FALL IN LOVE ALL OVER AGAIN
Revelation 2:2-4
There is a chronic love problem in America. People are losing love and it is a principle that we MUST get back to if we are going to succeed as individuals, as families, as a church and as a nation. If we are going to fall in love all over again, we must define love and identify the three main problems in a love relationship.
WHAT LOVE IS AND IS NOT…
LOVE IS NOT INFATUATION
“Infatuation is when you think your husband/significant other is as handsome as Tom Cruise, intellectual as Albert Einstein, as devout as Billy Graham, funny as Rodney Dangerfield and athletic as Hulk Hogan. Love is realizing that your husband is as handsome as Albert Einstein, as intellectual as Hulk Hogan, as devout as Tom Cruise, as athletic as Rodney Dangerfield and as funny as Billy Graham.” – Melvin Newland
James McDonald has basic principles to define what love is:
LOVE IS POWERFUL
I Corinthians 13:8 says, “Love never fails.” Love never fails to do what? Love never fails to do anything! Love never fails to reach out to a distant person who has grown cold and hard. Love never fails to conquer years of neglect. Love never fails to bring a stubborn willful child back into the fold. Love is all powerful because love never fails.
LOVE IS PROOF
Read 1 John 13:13-14. This verse tells us not to be surprised when the brethren hate you. Who are the brethren? What are they proving? Luke 6:32 says that if we love those who love us, then what is the big deal. Even sinners do that! The big deal is if you love people who hate your guts and can’t stand you, who will use you and neglect you. That is proving something.
LOVE IS GIVING
1 John 3:16 – “Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.” In explaining the verse, John Stott says, “Love is the willingness to surrender that which has value in our life to enrich the life of another.”
(Make a drawing of a license plate large enough for everyone to see that has UB4ME on it. Show it to the congregation.) This license plate can be read one of two ways; it all depends on how you perceive it. It can be read “You be for me”, or “You before me”. Our attitude of giving must always be “You before me.”
LOVE IS FORGETTING THE “IF” CLAUSE
I will love you if… Love does not keep count, love does not measure worth, and love does not tally a score. Love is not “I would only be happy if you…” “Love takes no account of a wrongdoing…” 1 Corinthians13.
THE THREE MAIN PROBLEMS IN A LOVE RELATIONSHIP
COMMITMENT means, “I still do.”
Read Matthew 19:4-6, 8-9. The marriage commitment is for a lifetime. It is easy to say, “I do. Okay, come on, let’s get to Hawaii.” But committing to something involves at least three disciplines”
1. Set your self apart.
2. Set a vision - Absolute, Total Commitment=ATC.
3. Set yourself up to give (and then once in a while you will take).
Commitment means that after 10, 20, 30 years you are still able to say “I’m going to stick through this through the best of times and absolute worst of times, through the financially stable and unstable, and whether you are healthy or next to death.”
ILL: A young couple had only been married one year when she was diagnosed as a victim of multiple sclerosis. After thinking about it, she told her husband she was “setting him free.” But he did not leave her. Why did he stay? “Because,” he said, “when I vowed before God ‘for better or for worse,’ and ‘in sickness and in health’ I meant it.”
CLOCK is ticking – you had better use it.
We must set aside time to be with one another. When you are COMMITTED to someone, you will think about this person often and will yearn to spend time with him. The amount of time that you spend together is not as important as the quality of time.
1. Commit to spending quality time regularly.
2. Commit to blocking our all other distractions during this time.
3. Commit to making the most of this time together.
COMMUNICATION is the blood of the relationship.
In a survey from a few years ago, the Family Services Association discovered that 87 percent of couples interviewed said that the main problem in their marriage was communication. How can you love someone if you don’t talk to that person?
Communication is not “Honey did you iron my shirt?”
“There is something wrong with the car?”
“The baby needs changed.”
Communication is “When can we talk this problem over?”
“I need to know what you think...”
“I can agree with you on this…”
FALL IN LOVE WITH GOD ALL OVER AGAIN
We are involved a love relationship with our husbands and wives in the family, but the preceding information was not necessarily about our marriage with our spouse. If was primarily about our marriage with God. The Holy Bible is explicit in relating that we the church have a marriage/love relationship with God. The Old and New Testament agree…
Isaiah 61:10 – “I will greatly rejoice in the LORD, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for he hath clothed me with the garments of salvation, he hath covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorneth herself with her jewels.”
Revelation 21:9 – “And there came unto me one of the seven angels which had the seven vials full of the seven last plagues, and talked with me, saying, Come hither, I will shew thee the bride, the Lamb’s wife.”
But Yahweh God has put a status on our relationship. He has drawn the plumb line; God has set up the standard and we have fallen short. Read Revelation 2:2-4. God recognizes that we go and do, and that we work so hard and try to serve so much, but there is a missing element. He says, “You have left your first love.” That word “left” implies an intentional, deliberate choice on our part. In order to fix the problem and “fall in love all over again”, we must solve the top three problems in relationships.
COMMITMENT means, “I still do.”
1. Set yourself apart for God – He has already set you apart: 1 Corinthians 6:11 “And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.”
2. Set a vision of Absolute Total Commitment: Luke 9:62 ”And Jesus said unto him, No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.
3. Set yourself up to give (and then once in a while you will take). Philippians 1:21 “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.”
CLOCK is ticking – you had better use it.
1. Commit to spending quality time regularly.
2. Commit to blocking our all other distractions during this time.
3. Commit to making the most of this time together.
James 4:8 “Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded.”
COMMUNICATION is the blood of the relationship.
Communication with God is not: “God can you do this for me?”
“God please forgive me of my sins, Amen.”
“God bless our food, Amen.”
Communication is: Psalms 25:4-5 “Shew me thy ways, O LORD; teach me thy paths. Lead me in thy truth, and teach me: for thou art the God of my salvation; on thee do I wait all the day.”
1 Thessalonians 5:17 “Pray without ceasing.”
Psalms 46:10 “Be still, and know that I am God…”
Invitation:
Has your marriage with God deteriorated? Have you lost your commitment? Is your clock time with God dwindling? Is your communication with God left undesirable? Take care of that tonight…
