25, April 2004
Dakota Community Church
Love in the Family of God
Part One: Loving God
1Peter 2: 1-12
9But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. 10Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
2Corinthians 6: 16-18
For you are the temple of the living God. As God has said:
"I will dwell in them and walk among them. I will be their God, and they shall be My people."
17Therefore "Come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord. Do not touch what is unclean, and I will receive you."
18"I will be a Father to you, and you shall be My sons and daughters,
Says the LORD Almighty."
I want to spend the next few weeks looking the qualities of the family of God that separate us from the world.
This week:
Love in the Family of God.
Luke 10: 25-28
25On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. "Teacher," he asked, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?"
26"What is written in the Law?" he replied. "How do you read it?"
27He answered: " ’Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ’Love your neighbor as yourself.’ "
28"You have answered correctly," Jesus replied. "Do this and you will live."
Listen again:
" ’Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ’Love your neighbor as yourself.’ "
For those of us who have been around the church for a while I’m guessing we will have heard those words many times.
But what does it mean – to love God? If I asked you now if you love God – what would you say? How do you gauge something like that?
What does love for God look like – feel like – how does it show itself? What does it look like if we don’t love God? Why do we sometimes find it hard to love God?
You would think that we should we able to answer those questions fairly easily – but I’m not sure that that’s the case.
You see ‘not loving God’ raises some interesting questions – disturbing questions.
What is our worship here together if we don’t love God?
- Is it just a ‘feel good sing along?’
Why do we serve if we don’t love God?
- Is it self-promotion with a veneer of God?
Why study the Bible? What use is biblical knowledge without love for God?
- We end up practicing religious behavior without passion or joy.
- We begin to become more and more like Pharisees.
1. We love God by spending time.
Is loving God an order, a duty, a command that we must obey – like a household chore? “Gotta love God today – I’ll do it between 7.00 and 7.30am?
Romans 12: 11-12
11Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. 12Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.
Philippians 4: 4-6
4Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! 5Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. 6Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.
Colossians 4: 2-3
2Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. 3And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains.
1Thesselonians 5: 16-21
16Be joyful always; 17pray continually; 18give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.
19Do not put out the Spirit’s fire; 20do not treat prophecies with contempt. 21Test everything. Hold on to the good.
There are 56 references to prayer in Paul’s letters alone. The whole point of the gospel is to reunite us in fellowship with God.
- When you love someone you want to spend time with him or her.
- It is not a chore.
- The key to every success you long for in life is in the secret place.
Psalm 31: 19-20
19Oh, how great is Your goodness,
Which You have laid up for those who fear You,
Which You have prepared for those who trust in You
In the presence of the sons of men!
20You shall hide them in the secret place of Your presence
From the plots of man;
You shall keep them secretly in a pavilion
From the strife of tongues.
The two main excuses most people give for not praying is that they don t have time and they don t have a place to go. Susanna Wesley, who was the mother of John and Charles Wesley back in the 1700 s, had 19 children. If anybody had an excuse for not praying but a need to pray it was her. Susanna would spend an hour every day in prayer. Where does a mother of 19 go to escape? Nowhere! What she would do is take her apron and flip it up over her head and spend an hour in prayer. Her children knew not to disturb her in that time because mother was in her apron praying.
2. We love God by giving Him our hearts in worship.
He is the only one we love by worshipping.
Matthew 4: 10
10Jesus said to him, "Away from me, Satan! For it is written: ’Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.
Isaiah 56: 6-7
6 And foreigners who bind themselves to the LORD to serve him, to love the name of the LORD, and to worship him, all who keep the Sabbath without desecrating it and who hold fast to my covenant- 7 these I will bring to my holy mountain and give them joy in my house of prayer. Their burnt offerings and sacrifices will be accepted on my altar; for my house will be called a house of prayer for all nations."
Many Christians act like worship is optional – it is not.
Back in 1992 when the Dallas Cowboys were preparing to play the San Francisco 49rs for the NFC Championship in San Francisco, the Cowboys had a pep-rally at Texas Stadium. The audience cheered wildly for each player when he was introduced. The fans carried banners. They painted their faces and proudly wore blue- and white outfits. They tried to get autographs. Not one fan walked away saying, “That event was a dud. It did nothing for me.” The event was a success, not because the performance was great (they didn’t play any football at all) or the players’ speeches weren’t inspiring (most of them weren’t’ very good speakers), but because everyone understood why they were there. The purpose was not to please the fans but to honor the team. The people walked away saying, “That was great! I hope the team understands how much we appreciate and support them!”
