

21 The one who has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. And the one who loves me will be loved by my Father. I also will love him and will reveal myself to him.” 22 Judas (not Iscariot) said to him, “Lord, how is it you’re going to reveal yourself to us and not to the world?” 23 Jesus answered, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. 24 The one who doesn’t love me will not keep my words. The word that you hear is not mine but is from the Father who sent me.

Deuteronomy 10:12–13 CSB

12 “And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God ask of you except to fear the Lord your God by walking in all his ways, to love him, and to worship the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul? 13 Keep the Lord’s commands and statutes I am giving you today, for your own good.

Deuteronomy 30:15–16 CSB

15 See, today I have set before you life and prosperity, death and adversity. 16 For I am commanding you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commands, statutes, and ordinances, so that you may live and multiply, and the Lord your God may bless you in the land you are entering to possess.

There is a dirty word in here that no one likes. That is the word obey. Scripture is very clear that those that Love God will obey his commands. This is so unnatural for us. Our sinful nature is disobedient by default.

Ephesians 2:1–3 CSB

1 And you were dead in your trespasses and sins 2 in which you previously walked according to the ways of this world, according to the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit now working in the disobedient. 3 We too all previously lived among them in our fleshly desires, carrying out the inclinations of our flesh and thoughts, and we were by nature children under wrath as the others were also.

I was talking with the youth group on Wednesday about this and I ask if there was ever a child that was born that was completely obedient. They were a little fussy and mom asks, dear calm down its ok and they did. Did any parent have a toddler that would do what ever you asked. One of our students said “He left his obedience in the womb”. Without obedience there is no love of God. Does that mean we get it right all of the time no, but there is the desire to get it right. When God gives a command that you do not like, what is your response? It can be very telling.

How important is obedience?

Romans 5:19 CSB

19 For just as through one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so also through the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous.

Romans talks about the transforming of our minds. It is through obedience that we are changed and transformed. We live our lives in pursuit of something. We are supposed to pursue God and we do that by obeying him. By obeying the word of God. That’s it. Without this we do not know what truth is. We must be in the word and studying the word to understand what the scriptures ask of us.

Romans 12:1–2 CSB

1 Therefore, brothers and sisters, in view of the mercies of God, I urge you to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God; this is your true worship. 2 Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may discern what is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God.

If we follow the scriptures we will be transformed and we will be changed in a way that does not conform to this world. Obedience leads to Righteousness and is righteousness, disobedience is evil or not of God. This is the process that the bible calls sanctification. It is the process though steps obedience that we are transformed more and more into the likeness of christ. this is how we love God.

In youth we talk about 4 levels of obedience. It is just something we to help understand this.

Level 0 is straight up disobedience. Clean the room, No

Level 1 is I do just enough to not be in trouble. It is the absolute bare minimum. It is a selfish love. Clean the room in the middle.

Level 2 is what we call clean the corners. This means I clean the room to the expectation of the the father.

Level 3 is the fathers will. this means that now keep the room clean because I know it pleases the father and I love to please the father.

Going back to 1st John

1 John 2:3–6 CSB

If we say we know God and don’t follow the command of the bible what does God’s call us? Liars but if we keep his word, the love of God is made complete. If we say we remain in him we will walk just as he walked.

Obedience leads to Transformation

We look to Jesus as the example of what love looks like for the Christian. Love is so hard to define in the world because sin has corrupted everything around us. Even love.

Paul says it this way

Colossians 3:12–15 CSB

12 Therefore, as God’s chosen ones, holy and dearly loved, put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, 13 bearing with one another and forgiving one another if anyone has a grievance against another. Just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you are also to forgive. 14 Above all, put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity. 15 And let the peace of Christ, to which you were also called in one body, rule your hearts. And be thankful.

If you take what John says that we are supposed to walk the way Jesus did and Paul says this is how we are supposed to be and there is consistency in the word of God then these are some of the characteristics of Jesus that was the example of.

Compassion: A deep awareness of and sympathy for another’s suffering

I am always surprised as I read the gospels how often it records Jesus having compassion on the people he interacted with. Whether is was the crowds that were hungry, or the blind and lame that he healed. He always interacted with people this way.

