Crazy Love

Crazy Love

Text: Isaiah 62:1-2a - "I will not keep silent because of Zion, and I will not keep still because of Jerusalem until her righteousness shines like a bright light, and her salvation like a flaming torch. Nations will see your righteousness, and all kings your glory."

Introduction: I want to talk about "passion" here for a minute. Stop and think about that word "passion." What comes to mind? What do you think about? Hollywood displays passion as an extreme intimacy between two individuals usually carried out in a physical way. When I think about passion, I think about more than just a simple love relationship. Love is the key ingredient for passion but it doesn’t end there. Love is actually the propellant that ignites true passion.

When I think about passion, my mind initiates thoughts of intensity and excitement. I think about a combination of physical, mental & emotional involvement. Webster associates passion with an eager desire, a zeal, an extreme agitation. You ever felt any of that before? Know what I’m talking about?

True passion is a God-thing! God designed the human soul to be passionate, excited, fiery, if you will. Passion is a compelling emotion - a strong, intense desire for something. Passion is a powerful catalyst. It often acts like a magnet - attracting its keeper to its source. The hunger for passion is universal.

People of passion tend to get things done - they tend to be able to accomplish great undertakings. We are born with passion tendancies but to be a person of passion requires grooming this trait. Passion involves commitment. The more you commit to that which you have a passion for the more passion you receive in return - that’s how it is with God. The more you give, the more He gives. You will never outgive God!

Passion overflows boundaries. It is not usually logical or even approopriate. Passion is what happens when we let go of control. In one sense, such as with God, this is a fantastic thing. But, uncontrolled passion in a wrong setting with the wrong person provides wrong results.

I want to look at passion from a God-standpoint. God wants you to let go. You wants you to turn it over to Him and allow Him to take complete control. I’m talking now about "extreme passion" - crazy love, if you will. It’s this crazy love that propels you to the cutting edge. It’s this crazy love that allows God to be God and to be in control so we can witness a new and extremely powerful move of God in this "now generation." It is for now!

1. Crazy Love is a personal experience.

A. Crazy love is experiential - get into an intimate relationship with God & you will begin to experience it.

1. It is a pleasure in the soul that God releases - it washes over you & delivers an unexplainable inner pleasure/peace.

2. When it happens, you feel the face of God smiling down on you.

3. A certain spiritual intensity washes over you that disrupts your whole life.

4. I’m not talking about some kind of shallow sentimentalism - I’m talking about a true experience.

5. This is that "first love" relationship Jesus spoke of in Revelation.

B. Crazy love involves an intense passion or desire for Jesus and His eternal purposes - we’re good at loving Jesus but find it a little too much to fulfill His purpose & plan - reaching the world.

1. We must be consumed by this.

2. We are living in a critical moment in God’s timetable right now.

3. God is imparting divine passion unto those who will receive it -

**Caution: this will make you appear fanatical to most out there!

C. We are in the midst of a revival, a surge, if you will, of intimate encounters with God.

1. As a result, more and more true believers are going to be filled with an extravagant fervancy.

2. Isaiah prophesied this event and its results: "I will not keep silent because of Zion, and I will not keep still because of Jerusalem until her righteousness shines like a bright light, and her salvation like a flaming torch. Nations will see your righteousness, and all kings your glory." (62:1-2a).

3. According to this prophesy,

a. God is going to give out enlarged hearts;

b. These will overflow with extreme passion resulting in worldwide witness;

c. The key lies within those who experience and practice this crazy love.

Application: God isn’t going to give up on you until a new standard of Christianity emerges out of you and reflects from you. He intends to demonstrate a blazing righteousness through you that will go forth like a nuclear explosion - a chain reaction - a supernova revelation of His glory in all its brilliance shining forth out of you. This crazy love experience is a passionate, holy zeal that violently consumes you with an unparalleled inner fire. This is an internal, supernatural fire, a spirit of burning that flows within you then out of you unhindered.