Why did you come to church today?
Our primary reason for attending church should be to worship God to honor Him and show Him how much we appreciate Him (Ps 95:6-7).
Come let us bow down before the Lord.
Worship is more than just singing a few songs, performing a few rituals, and enduring a sermon. We come to experience the presence of God, to acknowledge His authority in our lives, and to worship him as our Creator. We come to experience the presence of God (Duet. 23:14).
We come to pledge our faith and obedience and to seek His honor. Even though this is obvious it’s often the missing ingredients in churches today.
3. We love God by obedience.
Deuteronomy 7:9
9 Know therefore that the LORD your God is God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commands.
John 14: 15, 21
15"If you love me, you will obey what I command.
21Whoever has my commands and obeys them; he is the one who loves me. He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love him and show myself to him."
John 15: 9-17
9"As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. 13Greater love has no one than this that he lay down his life for his friends. 14You are my friends if you do what I command. 15I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 16You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit--fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. 17This is my command: Love each other.
This whole obedience thing carries with it the idea of desire, not just mindless empty works. God wants our willing obedience.
Psalm 42: 1-2
As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God.
2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God?
Quote:
"It is not the importance of the thing, but the majesty of the Lawgiver, that is to be the standard of obedience...Some, indeed, might reckon such minute and arbitrary rules as these as trifling. But the principle involved in obedience or disobedience was none other than the same principle, which was tried in Eden at the foot of the forbidden tree. It is really this: Is the Lord to be obeyed in all things whatsoever He commands? Is He a holy Lawgiver? Are His creatures bound to give implicit assent to His will?"
- Andrew Bonar - The Pursuit of Holiness, p. 23.
4. We love God by being faithful.
We all desire faithfulness from the people closest to us.
- Husbands and wives
- Friendships, confidences
- Children and parents
We expect and deserve faithfulness in all our important relationships. Nothing hurts like the betrayal of a close friend.
We love God by faithful exclusiveness to Him.
Deuteronomy 4: 23-24
23 Be careful not to forget the covenant of the LORD your God that he made with you; do not make for yourselves an idol in the form of anything the LORD your God has forbidden. 24 For the LORD your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.
In this day and age we are unlikely to bow down to wooden idols, we have substituted more sophisticated things:
- Education
- Social Status
- Political Power
- Wealth
- Pleasure
The American Idol TV show tells us what we worship instead of God today: fame, money, and talent.
Faithfulness has its rewards:
A man walking along a California beach was deep in prayer when all of a sudden he said aloud, "Lord grant me one wish". The sky clouded and a booming voice said, "Because you have tried to be faithful I will grant you one wish." The man said, "Build a bridge to Hawaii so I can drive over anytime I want to."
The Lord answered, "Your request is very materialistic. Think of the logistics of that kind of undertaking; the supports required to reach the bottom of the Pacific; the concrete and steel it would take. I can do it, but it is hard for me to justify your desire for worldly things. Take a little more time to think of another wish, a wish you think would honor and glorify me".
The man thought for a long time and finally said, "Lord, I wish that I could understand women. I want to know what they feel inside, what they are thinking when they give me the silent treatment, why they cry, what they mean when they say ’nothing’, and how I can make a woman truly happy?"
After a few minutes God said, "How many lanes do you want on that bridge?"
So then we love God by:
Spending time – Worshiping – Obeying – Being Faithful – and finally:
5. We love God by serving others.
Next week I want to look at this topic in depth. After our love for God the next most distinguishing characteristic of the Body is our love for each other.
- The neighbor as yourself part of the verse
John 21: 17-18
17The third time he said to him, "Simon son of John, do you love me?"
Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, "Do you love me?" He said, "Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you." 18
Jesus said, "Feed my sheep.
Conclusion:
“The real problem of the Christian life comes where people do not usually look for it. It comes the very moment you wake up each morning. All your wishes and hopes for the day rush at you like wild animals. And the first job each morning consists simply in shoving them all back; in listening to that other voice, taking that other point of view, letting that other larger, stronger, quieter life come flowing in.” - C.S. Lewis, in Mere Christianity
It won’t come in if we simply let the wild animals rule.