Kindness: the quality of being warmhearted, considerate, humane, gentle, and sympathetic

We don’t always notice but Jesus interacted with the marginalized in that culture. With the rejected and dejected, the dirty and to oppressed, the worthless and unworthy.

Humility: The disposition of valuing or assessing oneself appropriately.

Humility is knowing who we really are and where we really stand. Not higher or lower. This is a process of understanding who we are as sinners and as redeemed children. Christ showed this perfectly.

Gentleness: acting in a manner that is gentle, mild, and even-tempered.

Jesus acted this way all of the way to the end. Whether he was correcting Peter. Being Beaten. Watching those he would die for turn on him and yell crucify him. he was always gentle.

Patience: patient endurance of pain or unhappiness.

1 Timothy 1:16 CSB

16 But I received mercy for this reason, so that in me, the worst of them, Christ Jesus might demonstrate his extraordinary patience as an example to those who would believe in him for eternal life.

Patience is also defined as longsuffering. Waiting and waiting for God to work in the people and world around us.

Forgiving: to forgive someone graciously on account of the good will one has towards a person

This forgiveness comes from us not them. This kind of forgiveness is based on our hearts not on the actions of the other person.

And we are to above all put on Love and let it rule our hearts. and be thankful. We are to be ruled by love. and we are to be thankful or grateful.

If we obey God’s word and are transformed by it, we will put on these characteristics in our lives. Compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, forgiveness, love, and thankfulness. And when it does, the result is an outpouring of love to our neighbors.

1 Peter 1:22–23 CSB

22 Since you have purified yourselves by your obedience to the truth, so that you show sincere brotherly love for each other, from a pure heart love one another constantly, 23 because you have been born again—not of perishable seed but of imperishable—through the living and enduring word of God.

Transformation leads to Loving others

So the question today is How do we love God and our neighbor the way the bible teaches?

When we have been transformed by the renewing of our minds the way we live changes. It changes in two main areas of our lives. the Church and the home.

Colossians 3:16–17 CSB

16 Let the word of Christ dwell richly among you, in all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another through psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts. 17 And whatever you do, in word or in deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Loving our neighbor starts in the home. What would our families look like if compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, forgiveness, love, and thankfulness were the driving characteristics of your home? God established the family as the primary training ground for children. Not the church. We as parents are commanded to raise our children in the ways of the Lord. We are the primary teachers of the next generation of believers. The church is groups of families and individuals that have gathered in fellowship to teach and admonish and to help and support each other and to use our unique gifts to spread the gospel to the world around us. I am a youth pastor but I cannot teach them better than what they experience in the home. What we teach here should reaffirm what they see at home. What they learn here should not be foreign to them. They are to honor and obey their mother and father but the mother and father must be obeying the lord. So many of the students that I have are struggling with the conflict between what the bible teaches and what they see in the home. It comes to a head when they get close to their twenties. There are lots of questions that arise from the conflict between the home and the word.

We are here to help and we need each other. I as a your father needed men that were examples of what could be because my father isn’t a christian man. These men intentionally or unintentionally mentored be by their example. So the church is an active part of the home but it doesn’t take the responsibility away from the father and mother.

But we but be willing to obey the teaching of the word and be willing to be admonished in love when others help. It is interesting that over the years I have found that many want the promises of scripture but do not want to obey the word to get there. And I know it isn’t easy.

I struggled with Kayson when he was younger. I did not show him the love I had for him well and because of that I have had to work to build our relationship more than I have had to with the others. He is an exact replica of how I think and act.

Those who don’t have a family yet are you preparing to be in one now. My oldest is 16 and as I have started to think about her dating I have come to the conclusion that we should be doing premarital counselling before they start dating. Many get engaged and get into counselling and that is where they start to learn some of the expectation of God and they are well past many of those lines and they struggle with that.

The reason i bring up the family is because it is important to God and it effects the body of Christ. The church is where we come together in fellowship and community to worship God, grow in obedience, and to have God use our gifts to build his kingdom. It is where we come together to do life together. It is where we connect people to Christ and One Another. It should be a place of Love and it should be marked by compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. We will be different from the world because it isn’t characterized by any of that.

John 13:34–35 CSB

34 “I give you a new command: Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you are also to love one another. 35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

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