REAL LOVE
“What is love, as defined by the online world?
Resisting a YouTube video of the 1993 hit song, the first click plunges you into a world of pink carnation- tainted tackiness. The website’s designer no doubt spends all afternoon baking cookies, sending chain emails and sighing at the "Home Sweet Home" sign on the living room wall.
Then I get a jolting, computer- generated version of Lionel Richie’s Endless Love that offends the ears.
Up next is a serious message: great philosophers could not touch love’s true essence. Which is why, obviously, this website quotes four to eight-year-olds.
Gems include: "Love is when you tell a guy you like his shirt, then he wears it everyday"; and "Love is when mommy gives daddy the best piece of chicken". (Finding love online
The Press | Tuesday, 10 February 2009)
Yesterday we celebrated Valentine’s Day, a time to reflect on love and what love truly is. Let me tell you, you will never understand what love is, what true love is, until you understand love’s source. You may have warm fuzzies, you may have sweaty palms, you may care about another person, you may be committed, or need to be, but you will never understand true love until you know love’s source.
I. LOVE’S SOURCE
- 1 John 4:7-21
First I want you to understand that love comes from God. God is the true source of all love.
It is amazing the work we put into love and relationships hoping things will work out, when so many people never realize that God is the source of all love.
> 1 John 4:7-8 Dear friends, let us love one another; because love is from God, … God is love.
It saddens me when I think of number of people who try to build loving relationships and loving homes and loving marriages that leave God out of the equation.
> Psalm 127:1 Unless the Lord builds a house, its builders labor over it in vain;
God is love’s source.
When we think of love however, we think not only of its source, but we also must remember how it is demonstrated.
II. LOVE DEMONSTRATED
- 1 John 4:9-10
If yesterday is like Valentines of the past, over $1 billion was spent on chocolate, $1 Billion on cards, and 218 million roses were sold in the pursuit of, or in an attempt to demonstrate love.
The Bible tells us that God sent the first Valentine. He showed what true love is. He demonstrated His love for you and me over 2000 years ago when He sent His One and Only Son to pay the price for your sins and mine.
Listen, God didn’t just love you enough to tell you about it. He didn’t just love you enough that He settled for having it written in the clouds by angels in flaming chariots. He didn’t love you enough that He stopped at sending you a love note, or a card, or calling you, He loved you enough that He sent His Son Jesus Christ.
You see, when it came to demonstrating love, FTD was not fragrant enough, chocolate was not sweet enough, and Hallmark couldn’t find the words to set you free.
The Bible says,
> Hebrews 9:22 … without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.
Tell someone; God cared enough to send the very best. He didn’t look for bargains. He didn’t seek the cheap way out. He didn’t look for loopholes. God did not act like all the rest, when it came to love He sent the Best.
> John 3:16 For God so loved the world, He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish but hath everlasting life.
> Romans 5:8 But God proves His own love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us!
If you remember the old song, sing it with me.
I was sinking deep in sin, far from the peaceful shore. Very deeply stained within, sinking to rise no more. But the Master of the sea, heard my despairing cry. From the waters lifted me now safe am I. Love lifted me. Love lifted me. When nothing else would help, love lifted me. Love lifted me. Love lifted me. When nothing else would help. Love lifted me.
The source of all real love is God. We have seen love’s source. And, in Jesus Christ we have seen love demonstrated. This morning we also need to pause and consider love’s reflection.
III. LOVE’S REFLECTION
You know it is great when someone loves you. Isn’t it great to be loved? Sometimes the love another person shows you is so great that you just don’t quite know how to return it. To show them in return how much you love them. Sometimes it’s hard to figure out another person’s love language so that we can adequately reflect the love back to them.
Fortunately God did not leave us in that situation. He didn’t leave us wondering what His love language is. He didn’t leave us wondering how we are to demonstrate our love for Him.
> John 14:21 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.”
