Love me regardless
Open our bibles in
Romans chapter 5
Faith Triumphs in Trouble
1 Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have[a] peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, 2 through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. 3 And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; 4 and perseverance, character; and character, hope. 5 Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
Christ in Our Place
6 For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. 10 For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. 11 And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.
God loves us while we were still sinners and if this be true what happens about once we have become a Christian and perhaps fall into some weakness does that change his view of us?
When we look into the words that is used in the Greek for love we find several words talking about brotherly love the love of a friend love of a partner even love and affection for an animal.
Then we find this word agape this would suggest an unconditional love, it is the word that is used in John 3 16 when God so loved the world that he gave his only son. Unconditional Jesus said that greater love has no man than that he would lay down his life, do we really believe that we are worth dying for. Are we really worth the price that God the father paid for us in giving his son are we really worth the price that Jesus paid when he said that no-one has the power to take my life but I choose to lay it down for the redemption of many, Jesus believed fully that no-one had the authority over him unless it was given to them by His father.
Jesus knew that unless a seed falls to the ground and dies it cannot produce the life that God intended for it Jesus was that seed sowed for those who would come to faith because of those who believed in Him.
What faith do we as Christians now 2000 years later that this love still goes on, that his love has shed abroad in our heart today here and now.
Heb 7 25
He (Jesus) is able to save completely all who come to God through him. Since he will live forever, he will always be there to remind God that he has paid for their sins with his blood
Later we read Jesus is the same yesterday today and forever
And what about sin 1 john tells us that the Christian is not able to sin, is this simply not able to sin, I know when I was growing up a found no happiness in sin. No pleasure in straying away from God.
Are we then as pastors are supposed to police our congregation? Are we able to keep people from sinning. I read that Jesus is the shepherd of our souls he is able to keep us from stumbling and present us faultless, we cannot follow everyone around fixing their problems warning them from sin.
We have to have the faith that the spirit of God is in you. Once we have seen Christ manifest in you we never let go of that. We are pastors called by God to pastor the whole city, I believe that we see that all the people of city of Ely as ones who need a pastor someone to introduce to them this Jesus whom we have come to know his love and learned to love in return.
But this cannot be just the role of the pastor but the role of every believer that we can all pastor our neighbours, stand in the gap on behalf of sinner. We can be the ones to give hope to the hopeless faith to the faithless, belief to the unbeliever, strength to the weak, heath to the unhealthy peace to the stressed through our witness, and though our lives they can see our creator working in our lives today.
Some say pastor if you knew my life you would not say that I am the kind of witness you are looking for I struggle with believing certain things
…….Story of man not believing in hell………
What it is I wonder that we struggle to believe in? Do we really believe his love goes beyond our weakness of our sinful flesh, if this is true why dose he keep on loving us after we have accepted his forgiveness and then continue to make mistakes
What kind of grace are we able to preach and won’t this focus on grace keep allowing people to sin.
Does god love sinners?
How can he love us and make us acceptable in his sight and yet remain a holy?
What kind of love is this and what does that love look like and if he loves us so much that he gave his son, and that he give us his Holy Spirit with the only proviso that we believe, what if we say we believe but our lifestyle does not meet up to his standard. And what if we continue not to meet up to that standard, how do we as a community get people to behave like Christians, and if behaving like Christians is a set pattern, this is what religion does it sets a list of rules an regulations, but take a look at the 10 commandments these were rules but they were more than just rules.
You can read them like a love story, or a vow given between a husband and a wife.
1 And God spoke all these words, saying:
2 “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
It like God is saying look I am the one who rescued you, how many remember stories when the princess spent a lifetime waiting for her knight in shinning armour the hansom prince that will ride in and kill the dragon and carry her off into the sunset, this idea of romance is as old as time, a young woman dreaming of the knight on a white horse.
Later on in Deuteronomy God says to his people
“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one![b] 5 You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.
What kind of love is this bridegroom expecting from his bride, what does any man expect from his bride?
Let us get real here, when a man and woman are married they go behind closed doors, and what happens in their nakedness is only between them, when they are naked with each other they are at their most venerable, when we are exposed to God he sees us as if we were naked as if we have no defence to his holiness, all those things we would call sin cannot be hidden, in his presence.
Who are we trying to kid when we stand in God presence he knows our very thoughts, he know things that no other person on earth could possible know, he know what we thought this morning, and yet he still does not withhold his spirit. His judgement has to be full of His grace or none of us could be saved. We cannot think that the better Christian is the one who is better at hiding his or her weakness. Who looks better in a suit on a Sunday morning, who is able to hide their anger their failing that no-one can see their humanness
And what if that humanness is exposed, some of us would not even dare to admit that they suffer with some problems, they get used to hiding them from everyone.
What was Adam and Eve thinking in the garden after they had disobeyed God that they were able to hide from his presence.
We have to have faith in God’s grace that he is able to see the parts that no-one can see, our nakedness and still have mercy when we perhaps do not deserve it.
What is it that God is looking for the same as any anyone of us that we would love him? Is God so unlike us who He created in his image? We love God because He first loved us.
Jesus would later reaffirm God’s command as the most important, love God love your neighbour and in this love.
Back to the 10 commandments
3 “You shall have no other gods before Me.
4 “You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of anything that is in heaven above,
or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; 5 you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, 6 but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.
God is saying here that once we are married there can be no other lovers, there can be no other images in your mind other than me
Is this not a reasonable request?
Essentially the book Ephesians can be seen as a wedding book, the first three chapters focus on who we are in Christ, it focuses on the love Christ has for us. Almost like a courtship, the next three chapters read like a covenant agreement there are boundaries and guidelines
It is like God is saying to us he love us just as we are courting us to come near to him,
In chapter 5 we read about the kind of arrangement between a husband and wife as a picture of God’s relationship with us as church. Again we find this word agape, unconditional love, as a husband should love his wife as Christ loved agaped each one of us and gave his life for us
Agape does not love someone because they are worthy
Do we think that sub-concisely that God love is conditional and He has this list of do and don’ts and if we keep to the list God comes near and if we don’t he withdraws?
This is not agape
Agape love does not love someone because they are worthy agape love makes them worthy by the strength and power of that love agape does not love someone because they are beautiful agape loves in such a way that it makes them beauty
There is a love in order to… a love because… a love for the purpose of…. and then there is love full stop, the bible says that we love God because he first loved us, from God point of view he loved us way before we loved him.
Christ dies when we were still sinners
We were far of
You did not choose me but I chose you
People in the scripture are loved into their futures; God told Jeremiah that he loved him before he was born. He told David that while he was still in his mothers womb he skill fully made.
What if we were able to somehow tap into some of that love
What if we are able with God’s love able to treat our spouse as if they were the man of woman that we want them to be and not as he or she is
What if the wife is able to agape love the man as he is despite his faults and weaknesses?
Think about it this way if a man was to love the woman regardless of how he was treated, said he loved her other times than when they were naked, perhaps she would start to believe that this love was real.
Similar if we are only telling God we love Him when we want something, when we are praying for a need or we are in some kind of trouble, how does that make God feel, is God so compassionate that it does not bother Him, is he so forgiving that he takes no account of a suffered wrong or an evil done to him.
Some have a hard time believe that God loves them as they feel so unloved and that the love they have experienced as a child or as a wife / husband is conditional;
What is more motivation husbands being reminded of all your weakness or failings or being loved as if you are already a great man
We look at the Ephesians starts with the affirming of what God has for us
Love me into my future.
Close…
