Nativity: The Meaning Is Love

“This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through him” (4:9)! Jesus was God’s love in action.

I know God loves me, and I know God loves you because he sent Jesus into the world for us. All of us!

Love is a big word.

God doesn’t do anything on the cheap – unlike this so-called value Valentine’s Day card.

No, love is a big word, and God’s love is very big!

I love this photograph of the Helix Nebula containing millions of stars. Some people call it the ‘Eye of God’.

All I know is that God’s love is bigger than the universe and beyond my wildest dreams.

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Creation displays God’s glory; and yet God chose to show us his love through a person, through Jesus.

When I was 11 years old playing cricket in the nets and struggling when the ball was bowled at my legs a coach said, “Let me show you how to play that shot.” He took my bat in his hands, showed me 5 or 6 times then handed me the bat and said, “Your turn.” When I was 17 and learning to play the guitar I played the G chord very awkwardly so a friend got hold of my guitar and said, “Try it like this”; and he showed me a better way. When I was 19, emotional and upset and feeling unwell after I’d over-indulged …a friend literally picked me up out of the gutter and said, “It will be OK.”

When Nelson Mandela was in prison he learned the Afrikaner language so he could talk to his jailors. Later after his release and after being elected President he invited his former white jailor as a VIP guest to his presidential inauguration!

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Mandela had lunch with Percy Yutar who successfully sent him to prison in 1962; and he flew to Orania in South Africa for tea with Betsy Verwoerd, the widow of the high priest of apartheid thinking! Mandela was an example of the power of love in action!

Every Friday and Saturday night on Billericay High Street …Billericay Street Pastors are showing people the love of God; because ‘this is how God showed his love among us: He sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through him’. It’s the incarnation. God becoming like us so that in the fullness of time we can become like Jesus.

Love is a big word! Thank God he did what he did. Jesus is God’s message of love, wrapped up, displayed and revealed in a person: Jesus the baby; Jesus the boy learning to love God; Jesus the man demonstrating God’s love; Jesus the saviour showing us the full extent of that love by dying for us.

What does love look like? What does love feel like? What does it sound like? Tomorrow, at 9.30 a.m., I’m taking a wedding; and I’ll be reading these famous words written by St. Paul to a Church: Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonour others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered; it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes; always perseveres. Love never fails!

That’s the love of God in action in the person of Jesus and that’s the love he calls us and equips us to share with all others without exception. “Love God, love your neighbours, love your enemies”, says Jesus. So no-one is outside of his love. No-one is above or beneath his love, and we don’t get to pick and choose.

Let’s listen to a song (The meaning of love), and let’s invite God to minister his love to us and through us (note to the reader you can find the video here:

“This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through him” (4:9)! Jesus was God’s love in action.

I know God loves me, and I know God loves you because he sent Jesus into the world for us. All of us!

Love is a big word.

God doesn’t do anything on the cheap – unlike this so-called value Valentine’s Day card (look up Tesco value Valentine Card on the web)

No, love is a big word, and God’s love is very big!

I love this photograph of the Helix Nebula containing millions of stars. Some people call it the ‘Eye of God’ (you can find this photo on the web)

All I know is that God’s love is bigger than the universe and beyond my wildest dreams.