Now, I want you to underline that first sentence. The one who has My commands and keeps them is the one who loves Me.
How did God say we reflect love back to Him? How did He say we show our love for Him? He didn’t say it is done so much by the gifts we give. He didn’t say we reflect His love by saying how much we love Him. He says, we reflect His love by having and keeping His commands. That’s God’s love language. He wants us to do two things to demonstrate our love for Him.
1. Have His commands – That means we have taken the time to learn His commands. We have cared enough to study His Word, to listen to His Word, to learn His Word. We have His commands. We have become disciples, learners, students, and followers of Jesus Christ.
We haven’t taken a shot in the dark hoping we know what pleases God. We haven’t guessed, thinking that perhaps we have God, and what He wants, figured out. We have taken the time to learn His commands. We believed the Bible when God said in 2 Timothy 3:16 that:
> 2 Timothy 3:16 All Scripture is inspired by God and is profitable for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, for training in righteousness,
We took it to heart when we heard the admonition,
> 2 Timothy 2:15 Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.
Do you know there are people today who have never taken the time to read the Bible for themselves? I’m not just talking about leaving out some of the difficult books that talk about the priests. I’m not just talking about missing some of the chapters where it says this person was the father of this person and he had this many children and such and so forth. I’m talking about never having taken the time even to read the New Testament where it tells us about the life of Jesus and His love for us.
I know a man named James Bailey, from Marks, Mississippi, who was one of my former deacons. James Bailey was a grown man when he became a Christian. He had only gone to school through the 4th grade and never learned to read when he was in school. James Bailey was a hard man and he was a proud man, but when he became a Christian he had his wife and sons teach him to read so he could read his Bible.
In this day when we have the Bible on cassette, on CD, and on the Internet; where you can have it read to you, dramatized, or acted out, there are people who have never been curious enough or concerned enough to check it out. There are many people sitting in our churches who have checked it out for themselves. For many, it’s life Mien Kempt in the days of Hitler. It’s a book you need to have but it’s not necessary to read.
Imagine for a moment that Gladys took the time to write me a love letter and sent it to me telling me how much she loved me, and how much she cared for me, and telling about her hopes for our future together. Now, imagine if you will that she had Drew bring that note to me and that he was killed in the process of bringing me that note. Now imagine, if you will, how she would feel when she asked me about the letter some time later, and I told her I hadn’t gotten around to reading it yet, or I had been too busy, or I was too tired, or something.
Do you think my professions of love for her would impress her? Do you honestly believe she would be touched as I sang about how much she means to me and about how much I love her? I doubt it.
Jesus says, “The person who loves Me has My commands.” We reflect His love back to Him by being students of His love note to us.
2. Keep His Commands
Second, we reflect His love back to Him by not only having His commands, but by also acting on what we have. Look at the verse again.
> John 14:21 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.”
If you really love the Lord, if you really love Jesus, Jesus says that you not only have His commands but that you also keep them.
Listen, you can go to every conference in the world you want to. You can sit in a coliseum with 30,000 other men and holler back and forth, “I love Jesus, Yes I do. I love Jesus how bout you?” You can sit in a church and sing “Oh how I love Jesus” till you’re blue in the face. You can drive down the road listening to the Z and singing “Jesus is all the world to me”, until the traffic stops and you lose your concentration, but it won’t matter a hoot in a hail storm if you’re not acting on what you already know.
> James 1:22 But be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.
What did Jesus say? He said, “ John 14:21 The one who has My commands and keeps them is the one who loves Me.
But, praise God, He didn’t stop there. He said, the one who has My commands and keeps them is the one who loves Me, but He didn’t stop there. He also said, in the very same verse, And the one who loves Me will be loved by My Father. I also will love him and will reveal Myself to him.”
Jesus said, “The one who loves me in this way, I will love him, and my Father will love him, and I will reveal Myself to him.”
