I only have one point to make today.
God loves you.
(there will be two sub-points, but that’s the only point).
I love to tell the story . . .
I love to tell the story of unseen things above
Of Jesus and His glory, of Jesus & His love
I love to tell the story because I know tis true
It satisfies my longing as nothing else can do.
I love to tell the story, ‘twill be my theme in glory
To tell the old, old, story of Jesus and His love.
We all know this verse, those who were raised in church may have it memorized from childhood (let’s say it together)
John 3
16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.
The Bible has quite a lot to say about God’s love
Like
Psalm 136 – let’s read this together, responsively . . .
Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good.
His love endures forever.
2 Give thanks to the God of gods.
His love endures forever.
3 Give thanks to the Lord of lords:
His love endures forever.
4 to him who alone does great wonders,
His love endures forever.
5 who by his understanding made the heavens,
His love endures forever.
6 who spread out the earth upon the waters,
His love endures forever.
7 who made the great lights—
His love endures forever.
8 the sun to govern the day,
His love endures forever.
9 the moon and stars to govern the night;
His love endures forever.
10 to him who struck down the firstborn of Egypt
His love endures forever.
11 and brought Israel out from among them
His love endures forever.
12 with a mighty hand and outstretched arm;
His love endures forever.
13 to him who divided the Red Sea[a] asunder
His love endures forever.
14 and brought Israel through the midst of it,
His love endures forever.
15 but swept Pharaoh and his army into the Red Sea;
His love endures forever.
16 to him who led his people through the wilderness;
His love endures forever.
17 to him who struck down great kings, to the God of heaven.
His love endures forever.
God’s love for us is a bit too profound and supernatural. It’s difficult, maybe impossible, for us to understand:
Romans 5
6 You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. 7 Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
So, the question might come up in your mind,
If God loves me so much, why am I experiencing so much pain? & Why is there so much suffering in the world?
(This is one of the sub-points)
The Bible’s answer concerning why there is suffering in the world, may be in Job-and the answer is, God asks Job 64 questions he can’t answer (that’s the answer)-there’s no way for us to understand some things. Our 1.7 liters of brain (some more, some less), can’t process whatever eternal calculus results in the sum of a loving God that allows suffering. That explanation may be enough for some people.
For the rest of us there is a bit more of an explanation:
Part of the answer is that God loved us & sacrificed painfully for us. We serve the God who loves so much He Himself suffers. God demonstrates His love-Christ died for the ungodly, for us.
And there is a further answer-Our love, also, is best demonstrated in suffering.
1 John 4
7 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
So,
God suffered to show His love. If we want to show His love, it will probably involve suffering.
(this is the other sub-point)
Jim Eliot wanted to serve God as a missionary from the time he was very young. As he entered college at Wheaton he worked hard in studies & in fitness. He competed in state-level wrestling competition-not the kind of wrestling we see on TV these days, where oversized men hit other oversized men on the back with chairs, a choreographed and carefully rehearsed circus-real wrestling. He won the state championships. He wrote to his parents not to be concerned that he was getting too caught up in fleshly, worldly concerns. He told them “I want to offer a body to God, fit for His service”.
He famously said “He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep in order to gain what he cannot lose”.
He and four buddies were determined to reach an Amazonian tribe that had the reputation of being the most brutal head-hunting tribe remaining in the 20th Century. No one who ventured into their territory came out alive.
They went anyway.
The tribe killed all five men, and sent their bodies down the river, where they knew their wives were waiting. Some of the men they sent down the river floating on improvised wooden crosses-clearly they had heard the message of the love of Jesus, and had rejected it.
The ladies, all five of them, buried their dead. They then hiked into the mountain forests to tell the people of the Auca tribe that they forgave them, and that the God they served gave them the power to do so, and to love them in spite of the horrible thing they had done.
The whole tribe came to faith in Christ.
Sadhu Sundar Singh said
It is easy to die for Christ, It is hard to live for him, dying takes only an hour or two, but to live for Christ means to die daily.
So,
Subpoints-
1. We may never understand how the God of love can allow suffering in this world (our brains aren’t big enough), but we serve the loving God who suffers to show His love.
2. If we want to know God’s love, it will probably involve suffering.
So, we come back to the main point, God loves us.
It may have never been better said than in the old hymn:
Could we with ink the ocean fill,
And were the skies of parchment made,
Were every stalk on earth a quill,
And every man a scribe by trade;
To write the love of God above
Would drain the ocean dry;
Nor could the scroll contain the whole,
Though stretched from sky to sky.
1 Corinthians 13:4-7
Try putting your own name in every place the text says ‘love’ or 'it'. See if it works.
4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 8 Love never fails
My name doesn’t work very well there.
Now, try replacing “God” each place that is underlined. It works perfectly.
Romans 8
31 What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? 33 Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. 34 Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. 35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? 36 As it is written:
“For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
He giveth more grace as our burdens grow greater,
He sendeth more strength as our labors increase;
To added afflictions He addeth His mercy,
To multiplied trials He multiplies peace.
When we have exhausted our store of endurance,
When our strength has failed ere the day is half done,
When we reach the end of our hoarded resources
Our Father’s full giving is only begun.
Fear not that thy need shall exceed His provision,
Our God ever yearns His resources to share;
Lean hard on the arm everlasting, availing;
The Father both thee and thy load will upbear.
His love has no limits, His grace has no measure,
His power no boundary known unto men;
For out of His infinite riches in Jesus
He giveth, and giveth, and giveth again.
Karl Barth – One of the greatest intellects of the 20th Century, studied more than a dozen languages, wrote a work on theology that takes up an entire bookshelf (Dogmatics) in 14 volumes. He died in 1968. Toward the end of his life he took speaking tours through the US. On one occasion, the story is told that when he was taking questions from the audience, someone asked him, “Sir, what is the most profound truth you’ve ever learned?”
He paused a good while, and leaned over his podium, and said
“Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.”
I couldn’t have answered better.
God loves you.
Ponder that this week.