Some of you who have wondered why you have been unable to discern God’s will, could it be that you haven’t taken the time to find out what He wants in a source that’s already available to you? Could it be that He’s not told you more about what he wants in your life, or that He’s not giving you more direction because you’re not doing what he’s already told you to do?
We reflect God’s love back to Him by learning His commands and acting on them; putting them into action.
This morning we have seen love’s source. We have seen love’s demonstration, and love reflected. Let’s think for a moment about love’s display.
IV. LOVE’S DISPLAY
- 1 John 4:11, 20-21
Now, it is not enough just to accept the love God has given us. It is not enough just to reflect God’s love back to Him through obedience, but we must also demonstrate God’s love to the world by loving others.
> John 13:35 By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
Jesus said, “People will know you’re a follower of Mine, they will know you are one of My disciples by the way you treat others, by the way you love one another.
Turn with me please to 1 Corinthians 13.
- 1 Corinthians 13
This what the Bible says true love looks like. This is how true love is displayed. Expound.
V. LOVE’S REACTION
1. Accept the love God has offered
2. Reflect that love back to Him by learning and obeying His commands.
3. Display that love to the world in the way you love others at home, at school, on the job and in the world.
““Doug Nichols went to India to be a missionary there, but while he was just starting to study the language he became infected with tuberculosis & in 1967 had to be put in a sanitarium.
It was not a very good place to be. It was not very clean & conditions were difficult because there were so many sick people there. But Doug decided to do the best he could in that situation. So he took a bunch of Christian books & tracts & tried to witness to the other patients in the sanitarium.
When he tried to pass out tracts, they were rejected. No one wanted them. He tried to hand out books, but no one would take them. He tried to witness, but he was handicapped because of his inability to communicate in their language, & he was discouraged.
Here he was. Because of his illness he would be there a long time. But it seemed like the work that he had been sent to do would not be done because no one would listen to him.
Because of his tuberculosis, every night at about 2 o’clock he would wake up with chronic coughing that wouldn’t quit. Then one night when he awoke he noticed across the aisle an old man trying to get out of bed. He said the man would roll himself up into a little ball & teeter back & forth trying to get up the momentum to get up & stand on his feet. But he just couldn’t do it. He was too weak.
Finally, after several attempts the old man laid back & wept. The next morning Doug understood why the man was weeping. He was trying to get up to go to the bathroom & didn’t have enough strength to do that. So his bed was a mess & there was a smell in the air.
The other patients made fun of the old man. The nurses came to clean up his bed & they weren’t kind to him, either. In fact, one of them even slapped him in the face. Doug said that the old man just lay there & cried.
Doug said, "That next night about 2 o’clock I started coughing again. I looked across the way & there was the old man trying to get out of bed once more. I really didn’t want to do it, but somehow I managed to get up & I walked across the aisle & I helped the old man stand up."
But he was too weak to walk, so Doug said, "I took him in my arms & carried him like a baby. He was so light that it wasn’t a difficult task. I took him into the bathroom, which was nothing more than a dirty hole in the floor, & I stood behind him & cradled him in my arms as he took care of himself."
"Then I carried him back to his bed & laid him down. As I turned to leave he reached up & grabbed my face & pulled me close & kissed me on the cheek & said what I think was `Thank you.’"
Doug said, "The next morning there were patients waiting when I awoke & they asked if they could read some of the books & tracts that I had brought. Others had questions about the God I worshiped & His only begotten Son who came into the world to die for their sins."
Doug Nichols says that in the next few weeks he gave out all the literature that he had brought, & many of the doctors & nurses & patients in that sanitarium came to know Jesus Christ as their Lord & Savior, too.
He said, "Now what did I do? I didn’t preach a sermon. I couldn’t even communicate in their language. I didn’t have a great lesson to teach them. I didn’t have wonderful things to offer. All I did was take an old man to the bathroom & anyone can do that."” (Melven Neman, Sermon Central.com)
